This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Java Buzz by Marc Logemann. Original Post: Java and the scripting world Feed Title: Marc's Java Blog Feed URL: http://www.logemann.org/day/index_java.xml Feed Description: Java related topics for all major areas. So you will see J2ME, J2SE and J2EE issues here. Latest Java Buzz Posts Latest Java Buzz Posts by Marc Logemann Latest Posts From Marc's Java Blog

These days you can see a lot of blogs dealing with the competitiveness of scripting languages like PHP, Python or Ruby against Java. I really like this discussion, because during my last 5 years of programming, i coded 3 years mainly in PHP and the last 2 years mainly Java. I know both open source communities quite well (the PHP one perhaps better because of my involvement in moregroupware) and designed/coded advanced projects in both areas.

I wrote an article about this issue some months ago. Its a little bit outdated now but still hits some major arguments for having at least one weak typed language, known as scripting language, in your personal skillprofile. A great example is my very homepage. I do RSS web syndication with a PHP RSS parser, this took me 2 minutes installing, because PHP is allready a module in my webserver. Ok, i do email RSS syndication with a java app, but this is not important now. I do CMS style things and a lot of Homepage helpers with PHP.

On the other side, its absolutely important to have also the strong typed language on board. Of course i suggest Java here. On projects where messaging or portability in managed environments is important, there is no alternative in the scripting world. I am quite lucky that i have the choice what type of language to use. The only concern i personally have is that PHP still lacks in OOP. Either i wait for PHP5 and check how they perform then or i will take another pill and start learning Python or Ruby.