PHP or ASP .NET – Which is Preferable?

“Every technology comes with some motive or vision that either creates or demolishes the future of the technology depending upon its real time execution! PHP and ASP .NET are two major web domain specific technologies of the industry, having some common and little uniqueness within them, which have made them to sustain in the industry till date. They have different objectives and visions from their inception and they stick to that to provide their customer base the best in the industry web solutions. When you are asked to choose one which is better for you; you need to be cautious enough because both have their advantages with respect to the requirements of the users; and they both fail to meet the expectations of the client in some specific cases; because they are not developed keeping those scenarios as a priority. So, let’s check out when and where PHP is preferable and when ASP .NET.”

PHP for low cost web development projects: The most important distinguishing feature about PHP and ASP .NET is the cost effectiveness. PHP is an open source technology where as ASP .NET is a proprietary product from Microsoft. Hence the software cost of PHP is too less than that of ASP .NET. In fact, due to its open source nature, PHP developers can get adequate rooms to modify the source code of the language as per their requirements and project demand. Again, the initial cost of PHP installation is negligible as compared to ASP.NET. Hence it is often preferred by small website development projects having limited budget for the development process. Again, the wages of PHP developers are much less as compared to ASP .NET developers due to its easy to learn approach that triggers fresher to kick start their career with PHP at very economic wages. Moreover, due to the open source nature of PHP, the industry is flooded with large numbers of open source PHP modules and plug-ins that help in decreasing the development time significantly. Considering all above situations it is clear that the development cost of any PHP application is less as compared to ASP .NET.

ASP .NET for large scale web applications: Though, ASP .NET is not preferred for low budget or static web projects, but it is having a tremendous demand for large scale web applications that need high performance, speed and better user experience. ASP .NET can handle any size of data driven web application in a hassle free manner without compromising on the quality of the application. The highly expert teams of Microsoft who have built this framework are extremely cautious for the optimization and high efficiency of this framework. The inbuilt libraries, methods and controls are extremely reliable and stable enough to deal with any type of complex situation. On the contrary, PHP as a language can’t afford such amenities for its developers.

Highly customizable and scalable application can be well handled with ASP .NET MVC: Due to the core MVC Architecture i.e., model view controller scheme, ASP .NET enables the ASP .NET developers to approach their programming style in an efficient and systematic manner. It keeps the view part of the application isolated from the model section by an intermediate controller. As a result, different components of the application are loosely coupled with each other and don’t interrupt any other’s functionality at all. This makes the application more scalable and customizable in order to provide enhanced user experience. Moreover, this encourages experienced ASP .NET developers to follow an Agile approach of web development process for utmost productivity from the application which is seriously restricted with PHP.

Programming effort can be decreased drastically with the integration of third party open source PHP modules and plug-ins: Undoubtedly programming becomes efficient within the ASP .NET IDE, but the coding effort of a PHP developer can be decreased tremendously due to availability of readymade modules and plug-ins to be integrated with any PHP web application. There are millions of open source PHP modules and plug-ins available in the industry that can be well integrated into PHP application with a little tweak by the developer. On the other hand, Microsoft strictly prohibits the integration of any unreliable third party modules or plug-ins into an ASP .NET application.

Quick web development can be achieved with the ASP .NET framework: Though, Microsoft never encourages relying on any third party modules and plug-ins but it offers more than that with its inbuilt mesmerizing features. ASP .NET is commonly known as “drag and drop” technology. That means it provides many web contents like form components that can be easily implemented into the application without any hassle. In fact, it enables the developer to take the advantage of its inbuilt validation methods to make the process much easier. As a framework, it also provides enough inbuilt packages, libraries and controls to craft highly optimized and efficient web applications on the fly.

High performance and reliable end product is must with ASP .NET: Since ASP .NET has inbuilt libraries containing large number of commonly used methods and classes, it makes the web development process much faster than that of PHP. To add this, those methods and libraries are developed by the expert team of Microsoft who are highly motivated in writing extremely optimized and stable codes for those components. During the development process when the ASP .NET developer calls those methods or classes, they needn’t to bother about the reliability and efficiency of those inbuilt stuffs. As a result, the end product developed with those components is dam reliable and is highly optimized.

Both support all modern amenities but in a different manner: Modern amenities like integration of JQuery, HTML5, CSS3 and other interactive plug-ins can be integrated with both PHP and ASP .NET applications but in different approaches. PHP enables PHP developers to integrate these amenities manually into their application where as ASP .NET provides many tools, supports and inbuilt packages to take the advantages of these amenities. Moreover ASP .NET also provides scope for crafting highly advanced and contemporary web applications with the support from its inbuilt emulators for different platforms like Android, Windows and iOS. As a result, an ASP .NET web developer can create smart apps for multiple platforms from within the ASP.NET environment.

