Thanks again for writing. I’ve read your article and overall it’s a very good piece. However, I think you and Ken are truly missing the point on the PHP complaints.

I know a lot of PHP developers, almost every one of us are multi-discipline developers. None of us think that PHP, or any other language for that matter, is the answer to every question. Your insistence that we provide you with a bullet list of when we would not use PHP is a bit of a straw man…but I will respond on your blog today with my list.

The problem with your PHP article is simply this. It is not, as you say, an opinion piece. It is factually wrong. Ken vacillates between insulting:

Prototyping an application that will be converted to Java or some other language.

to slanderous:

and detractors claim that it has somehow been crippled in order to prompt users into purchasing the Zend Optimizer.

To outright “incorrect”:

In general you should not use PHP: Where data security is of high importance.

These are not presented as “opinions” but as facts from an authority. All this to an audience that trusts you to present correct facts.

In all of your postings, you’ve called us fanbois, Ken has dismissed us as irrelevant because we only have a hammer so everything is a nail. What neither of you have done is corrected the article or apologized to the community for the insult. That is what we are upset about.

Again, I will extend an offer to you. If you want a knowledgeable and balanced article, as an Editor myself, I can help you find an actual expert in PHP. I know people who can help your readers understand the tool for what it is, when to use it and when not to;all without insulting the community and without lying to your readers.

Thanks again for writing,

=C=

So I wrote about it… http://advice.cio.com/esther_schindler/language_question

In response to the other note: our Drupal is heavily customized, so it’s difficult to upgrade. In any case, I try to stay out of the developer’s hair, so he doesn’t tell me how to write articles.

The CIO article, if you can call it that, was clearly written by an person who knew little about their stuff. It’s a shame, it could have been a pretty darn good series.

First, thanks for writing.

Second, I cannot craft a better reply to your comment than Stefan’s. (Great job Stefan)

As an Editor myself, I do understand your position and offer this olive branch, the next time you want to write about PHP, if you will contact me, I will help you find an author who understands the language.

=C=

I think most developers will not have a problem with the message this article is trying to get across as long as the facts are correct.

Nope. Wrong assumption.

The premise of the article series — which will be continuing with other languages — is that no programming language is appropriate for every use. Everything is good for some purposes, inappropriate for others. Techies make this argument when an IT manager or CIO forces the “wrong” technology down their throats — but rarely do you see a list of “here’s where PHP is the right answer; here’s where it’s wrong, dammit, just the wrong damned tool.”

I find it curious that many of the people who disliked the authors’ lists of “right and wrong uses” fail to give their _own_ list of “when to use this language” and “you used it to write WHAT?!”

Esther Schindler
senior online editor, CIO.com