ASP and PHP are two languages that are slowly on the rise and becoming more mainstream as companies discover the power within them. You could hardly describe them as programming languages, more along the lines of web design languages. But no matter their classification, they are powerful tools that are making websites more user friendly, and more importantly, more dynamic. Websites can now incorporate archived information in databases as well as other server side applications with the greatest of ease. So lets discuss a little bit about ASP and PHP.

Active Server Pages (ASP) is Microsoft’s little baby that revives the dying popularity of Microsoft products. It also embraces Microsoft new internet revolution, the .NET framework. Keeping it in the family, ASP is generally not support beyond Microsoft servers. Of course there are always third party applications that can allow you to use ASP with other server types. Larger, more established companies are using ASP with great enthusiasm, embracing its features to power their website framework.

Originally designed as a parsing language, Personal Home Pages (PHP) has now grown to be one of the most widely used languages for web design. I should also mention that PHP is now officially described as PHP Hypertext Processor, not Personal Home Pages. Regardless, it is supported on NT and Unix servers and is easy to manage. Almost like brother and sister, PHP and mySql go hand in hand and their compatibility has made the duo a strong web design tool for webmasters, young and old.

Based solely on personal experience, I found that PHP is a great introductory language to web design. Coming from a programming background anyway, the PHP structure was much like what I was used to when I programmed with C or Java. The syntax was different, but the concepts, the features, they were all there. The other benefit of PHP, from my own experience of course, was how easy it was to find tutorials and examples on the net. PHP is so widely used and popular that virtually any problem I ever encountered was either covered on a forum or in some example that I found through Google searches. The language is easy to learn and very robust. If you’re trying to put your foot in the door, PHP is by far the first step that you want to walk towards.

Conversely, ASP had a slight learning curve to it. It is definitely not a straight forward language that you can pick up in a “Learn ASP in 24 Hours” book, not that I’ve tried! It makes use of dying applications like Visual Basic and MS Access. I will say, however, after becoming fairly proficient with PHP, the syntax and power of ASP made more sense and was easier to grasp. But why ASP? Who uses it? If PHP is so powerful, why don’t companies just use that instead? Well, the main draw to ASP is that it is a Microsoft supported invention. I don’t have to tell you that Microsoft is the dominant word processing software and operation system used across the globe. Why fight it? So, being that everyone uses Microsoft, it makes sense to use a framework that most of your competitors and partners are using. If your company was to merge with or acquire another company, odds are that both companies will be running off of a Microsoft based server and integrating information will be as easy as pie. Updating database information and other documentation would be no big deal. The same cant be said if PHP was in the picture. The mySql based program would bring up a lot of issues for integration. You also have to consider that most employees are trained to use and adapt to the Microsoft environment. Everyone uses Excel spreadsheets, PowerPoint Presentations are the backbone for a lot of meetings, and Word documents are the standard document type for companies across the globe. It only makes sense to use ASP as part of this homogenization.

Both languages are powerful in their own respect and bring the world of dynamic content to homes and businesses everywhere. Microsoft definitely pulled another rabbit it out of their hat with their marketing for ASP, it has definitely increased the popularity of the Microsoft Operating System. PHP holds it own though. Its definitely a language that offers webmasters total control of their dynamic content. Its easy to learn and just as popular among the web design community as ASP. So which one should you choose? It all depends on your circumstances and preference. If you want to fall into that homogenized Microsoft framework that I mention previously, then ASP is definitely a language you should consider. If you’re looking for a robust language that offers you or your company the ability to get dynamic content on the web fast and efficiently, PHP is a great solution. The small learning curve and huge support for this product is incentive enough for most people to apply it to their web design applications. So long as you keep your client happy and get the content that you want other to see on the web, you cant go wrong either way.

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