Finally, it’s not fair to compare a language with a framework! As discussed above, we clearly visualize that ASP .NET outperforms PHP in most of the circumstances and it is obvious as well; because we were trying to compare an industry leading web framework with a web domain specific language. If you are looking for expert PHP development services and are interested to outsource your software development part, then look no further. Mindfire Solutions has been consistently developing industry specific applications for more than a decade now.

What are the pros and cons of using Yii Framework?

A framework can be massively productive for any developer who intends to build compliant, structured and efficient web apps in minimal time. In today’s time, as developers, we have a plethora of diverse frameworks regardless of the language we are programming in. The YII framework, however, is by far one of the most result-oriented, secure web frameworks to depend upon. It is designed for and by PHP to provide better developer experience through its features and better user experience through its end product.

Agreed, it may not be the one of the popular PHP frameworks for web development, it is surely one of the most promising open-source web app development frameworks. Below are some prominent advantages and disadvantages that come with YII, they are worth having a glance at.

Pros:

 The open source YII is undoubtedly the fastest framework for building Web2.0 applications (large scale). It renders a highly optimized performance, and can seamlessly be employed by developers for designing any kind of web applications. The generic web programming framework makes web development an enriched, intuitive experience (using PHP), and is perfectly suitable for large scale web applications – including e-commerce projects, forums, web portals, content management systems, RESTful services, and more.

 The MVC architecture of Yii helps the PHP web developers in crafting technically a smart web application. It helps in keeping the database server isolated from the view state of the application making it cleaner and effective. The Controller of the frameworks helps in managing different packages and libraries of the frameworks efficiently so that, the code pressure will decrease from the developer. It makes the whole system work as an object where a little tweak on the codebase will modify the entire system simultaneously. Any modification, addition, alters or deletion will be performed in a single line code and it will be visible throughout the application. At the same time, it provides a systematic approach to handle any application building process.

 Integrated with a Model-View-Controller structure, YII provides a horde of security features to ensure the highest degree of security to your application. Security plays the most important role in today’s world; because, more number of websites are dealing with sensitive informations like user data, their transaction history and also their personal credentials etc. So it must be given maximum priority in any web application. Fortunately, Yii comes with security features such as Cross-site Request Forgery Prevention, Cross-site Scripting Prevention and Cookie Attack Prevention. Since it is very significant for web developers to ensure thorough security for their app development, the framework comes embedded with authentication support, and authorization through hierarchical role-based access control. There is client side and server side validation as well, which developers can enable or disable as per their project requirements.

 The framework stands distinguished for its ability to function smoothly with third party codes. Users can seamlessly use code from their Zend or Pear framework in their Yes It Is (YII’s extended form) framework. This is like an ice on the cake; because this helps in increasing the potential of any web solution in an efficient yet professional manner. Imagine, a web application having the power of both Zend and Yii or of both Laravel and Yii!! They can definitely stand ahead among their peers and can contribute more to the PHP developer.

 Web developers also admire its clean, elegant caching support, and component-based architecture. For a developer, YII’s philosophy that code should be simple, and be written in the sophisticated manner works great. With caching, a smart web developer can build highly optimized web applications on the fly. In fact, considering a recent scenario where most of the web traffic are coming from smart devices; it becomes essential for every web developer to consider their website as a cross platform compatible one. Again, since their web app will render over smart phones, so they must be optimized enough so as to render similar user experience in all these memory intensive devices and platforms and fortunately Yii takes care of this wisely.

 It also offers ActiveRecord for relational as well as NoSQL databases, not to forget the query builders feature that YII provides. The tool further highlights its some of the most efficient caching features – letting users store cached data in different media. YII paves the way with an extremely solid yet seamless caching system, and lends support to XCache, memcache, ABC, and DB based page.

 YII framework is supremely easy to customize or check over, owing to its simple code structure. This enables developers to use varied widgets and extensions depending upon their web project requirements. At the same time, it is thoroughly object oriented – making it an ideal choice for anyone who is versed in object oriented web programming.

 The framework provides web developers with neat Ajax helpers, particularly with Grid view, and CRUD generator using Gii. Its Bootstrap extension support simplifies the whole process of creating responsive applications while integrated support for I18N allows users to have localized versions of their applications.

 Another significant advantage that YII has over most other programming frameworks is its large community support. The framework is supported and looked after by an extremely efficient team of professionals that consistently contribute to YII’s growth and development. The community pegs away at constantly integrating new features and advanced practices into the core framework – helping it evolve into a more sophisticated, performance oriented web application framework.

Cons:

 As a framework, YII does not come flooded with too many minuses. However, there is a portion of developers that steer clear of using YII as a framework for their web programming needs. To begin with, YII reveals kind of an over-reliance on static methods (a part of web developers community may not be comfortable with it).

