Here's a thread I posted on previous forum regarding the three:

I've used PHP, ASP, and ColdFusion, and out of the three, ColdFusion is probably the most fun to play with. Of course, this is a very biased question to begin with. If you ask a C++ programmer what the best language is, you won't get "BASIC" as well as if you ask a physicist what the best science is, you won't get "Psychology." The three have its strengths and weaknesses. This is what I like and dislike about them...

PHP - The Good: Speed. PHP has the ability to pump out pages faster than you can bring up your pants while your girlfriend's dad is banging on the door asking if she's in there with anyone. And with the Zend Optimizer, it can go even faster. The function list is also very useful. Contains several functions to do pretty much anything. Can run on several systems including Unix/Linux and even Windows. A large community of developers exist as well many books out there on PHP. Goes together nicely with MySQL and PostgreSQL. Goes well with Apache. If you already know C++/Java/Perl, it's a breeze. IT can even take advantage of limited OOP functionality... and best of all... it's Free!

The Bad: Was only really meant to be used (and taken seriously) on Unix/Linux related machines. Database access is annoying if you're changing from MySQL and PostgreSQL, you have to use different functions to access them, there's no one overall functions that handles all DBs. (If you use MySQL, say goodbye to stored procedures and triggers.)Try/Catch errors are not as good as other languages. OOP is very limited (everything is public, you cannot have private or protected). Does not intergrate as well with ODBC as ASP and ColdFusion would.

ASP - The Good: If you know VB/BASIC, it's a breeze. Good learning curve. Because it's a Microsoft product, it integrates well with SQL Server, Access, COM, and pretty much anything related with Microsoft. You can use VBScript or JavaScript. Speed is good. You can use ASP free with NT and W2K, or a limited version on Win98 with Personal Web Server. If you want to use it on Linux, you can use Chili! (some differences exist from what I hear). There's a huge community for ASP, as well as books, and magazines on ASP related technology(SQL Server, IIS, etc.). With the new .NET Framework, we should see an improvement.

The Bad: Was only meant to be used on Windows. Microsoft tries to keep it proprietary to Windows. Does not contain a good function list(as well as PHP): things such as Upload must be installed as a separate ASP Component. Too many components may crash the system at times. More overhead than needed because it depends on COM. Error trapping is ok.

ColdFusion - Extremely is easy and powerful. The development time needed to create an app is faster than the speed of light. (It will take less time to create an app for ColdFusion than for ASP or PHP.) Database integration is a snap, and a lot easier to handle compared to ASP and PHP. Error handling is superb, blows PHP and ASP out of the water. No need to install extended functionality like ASP to upload. All that comes out of the box. It can even connect to LDAP, use COM components, Java Objects, etc. ColdFusion 5 contains a small version of Generator for generating Dynamic Flash content such as graphs, and in the new ColdFusion 6 (Neo), it will move to the Java Architecture. All CF templates will be compiled to Java Byte Code and will run like Java. ColdFusion will be able to use ColdFusion objects, functions, CFML, and be open to the whole Java world, to use its classes. There's a large community for ColdFusion.

The Bad: Only meant to deal with Windows (and Linux, but not too many Linux users out there, compared to Windows). ColdFusion is NOT free! There is a developer version available that has all the functionality of the regular version, never expires, but can only be used on one IP address. (For more info, check out Macromedia's site.) Doesn't use traditional programming syntax, but CFML (like HTML) to get the work done... this may seem awkward at first. A lot of the language relies on Custom Tags, some of which are made in CFML itself along with CF functions - this may cause a high overhead. Does not work like tradional OOP (UDFs- are still new, just came out in CF5), but conventions such as FuseBox can be implemented (in Neo-CF6- this will change, you'll be able to also use Java in ColdFusion).

Of course these are my opinions, and I'm sure you could think of other reasons why a language is bad/good.

Wow. I give you a 10 for that post... very interesting to a person ready to get there feet into dynamic web pages (aka me).

Well... ASP is my fav because i know it the best. I'm probably going to stick with with it for a few months and become a "professional" in it. It's SOOO ezy. Me and a friend of mine are prolly going to make a huge asp help site soon (very hard to find a good one with people that ACTUALLY post in the forums).

PHP i'm going to start learning, probably sometime around late summer (after camp, and yes, i'm going back). Main reason for this is because, say i ever go into web development, most people like serving on the linux platform because of its affordability, stability, and reliability. Also, as you said before, it's really good for php/mysql.

Coldfusion... well, probably not for a few years. For the near future, all that will be useful for my will probably be asp and php, so i'm sticking with and mastering those.

