PHP, especially post 5.2, is a flexible and battle tested language to do work in. It has some bad design choices inherited but nothing that you can't overcome and never have to think about again in a couple of weeks of learning the language.

Exactly like Javascript in this regard. I've been programming JS for over 15 years, and with the exception of cross browser support back in the day, there's nothing that had me startled after I learned the language -- except for a few issues related to floating point that I stumble upon now and then, but then that would be true for floating point math in any language.

The only PHP inconsistency is with the naming of the built-in functions. Functionality wise, most are solid bindings of respected C libraries. And, really, the needle/haystack thing has been blown out of all proportion. As if that's the biggest challenge one faces when programming.

PHP is making strides to remove legacy pain points. Check the changelogs i.e. http://php.net/ChangeLog-5.php#5.4.0

As to parameter ordering .. I've been using PHP for so long now that they've been memory to committed ;)