 It is believed that YII demands extreme attention while one works with their application, for their code can quickly become bloated if proper care is not taken.

 The framework further has a somewhat steep learning curve, making it operose for new web developers to use or get started with.

Our word

Yes, YII framework does come with a few disadvantages, however, it is extremely powerful as a tool for developing a layered, structured web design. Some amazing attributes such as security, extensibility, theme organization, error handling, and integration with other frameworks make YII a great choice for web app development. We would highly recommend it!

Mindfire Solutions provides expert offshore PHP development services from India, gaining its expertise from years of experience in PHP web development and PHP application development. We have been working in PHP for the last 8+ years and have gained expertise on various PHP application development frameworks and PHP services.

What’s the best MVC framework for PHP?

“The 21st century has received a magical touch from the web industry. Every sector and every enterprise are now taking the assistance from web applications to enhance their business possibilities and productivity. As a result, many web domain specific technologies were born in this era starting from JSP, ASP, PHP, ROR and Python, etc. To make the web development process quicker and accurate in order to meet the expectations and high demands of the industry, many web frameworks have been developed for different web domain specific languages. These frameworks are equipped with highly optimized and well-organized libraries, modules, and packages to help the web developers in designing enterprise standard high performance web solutions. Most of the 21^st century frameworks follow MVC architecture, i.e. Model-View-Controller scheme. With MVC, the View component (user interface) remains isolated from the core logic section of the application making the development process much professional and well-organized than before. Fortunately, MVC architecture received overnight popularity from the industry and has been well accepted by both the developers and the tech experts. As a result, the industry is now flooded with many MVC web frameworks. Among those, PHP web frameworks have been a boon for the industry. This is mainly because; they are usually open source and hence enable web developers to create low cost web applications on the fly. Let’s check ‘what are the top PHP MVC web frameworks of the industry’ and then we will try to find out which one is the best?”

CakePHP- the power of OOP and ORM: It has been a continuous concern for PHP developers to implement Object Oriented approach to their application; now it is utterly possible with CakePHP. Besides other features that are common with many web frameworks, CakePHP comes with inbuilt support for ORM i.e. Object Relational Mapper. Here, the PHP developer is given adequate room to play around the database. In fact, the database tables are transformed into Objects; and different operations over the table are performed by different functions. This is very easy to digest for any web developer. Moreover, it is well equipped with CRUD scaffolding i.e. database operations like Create, Read, Update and Delete are performed in such a hassle free manner that the PHP developers need not think much about the background database queries for any modification of the database. Everything is done in a smoother manner by the framework without giving any pain to the developer. As a result, the web developer can focus more over the core logic and innovative ideas instead of running behind the database stuffs. As the database is under the control of CakePHP, any change in the application will automate the overall changes of the application without having to modify the code at every place. This establishes the power of the Object Oriented approach of CakePHP.

Zend for high performance web app development: Zend is one of the oldest frameworks of PHP and still it has remained as the first choice for many PHP developers. Zend was one of the first PHP 5 compliant frameworks for web developers, enabling them to develop contemporary web applications at a faster rate. Now, the latest Zend framework has made it PHP 7 compliant and that means more power and more efficiency than before. It has inbuilt debugging tools, i.e. xDebug and ZendDebugger to debug your source code. It makes the code not only error proof but also well maintainable. It has Zend server and when it combines with the core framework, the performance becomes outstanding, the efficiency touches every limit and the user experience improves a lot. Capability to integrate Emulators has made it future ready and to design modern web apps for different smart operating systems like Android, iOS or Windows and of course in a responsive manner. It enables the developer to have some inbuilt testing methods to be carried out over the application in a magical manner like unit testing with PHPUnit and Integrated PHPDocumentor 2.

Laravel for large scale development: It is yet another renowned PHP MVC framework having a tremendous market share gained in a very less span of time! It is best suited for large scale web solutions. Though it got launched in 2011 but by 2015, it surged out as the best PHP framework of the industry. Being a MVC framework, it enables the web developers in creating awesome web apps in a flawless manner. It is also known as FullStack because of its unmatched quality of resource handling. It has many unique features like HTML generation, optimized web serving, user authentication, etc. The list does not end! Features like automatic pagination, blade template engine, eloquent ORM, expressive syntax and reverse routing are there to boost the confidence of any PHP web developer. Modularity, flexibility and highly customizable offerings of this framework have made it possible to rule the web industry with dignity.