If you're really serious about a taking up a language, I suggest you pick one, and don't stop using it for about 2 years+. It's ok to take up other languages as well, so you get a sense of what they're about, but to make an honest opinion about a language that you've only worked on for a few months NOT in a professional work place... I think it's crazy.

When I went into my first job doing ASP programming, I felt like I didn't know anything. I had read several books on ASP too. It's those little tricks that you pick up a long the way. For example, passing form variables through a JavaScript is a neat trick that really isn't listed in any ASP books. This is not ASP exactly, but it helps you in development. Also, learning ASP by itself is not enough. You have to know some JavaScript, CSS, Relational Databases, SQL, information about your web server and services on your OS, and networking, to only name a few.

Goodluck with your choice!

That's what i'm trying to do! And i'm going to use asp in a sorta professional thing. I wanna build an ASP help site, like ultimateasp or wateve. I noticed that there isn't a good central place for help on ASP, so i've decided to try to make one. So far, me and a friend of mine are thinking of the plans and everything, and it's going to be nice.

I want to use an interface like PHPnuke (really cool looking, and very efficient), with forum boards in PHP/MYSQL (reason i want to learn php/mysql soon). I would've made the forum boards in ASP, but i didn't find any good ones online. Their all in PHP/MYSQL. I don't plan on spending months trying to make a really cool ASP forum board when i could get one that's better than VBulletin for FREE!

When the site is up, i want to first set it up on my desktop/server. Then, if it gets popular, buy a cheapo 300 dollar computer and cluster it! But... this is still a dream, kinda like www.geocities.com/cyberpitstop . I haven't updated that site in over a year! last thing i did was finish the cool stuff section! lol!

P.S. I'm hoping to get some professional experience soon ;D

You should really try making a forum. Even a simple one. It's not going to compare to this forum, but you'll learn a lot, trust me. It's not that hard to do anyways. My first forum was kind of crappy, but I learned so much.

There isn't a good central place for ASP help?! Hehe... man, I can't even name all the places that are about ASP help and resources!!! Prob my fav three are:

http://www.aspin.com
http://www.4guysfromrolla.com
http://www.haneng.com

But definitely try writing your apps at first... you'll learn so much than just using someone else's, even though they're better. Hey, you have to start somewhere.

Wow... thx, a lot of good sites.

www.haneng.com doesn't work, but uhh

about the forums... i'm sooo extremely busy over the next few months that i don't want to waste my time on designing a forum. Maybe i'll do that at a later point (if/when the site becomes popular), but as for now, i just want to get it out there quickly and as complete as i can.

Works for me. =) Maybe the server was down when you were visiting. Try it again. It's a great site.

Ok... the site is working now, pretty good site, one where people actually reply!

I'm surprised you can even write according to your judgement on what's good. Put your pathetic ugly plug for that garbage site somewhere else. Have a wonderful day, you scumbag.

un, we really don't appreciate any links to warez-type sites around here. This is a computer tech related bulletin board system - not a spam center for illegal crap.

The only reason I am taking the time to write you this warning is because this is the *second* time you have posted this same freakin' link on this site.

It's really great and nice if you wish to talk to the people on this board or post legit questions or comments. But the underground is a scene we really don't want discussed here.

Consider this a comment, a warning, or whatever you want. But just understand that I am serious.

>>SNAP!! You go girl! Ain't no one talk to a sistuh dat way. ;)

haha thanx 4 sticking up 4 me inscissor ;)

why dont either of u edit out the url? ???

Because that would be too easy. I love flame wars. =)

I have to admit ... I was just about to edit out the URL - when inscissor got me all riled up and told me to respond to his comment.

ALL DAN'S FAULT I TELL YA!
Blame Dan !! ;D

LOL!!! .....woops, forgot: i'm still not talkin 2 u 2 4 not answrin my C++ vs. Java ? earlier! :'(

Am I missing something? Where is that C++/Java question ...?

Admit it Dani, it was YOU who put that URL to that site. You know it. :)

What question are you talking about aeistein?

Oh of course it was me!! You caught me. I'm such a horrible admin b/c I am such a warez freak ;)

um, ok!!! ??? like THAT came out of left field!!! :D anyway heres the url u requested: [thread]126[/thread] ...& btw, i really NOT mad, but i sure wouldnt mind some insight! :)

I told you, it makes no difference. If you must put it under a category, put it under the Mac OS. ;)

I've only used PHP out of those three, I like it a lot. It's got it's strengths and weaknesses. Though after reading your post, I think I'm going to look into ColdFusion since I'm mainly a Java programmer. Thanks for the post! :D

ASP.NET - and I can go on for hours why. Instead of that, tell me why you love your langage, and I'll tell you why its better in ASP.NET ;-).

