A lot of Internet startups use PHP. How does Python compare to PHP ? Please include scaling, the cost of hosting, maintainance etc. The dev time might be lower with python, but how does python hold up when you consider Total Cost of Ownership of a Python Application
Shalabh Chaturvedi, 08:01 PM on Sep 07, 2005
This depends greatly on the actual web application. Python is a general purpose programming language whereas PHP is specific for web applications. If you have a relatively simple or typical web application, PHP is probably a better choice because of its specialized purpose and abundance of resources (both people and services). On the other hand if you have fairly complex business logic, need to interface to non standard external systems or are building more of an extensible framework, Python's strengths might give you a lower TCO.
Python also has no 'standard' web application framework or templating language, there are dozens - http://wiki.python.org/moin/WebProgramming. It might be hard to find a shared virtual hosting provider that supports one of these. On the other hand if you are investing enough to co-locate, or are able to install your own framework, you might find something that is perfect for your needs. Again, a thorough analysis for the specific product you want to build is required for a better TCO comparison.
A lot of Internet startups use PHP. How does Python compare to PHP ? Please include scaling, the cost of hosting, maintainance etc. The dev time might be lower with python, but how does python hold up when you consider Total Cost of Ownership of a Python Application
This depends greatly on the actual web application. Python is a general purpose programming language whereas PHP is specific for web applications. If you have a relatively simple or typical web application, PHP is probably a better choice because of its specialized purpose and abundance of resources (both people and services). On the other hand if you have fairly complex business logic, need to interface to non standard external systems or are building more of an extensible framework, Python's strengths might give you a lower TCO.
Python also has no 'standard' web application framework or templating language, there are dozens - http://wiki.python.org/moin/WebProgramming. It might be hard to find a shared virtual hosting provider that supports one of these. On the other hand if you are investing enough to co-locate, or are able to install your own framework, you might find something that is perfect for your needs. Again, a thorough analysis for the specific product you want to build is required for a better TCO comparison.