Symfony 2- better for speed carving websites: Symfony 2 is yet another PHP MVC framework that was gifted to the PHP developer in 2005. When it was introduced to the industry it had a clear vision to provide utmost benefit to the PHP developers in creating highly optimized and scalable web applications. Over time, it got reinvented and refined to make the framework even more useful than before. Now in 2015 it has come up as the most popular PHP framework for high speed web application development. It has a unique approach to handle multiple resources at once without compromising on the efficiency of the application. Like any other MVC framework, it also enables the PHP developer to keep logic section of the application isolated from the View section. But here, the database is handled in an optimized manner so that the end user will get the best user experience for any type of interactive communication between the user and the server. It is highly popular in creating event driven web applications that need excess power and speed for the process and Symfony 2 framework provides the same in a tranquil manner.

Yii – small yet powerful: Yii is considered as one of the smallest PHP frameworks of the industry; but it enables the web developer in creating attractive and beautiful web applications in a short span of time. It has many templates that help in creating quick web solutions without compromising on the look and feel and user experience of the application. Though, it is micro in size, but it is highly efficient and useful in crafting quick web applications preferably for small scale web solutions.

From above discussion, we find that every framework has a specific use and if they can be efficiently used by any PHP developer, the end product will be simply outstanding! So, all are best in their fields and specific circumstances and it would be biased to declare any one as the best. After all, it depends upon the project requirements and personal choice. If you want to harness the benefits of PHP then Mindfire Solutions provides expert offshore PHP development services from India, gaining its expertise from years of experience in PHP web development and PHP application development. We have been working in PHP for the last 8+ years and have gained expertise on various PHP application development frameworks and PHP services. 

Checklist of points while migrating to PHP

“In software language, migration refers to improvement. With every newer version, you will get more user access for better customization and improved user experience. So you must consider the migration process for your PHP website to make it a smart site on the fly over the latest platform. But, there are many potential threats in the migration process and we can’t ignore them at any situation. You must go through some considerations before you jump into the migration process.”

What you get from migration to latest PHP version? Migration means improvement. With the latest version of PHP, you will get enough scope for advanced web application development with many new and enhanced features. Features include support for namespace, Late Static Binding, native Closures, Jump levels, Nowdoc syntax etc. Along with that, a garbage collector is also added for developing advanced web applications on the fly. It is always recommended to remain up-to-date with the latest version of any technology to deal with the ever changing demands of the user.

Back-Up- the term has the highest priority for any Migration process: When you decide to migrate to PHP i.e. the latest version of PHP, the first thing that you should do is to keep a backup of all your previous resources at a secure place. It is recommended to keep those data in a new drive or a different machine drive so that, even by mistake you are not going to lose it during the migration process. The migration process doesn’t take few seconds or minutes rather it may take as long as few hours. So, there is a potential threat of unsuccessful migration process and hence chance of data loss in between. To avoid this issue, there must be a backup of all your resources including the database. Many times the database gets altered during the process so it is necessary to keep the database in a more secure place so that if any data loss occurs we can get it back without much hassle.

Consistency is must: During the migration process due to the change in platform, there is a high chance of inconsistency after the process is completed. It is very common and obvious to find inconsistency between two different versions of any platform. Usually many existing method names, class names and libraries source code get changed in order to provide better quality services with the latest version; but, this affects the behavior of our old PHP application significantly. To avoid this, you must go through each and every modification in the technology and then study the source code of those functions from the documentation and accordingly you should change your previous codes to work with the new platform. In this manner you can avoid the inconsistency issue caused by the migration process.

Compatibility should be well tested: Just like the inconsistency issue, there will be a sure shot compatibility issue when you evolve to the newer version of PHP due to the modified source code. Moreover it also affects the existing plug-ins severely. Most of the plug-ins will not work properly with the latest version and they should be replaced by the corresponding update versions in order to compatible with the latest PHP version. Usually most plug-ins releases their updated versions for the latest PHP version to avoid compatibility issue; but there might be few plug-ins or components that don’t have any compatible updates for the latest version. In that scenario, the developer has to take the responsibility of the plug-ins or components to make them alive in the new platform without mismanaging the application. It can either be done by removing the entire plug-in and its dependencies and then substituting it with another plug-in that may work what the existing was doing previously. Another way is to modify the existing plug-in codebase to make it compatible with the new platform.

Database migration needs full attention from the developer: During the migration if anything is highly unstable then it’s none other than the database. There is a high chance of data loss during the transition and hence you must take preventive steps before you start the migration process. As we have already discussed, the previous database should be kept in a safe and secure environment just like in an isolated drive of the same system or in a different machine. If any data loss occurs we can roll back the database from the backup folder.

Always perform the migration process with a SVN or RTC: SVN or RTC are used for keeping track of any codebase change in the application server. These are highly impactful when we are performing the migration process followed by code modification to make our application fit with the new environment. Usually we find errors and bugs in the new application after the migration process and hence it can be avoided by using an enterprise standard SVN or RTC for versioning purpose. It is like a life saver for the developers during any critical situations; because it enables the application to roll back to its previous version without zero hassle.