Actually there are versions of Cold Fusion for Windows, Linux, Solaris, HP-UX, and AIX.

I do projects in both ASP and Cold Fusion, and prefer Cold Fusion in that ASP is more complex.

For instance, to create database connection, you have do do something like this:
<%
'create DNS-less connection to Resource Directory
strConnect = "Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0; Data Source="& _
Server.MapPath("data/dbname.mdb")
Set oConn = Server.CreateObject("ADODB.Connection")

sql1 = "select * from table where criteria = criteria1"

oConn.Open strConnect
%>

Then to retrieve the data you have to create a loop and use a response.write (thankfully you can use the <%= %> shorthand)

example

<% set ors = oConn.execute(sql1)
if ors.eof then %>
<br>No Records Found<br>
<% else %>
<%= ors("field") %><br>
<% end if %>

In the example this is for a DNS-lss connection to an Access database, which is good if you don' have admin priviledges on the IIS server (I guess that would be an example of ASP)

On Cold Fusion, you would have to setup a DNS (which requires Admin priviledges)

Once it is setup you can create the queryy like this:

<cfquery datasource="dns" name="queryname">
select * from table where criteria = criteria1
</cfquery>

To output, you don't have to use a loop (this is built in)

ex (cf uses # to indicate fields instead of response.write or <%= %>

<cfoutput query="queryname">
name = #name#
</cfoutput>

Also CF will run on other web servers, like Apache and O'reilly, so you aren't stuck with IIS like you are with ASP, (unless you have third party product like ChiliSoft).
I have no knowledge of PHP, so I have no way of judging it.

ERMRMMRMRMRM, folks can we stick with the question here. I almost lost the intrest of this entire thread because of a continuously warez this and that. I LOVE WAREZ but also rspec sites privacy policy about links and crap. So please, can we stick to the questoin about Languages?:cry:Thanks. Thats the fun part for me too:cheesy:!

Anyways, back to the question or opinions here, I love all three. I learned all three witin 1 year and probly no even that long. But the best Id say and stick with would be PHP and Cold Fusion. The similarities are almost the same. The statmentsare almost quit the same, just not exactly all the way. Cold fusion also gives you alittle more advantages then PHP does I think personally, but again I love all three because they are all effective and great to use if your good at them.;)

I see lots of developers stating what their favorite languages are, but I hardly ever see any server admins posting. So, as a server admin, let me put my 2 cents worth in.

ColdFusion is great language for a developer. It's fast, it's easy, and database interactions are a breeze...WHEN IT WORKS. The main problem with ColdFusion is stability. ColdFusion has a serious memory leak issue which causes the server to hang up and stop serving CF pages. The creators of CF refuse to actually fix this problem. Instead, in newer releases, they have simply put a band-aid on it by introducing some performance monitoring. Basically, if the server stops serving CF pages, or the memory or processor utilization get out of hand, the CF services are stopped and restarted. This is NOT a permanent fix for such an annoying problem. Also, out of the box, CF's implementation of security is laughable. Be sure to shut down all RDS services to avoid any security issues because they are just chock full of holes. It seems that instead of the usual "that which is not explicity allowed, is denied" policy CF reverses it so that it is instead, "that which is not specifically denied, is allowed!" When I first implemented RDS on a CF server, any of the developers could get to ANY portion of ANY drive - floppy drive, CD drive, WINDOWS SYSTEM DIRECTORIES, etc! And, with no security restrictions! For developers, CF is a wonderful tool, but for administrators, it's a royal pain the you-know-where! Not to mention its enormous cost.

ASP is a bit more stable than CF, but it too does occasionally hang and stop serving pages. But, unlike CF, there are no individual services that can be stopped and restarted to correct the issue. The only course of action that I have ever been able to find is a total server reboot. Talk about a royal pain. Also, ASP is harder to code in than CF. Database interaction takes way more code than with CF. Also, other features such as file uploads and e-mail interaction are more difficult to implement. However, ASP is free if you are using a Windows platform as it is built into Windows servers using IIS.

Unfortunately, I have had no experience at all with PHP at the moment, but I soon will. I will be using PHP to write a trouble ticketing system, and it will interact with an SQL server. I'm just not sure at this point which SQL server I will be using. However, my experience as a server administrator has been that Unix based languages and applications are far more stable than Windows based ones. I started my career on a Windows platform, and for many years that's all I knew. I just got into Unix a few years ago. The more I work with it, the more I like it. Functionally, it's harder than Windows, but you can't beat the stability. Also, everything Linux is free - including PHP and several SQL implementations.

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