PHP: Often "lite" Is Just Right · 12 August 2007, 22:02
I have been a software developer for a little over ten years now; in that time I have written software using a wide variety of languages. With most languages, the key to fast success seems to be finding the right (i.e. most widely used, most idiomatic) frameworks or libraries to use.
I find that with PHP I am often developing on memory or I/O starved platforms; for these situations the “right” frameworks tend to be too memory and/or CPU intensive for the hardware (or VPS) that is hosting the application. More often than not in these situations I use an Extreme-style of JIT infrastructure development approach.
For example:
- Create a lightweight DB wrapper class to make DB queries easy
- Create a simple data-holder class to centralize and make retrieving application configuration settings easy.
- Create a lightweight display framework that separates the app header, footer, and page layout into separate files.
As a project / site grows I add to these libraries to fit the needs of the site. If it gets large enough to warrant more beefy hardware, RAM, and disks, then I look at converting to PEAR libraries and larger frameworks, which tends to be fairly easy as I already have class wrappers for most functionality in place at that point.
— Max Schubert
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