Make sure, your application can be roll back if needed: As discussed above versioning tools like SVN or RTC can be used for roll back of modified codebase but what about if the migration process is absolutely unsuccessful? In that case, we have to check if there is any migration tool available for PHP to migrate to a newer version and whether it provides the roll back option if the process is unsuccessful. As a tech savvy, we will not recommend you to rely over a software tool for the migration process and putting all your effort and risk on the same rather we would say it would be an unwise decision to rely on a manmade migration tool. To avoid this you should keep all your existing resource as backup in an isolated location or machine so that in case of unsuccessful migration you can restore your application from the backup.

Finally, Extensive testing is must: Once the migration process is completed there must be many compatibility issue, inconsistency and unreliability in your application. Hence it must be under go severe testing approaches i.e., both manual testing as well as automation testing to find out if any loop hole is still present in the application after iterative testing processes. Never compromise on the quality of testing at any cost because this will seriously hamper your end product or application.

Mindfire Solutions provides expert offshore PHP development services from India, gaining its expertise from years of experience in PHP web development and PHP application development. We have been working in PHP for the last 10+ years and have gained expertise on various PHP application development frameworks and PHP services. We offer expert PHP web design and programming services for global clients. Our Zend certified PHP programmers are proficient in PHP Porting and Migration services, PHP website development and PHP web development.

Review of PHP CodeIgniter Framework

“The new era web service applications are designed on a modern platform for better accessibility and code integration: It is known as Model- View- Design pattern or simply MVC. The same, we can find from PHP CodeIgniter platform. As the name suggests, there are 3 components and they are separated from each other by a virtual yet effective screen. It keeps the View i.e. the user interface absolutely isolated from the core logic. The View and the logic are controlled by an intermediate Controller. The Model consist of the core logic, database and rules of the application and it provides the relevant contents to the View i.e. Browser after the instruction of the Controller. By this process, the MVC architecture helps in keeping every aspect of the application safe and secured and most importantly in a systematic manner. Let’s have a glance over the CodeIgniter framework”.

Complete documentation for the user: Since, CodeIgniter is a framework developed on the MVC architecture; there are many components, libraries and functions available inside. In fact, the Model designs itself cumbersome. So, it becomes difficult for a developer to start writing code on the platform without any prior knowledge or in-depth knowledge of its components. To make the things easier CodeIgniter provides a complete documentation for all its components and features. As a smart web developer, you should go through each and every page of the documentation so as to make the best use of the framework. The documentation works like a user guide and hence it is extremely useful from the developer’s point of view. It has various indexes like MVC basics, Routing basics, Form validation, Performance improvement etc and these are extremely important in developing an enterprise standard web solution. It is always recommended to learn the documentation along with a corporate training for improved productivity of the developer.

Installation will not take more time or effort: CodeIgniter is a web application framework developed in PHP and enables PHP web developers in building reliable yet faster web solutions without much hassle. To getting started with CodeIgniter, one needs to install the framework on the server. For the same, you need to download the software and unzip the package from internet. Now you have to upload all the folders and files to the server on which you are suppose to work on. You can also use encryption or sessions by setting encryption key. The process is very simple and it doesn’t require any hard effort from the developer. Once you configure CodeIgniter you can start coding from the index.php page.

Advanced features have made it to sustain in the industry for years: There are many advanced and effective features that CodeIgniter possesses for designing high quality web applications. The most important feature of CodeIgniter is its MVC Architecture, which is extremely helpful in creating complex web applications in less time and with more accuracy. CodeIgniter is extremely light weight and hence it can help you in building light weight web applications that will definitely load faster on the browser especially when we are considering modern browsers for smart phones and tablets etc. CodeIgniter has an inbuilt form and data validation feature that eliminates the unnecessary effort that is being given by the developer in other platforms. It has FTP class and File Uploading class for manipulation of files in the application server. The enhanced full page caching features can definitely help in improving the performance of the application and hence user experience. It has other features like Active Record Database Support, Session Management, Error logging and Calendaring class etc.

SEO with CodeIgniter: Search engine optimisation is the most important feature of any web framework and it is now a must for every framework. Just like other PHP frameworks i.e., WordPress, Joomla etc, CodeIgniter also possess a search engine optimisation tool to make the PHP website well visible on Google. The search engine optimisation process starts with the title of the page and the search engine friendly URL. CodeIgniter has support for creating search engine friendly URLs along with other SEO features like key word density calculation, URL routing and SEO analysis etc. The URL routing or rewriting technique helps in improving page ranking in the search engine for better visibility of your website.

Ease of Use for CI developers: A framework can’t sustain for a decade in the industry without any potential. CodeIgniter has already proved its potential with awesome features and of course easy to use developer interface. The developer interface of CodeIgniter is extremely easy to understand i.e. a beginner can start coding on the platform without much hassle. Different components of the framework can easily be integrated to the application for enhanced productivity. It has many templates available for the CodeIgniter developer so that he can start developing web pages easily with the templates that are already made available for the developers.

Migration process is not a headache for you: Migration is something used for the improvement of your application with more optimised classes and data query. In web application development process it is extremely important for any business to be up to date with time in order to provide better customer support for your service or product. In CodeIgniter, the developer is allowed to manage his database schema for different environments and platform. The developer needn’t to manually run the MySQL queries for this process rather it can be done from within the platform itself. The best part is that it also provides scope for the CodeIgniter developer to reverse or role back of the migration process if found any issues during the migration. With CodeIgniter you can track all the versions of your database changes just like versioning of files as we use git i.e., we can go back or forward easily to a different DB version as per our requirement and as when we need it.

Flexibility and customization is really a wonderful feature: A framework is usually having some optional features that can be achieved for your application with the integration of plug-ins, themes etc. CodeIgniter developers are allowed to integrate various open source plug-ins developed in PHP or jQuery to make the website more feature loaded and attractive. A PHP developer can customise his web application through different plug-ins and components for enhanced user experience. On the other hand, it also helps in extending the functionality of the application without any high effort due to availability of source code from CodeIgniter expert community.

Nevertheless to say, CodeIgniter has an amazing track record of more than a decade and how this is possible we can easily guess from above discussions.

At Mindfire Solutions, we have dedicated developer teams for almost all major PHP Frameworks. We have been providing expert PHP development services to our clients for more than 10 years now and have executed over 100 projects in various PHP and PHP Frameworks. Please feel free to contact us if you have any custom application development requirement, our senior CakePHP, zend, CodeIgniter, Symfony developers will love to assist you in your requirement.

An insight into PHPStorm

PHPStorm- An intelligent IDE for PHP web developers: PHPStorm is like a blessing for PHP developer. It is an outstanding IDE or editor for PHP web developers. It is developed by Jetbrains and has a received a tremendous popularity from the IT industry in a very less span of time due to its magical features. It not only supports PHP codes but also other web scripts like javascript, JQuery, HTML and CSS etc. It helps in reducing the effort and time of a web developer to a large extent with its intelligent properties. When we say it’s intelligent, that means it is smarter than other IDEs like komodo or notepad plus etc.

Why IDE? IDE stands for integrated development environment. This is like an editor that capable to be integrated with a framework for better productivity. It provides numerous types of assistance to a PHP developer during the development process which helps in avoiding silly mistakes and hence bugs in the application. On the other hand it also reduces the effort of the tester to a large extent due to minor bug free application. Hence it is like a integral part of the development process for any web application development project.

Code assist: The basic nature of PHPStorm is to provide code assistance to the programmer during programming. It helps in different programming supports like code auto complete, code suggestion and highlighting different components of the web application. It also helps in maintaining proper indentation in the programme that can help the application to be well readable and maintainable for future. Moreover it can also suggest for different method name, variable name or even library name during the development process which definitely helps the developer in avoiding common spelling mistakes in the application. Different web components like HTML tags, CSS tags etc are highlighted on PHPStorm platform that helps the developer in avoiding unnecessary silly mistakes.

PHPDoc support: PHPDoc is well supported by PHPStorm. As a result it helps in developing enterprise standard web applications with global rules adopted by the developer. It gives the application a new standard that will definitely help the application to be debugged in future. Well we can make few customisations in this option for our requirements and needs.

Debugging can be hassle free: With PHPStorm IDE a PHP developer can debug the application in a more professional and efficient manner. He can take the help of other debugging tools like xdebug for quality debugging in less time and with more accuracy. In other words we can say the debugging process can be easier through PHPStorm.

Productivity increases: PHPStorm helps PHP web developers in writing industry standard professional codes on the platform. Moreover these codes are not only well readable but also highly maintainable and flexible in nature. Hence it reduces the overall maintenance cost of the application in a long run scenario. Due to its intelligent features as discussed above it reduces not only the time and effort of the developer and tester but also the overall cost of production of the project making it quite productive than before.

Mindfire Solutions provides expert PHP development services from India, gaining its expertise from years of experience in PHP web development and PHP application development. We also have dedicated teams of various important PHP Frameworks like Zend Developers Team, Kohana Developers Team and CodeIgniter developers Team. If you want to Outsource PHP Development or hire PHP Developers, you are at the right place. Please write to us at sales at MindfireSolutions dot com and we will be sending a free quotation in one business day.

Essential modules in Joomla development

Joomla is a PHP based CMS i.e., content management system. It is one of the best open source content management systems of the industry. It helps in developing quick web applications which are basically content driven. That means we can create a news portal, blugs etc using Joomla. Today we will discuss about some of its important modules and some third party plugins or modules to help the Joomla developers creating interactive web applications. Let us start with some inbuilt modules of Joomla.

Breadcrumbs: As the name suggests breadcrumb is a module in the Joomla CMS which can be used to make the user understand the current location in the web application. While browsing a website, sometimes the user enters into a new environment which may give him an embracing feeling. To prevent the same Joomla PHP developers can integrate the breadcrumb module which will display the status of current web page.

Archived articles: While dealing with a content driven website, the web developer must ensure that all the posts or articles are placed in a systematic manner. We can keep a set of articles or blogs according to their date of publish using a month wise archived directory. We can place this module in the right panel of the website so that the user can browse different articles which are published previously.

Articles- newsflash: This is an extremely important module of Joomla CMS. This module helps in providing a list of latest articles to the user within a specific location. This is extremely helpful if the web developer can give special visual effects to the module like blinking of titles or colour change so that it can be highlighted to the user.

Articles category: PHP developers must use this module in order to differentiate between different types of articles. Assume a website containing a block of articles on sports, entertainment, politics etc. So the user must be given the control to choose his category from the website. In that case articles category module helps in lots of way to provide inter-related articles to the end user. This will improve the user experience as a whole.

Login: This is one of the most vital modules of Joomla CMS while building a content driven web application. The administrator usually tries to e-campaign his website using various methods like e-mail sending, SMS sending and through social networks etc. To achieve the same the PHP developer must build an application which can take the visitors e-mail ID through sign up process. Later on the web administrator can send him up-date mails from his website to attract him to come back to his website. Moreover, it also helps the user to feel like a privileged user.

Menu: Menu is an integral part of any web application. Its importance can never be ignored by any web developer. Menu helps the user to roam around the web application in a hassle free manner. It improves the user experience of the web application.

Most read content: This is one of the vital modules for any content driven website. Because this highlights some of the most visited web pages of the website. This helps the user to stick with the quality content of the web application.

Besides above mentioned modules, there are many in-built and third party plugins and modules which can be used in developing industry standard content driven web applications.

At Mindfire Solutions, we have an expert Joomla Developers team, who have been serving our esteemed clients since over 5 years now. If you have a custom Joomla Development need or need assistance with your PHP Application Development, please feel free to write to us at Sales at MindfireSolutions dot com and we will revert back with a free quote within one business day.

Why is MySQL considered a partner of PHP?

We have landed in the web era: Hey guys, am I mistaking!! I hope no. Managing our day-to-day task in the desktop is gone and now it’s time to organize our life on the cloud. Who needs that heavy desktop for just a small calculation which we can be performed in our iPhone and can be kept inside our chest pocket? Everything is now online may it be message service (chatting, e-mail and sms), organising our life and business using software like file maker and bento etc. Organisations also love to use web services more than that of desktop applications which is rigid and irritating. So everything is depending on the wireless internet connectivity. Understanding the situation many software firms including offshore software development organisations are now tensed to build modern web applications for the industry. There is an adrenal rushing in their vein to build more and more web applications by the web developers.

PHP a perfect web language: In this situation if anything has received tremendous support from the web developers then that is none other than PHP development. Being one of the web languages, PHP received a tremendous popularity among the developers in building modern enterprise standard web applications. One can start his web development process now with PHP by just studying some tutorials on the web. PHP is extremely easy to learn and develop web applications for the new web developers of the industry. Hence PHP is treated as the main gate to enter into the IT industry by the web developers in less effort and small time.

PHP is a dead concept without MySQL and the combo becomes deadly for sure: When we think about PHP the first word comes to our mind is open source. Yes PHP is an open source language and hence a PHP developer can modify the source code of the language. Due to open source in nature we can start using it for developing our own web application without any bucks to invest. This makes it first choice for the beginners to kick start their carrier in web development. But, any server side language like PHP is incomplete or we can say dead without a database support. Fortunately, MySQL has similar nature to that of PHP. My SQL is also an open source database service. Hence we can develop a complete web application using both PHP and MySQL without any investment. This is really like a boon for the web developers or PHP developers to start their website development from the day one with this open source language – database deadly combo.

PHP and MySQL for modern web development: Both PHP and MySQL when get together results in an enterprise standard web application which is not only superfast but also efficient. Due to low start-up cost, many offshore software development farms and their clients love to develop industry standard web application in less time, money and effort. Most importantly, we can develop modern web applications using HTML5, CSS3 and dynamic java script in addition to PHP MySQL for different platforms and devices. Of course we needn’t to say, the web developers (PHP developers) can also build responsive web applications using these technologies for modern smart phones and tablets.

Industry respects this couple: Industry also understands and hence respects the strong intangible relation between PHP and MySQL. Hence, they are giving away gifts like wordpress, zend framework etc to the web developers.

We provide PHP web development services. If you would like to hire PHP developers for your web development needs, please contact us Mindfire Solutions.

The necessity of certification in PHP development

PHP has retained the same essence in the industry even after a decade!! PHP is only technology that showed courage to fight against the monopoly of Microsoft’s ASP .Net and Java in the web industry. To add this, PHP also gained success in the industry due its continuous effort. During the beginning phase, PHP could not perform better; but with time it learned from its mistake and made them as their weapon for the next version. As a result, it comes up as a winner in the industry. Considering its popularity and power, new generation software developers or web developers are willing to work in PHP to showcase their talent in the industry. This is creating a competitive environment in the industry and hence PHP developers are under pressure. To overcome this, they are trying to get corporate trainings on the technology to polish their knowledge and skill. In other words, we can say they are trying to achieve Certifications in PHP to prove their talent. Today we will discuss the importance of such certification in PHP.

Certification is nothing but a symbol of your proficiency: When you are having a certification in any technology, it simply refers to your command over the language and the same happens with PHP development as well. Though it is not a concrete way to measure someone’s talent or skill; but it can be accepted to some extent. Even a qualified graduate may not be come up as a skilled labour in later phase of its life; but at the same time many certified developers can be more valuable!! Hence certification always refers to skill; it may not be talent always.

Certification can help you creating a unique position in the industry: Imagine, you are one of the thousands of PHP developers seating in a hall. If you have a certification in PHP and it is limited in this hall, you will definitely feel privileged. Isn’t? You will feel that awesomeness in the bulk due to your unique characteristics. Moreover you will get some additional scope among your peers. You will get more chance in an interview if you are having a certification in PHP. Moreover, a certified PHP developer means efficiency, experience and skill. So, a software farm when thinks to hire some efficient PHP developers, it will definitely think about Certified developers more positively than others. So, it is always beneficial to have a certification in PHP.

It can help the industry in getting quality professionals: On the other hand, when there are more numbers of certified developers in the industry, it will lead to better output. Because they will put their expertise and experience in web development process and that will lead to awesome output. In this situation, the developers will get better opportunity from the industry and the industry will get better quality of resource for the development process. So it will create a win-win situation for both developers and industry. Then what are you waiting for? Have a certification today in PHP.

We provide PHP web development services. If you would like to hire PHP developers for your web development needs, please contact us Mindfire Solutions.

PHP and its elegant features that controls web development

PHP on its way to success: At a time when the industry was dominated by Java and .Net, PHP had come up to challenge them on the battle. In early stage of its life cycle PHP was not a huge success, but with time, it received tremendous acceptance value in the industry. This is possible due to the continuous learning attitude of PHP. PHP has been undergoing several changes over time to suite the demand of the PHP developer and industry and hence it come out as a gem in the industry. Moreover, at a period when the industry was carving for a better web language, PHP turned out as a boon for the web developers; because web development process through JSP or ASP was damn tedious at that time where as PHP made it easy with its simple approach and write less do more concepts. This brought an overnight popularity of PHP developers in the industry.

PHP is a true web domain specific language: PHP can only be used for web application development; it can’t be used to develop desktop application like Java or .Net. So at a time when the industry was dominated by web applications, PHP turned out as a leader of web domain specific language. PHP developer can develop any type of websites on the fly. It can be used for agile web development process to develop enterprise standard web applications for the industry. PHP developers can develop any size of application efficiently in less time and more productivity.

It has an awesome feature i.e. Functions with Arbitrary Number of Arguments: Well, PHP has an awesome feature i.e. we can dynamically set the number of arguments for any function. Let me explain how it can be helpful. Suppose, in our web application, there is a function that needs the user to enter the arguments as per his choice; at that time, the application developer is unaware of the number of arguments that can be sent to the program. So, to handle this issue, we can use the above concept to develop our web application.

PHP is future ready: Yes! PHP is future ready; because it has all the future amenities under the hood. Technologies like HTML5, CSS3 and jQuery etc. These technologies can be used to write responsive web applications for different screen size, resolution and platforms so that the user can get similar user experience in all screen sizes. To add this, Cloud technology can be integrated by a PHP developer in the web application. With the integration of Cloud technology, PHP developers can give the users an awesome and hassle free experience without any worry for the memory storage size.

It is Open source along with its best friend MySQL: MySQL is treated as the best friend of PHP. It helps the PHP web developer in developing dynamic and data driven web applications on the fly. The best part is it is open source just like PHP. Hence we can expect an exceptional quality of software from the PHP MySQL combo. Moreover you can kick start your first web application using PHP MySQL from the first day itself without any investment.

You can get in touch with a PHP web development company India who can help you build projects within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide PHP web development services. If you would like to hire PHP programmers for your web development needs, please contact us Mindfire Solutions.