Is PHP a better choice for larger & complex projects?

Over the last few years, PHP has turned out to be one of the most popular scripting languages and its popularity seems to increase all the time. The principle reason behind its popularity is the fact the language is extremely easy to be picked up and can be used to design as well as develop customized web pages. This ideally implies that by opting for PHP as the principle implementation language, a user can have the liberty of building a web page that is dynamic, rather quickly as well as easily.

However, when it comes to dealing with larger projects, it is highly imperative to take certain measures to make PHP development an effective tool for larger as well as more complex projects.

The measure includes:

• Separating the business logic from the presentation itself

• Taking the help of individual developer(s) instead of a development team

• Taking Special care of those areas where the initial simplicity of PHP can make things too much complicated for you

Though PHP at times can create a lot of issues in the case of bigger projects, taking special care in these three aspects can make the scripting language a handy one.

Separating the business logic from the presentation itself

The websites that are designed nowadays are scripted in such a way their reaction time is minimal when it comes to meeting the changing demands of the market. From the point of view of the developers, this means that they need to alter the contents of the website along with its looks in a seamless way and with minimal effort. This can be done by separating the presentation (which means the site's aesthetic look) from the very logic of the business (which means the activity of the site or what the site is expected to do).

This type of separation will provide an opportunity of engaging two separate development teams – one team, taking up the responsibility of setting up the business logic and the other team, taking up the responsibility of designing. As very few programmers are equally competent in visual designing, this clearly gives a significant edge over the competitors. This is more apparent in case of development of bigger as well as more complex projects with the help of PHP.

Now, let us see the other ways in which any disadvantage that PHP carries with it, can be negated. The principle objective of PHP is combining the HTML that will create the main get up or the look of the site along with the logic that is used to carry out the business. The codes develop the contents of the site, that can easily be derived from a database. Even developers who are not that experienced find this easy to deal with and this makes PHP such an easy language to understand. This makes all the difference even during bigger or more complex projects.

To make sure you can make the most of PHP during development of larger and more complex project, the following checklists should be maintained.

• The amount of control that needs to be there over deployment platform.

• The number of people who will be working on the particular site – at present as well as in the future.

• The size of the site needs to be ascertained in advance and the number of pages needs to be determined alongwith.

• The life cycle of the page or in other words, how long the page is expected to last? This will determine the extent of changes that the page will undergo and depending upon that, the users can extend the PHP with a suitable templating system.

• Also, take into account the extent of experience that the developers have, along with the complexity of the site as that will be determining the changes that the site will undergo.

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

Best Frameworks in PHP for ERP Applications

The complex nature of business processes has made it a daunting challenge for developers to build robust ERP application rapidly. With more and more enterprises outsourcing business processes, the ERP application needs to consider the requirements of several distributed teams. But there are a number of frameworks in PHP that allows developers to build a variety of ERP application rapidly. Most of these frameworks support the model-view-controller (MVC) approach, while allowing programmers to optimize the app’s performance by structuring their code. If you are planning to build a robust ERP application rapidly, it is a good idea to know some of the best PHP frameworks that will complement your project requirements.

Five of the Best PHP Frameworks for ERP Applications

1) CodeIgniter

The robust framework comes with a set of advanced features that make it easier for programmers to rapidly build ERP applications. In addition to facilitating fast page loads, CodeIgniter further allows developers to avail brilliant documentation and assistance from a large community. The non-strict structural requirements, at the same time, make the PHP framework cost-efficient. You can learn and use CodeIgniter without putting any extra time and effort. Also, the online community forums and chat services will help you in clarifying your doubts and questions.

2) Zend

As the framework developed by makers of the PHP, Zend is used widely to build ERP and business applications. It also allows users to access loads of plugins and advanced features, along with optional free downloads. Unlike other PHP frameworks, Zend enables you to access a custom server. You can use the custom server to check the look, feel and performance of the application across multiple platforms, without additional configurations. However, Zend will require you to invest some funds initially. Also, you have to incur additional expenses to buy add ons from Zend. If you are ready to spend some money, Zend will help you in building robust and customized ERP applications quickly.

3) Yii

Yii is considered to be one of the most effective frameworks to develop social and business applications. It allows you to optimize the performance of the ERP application by availing features like SQL injection, input validation and several security tasks. The framework can further save your time by generating the base code automatically. Also, Yii, at present, is the fasted loading PHP framework in the market. However, you have to invest both time and efforts to learn the ins and outs of Yii. The lack of books and tutorials will further require you to avail the assistance of other PHP developers.

4) FuelPHP

FuelPHP comes with features found in major PHP frameworks. But it combines these features into an approach that is both fresh and distinct. You also have option to refer to active comprehensive and updated Fuel documentation, along with getting help from a large community. The PHP framework is further updated frequently to support new features. Like CodeIgniter, FuelPHP can also be learned without putting any extra time and effort. But you will find the code to be less compact in comparison to CodeIgniter. The framework allows you to optimize the ERP application’s performance by implementing your creative and innovative ideas.

5) Symfony

In comparison to other MVC frameworks, Symfony is much more customizable. You also have option to improve the ERP application’s performance by using different software components that are being used by the project already. Many developers also considered Symfony to be the complete framework to build ERP and business applications. You have option to determine the security level of the application simply by configuring the two writing folders required by Symfony.

While developing an ERP application, each PHP developer has option to choose from several frameworks. So you must evaluate different PHP frameworks according to the specific requirements of your project. However, you also need to keep track of the new and innovative frameworks being launched at frequent intervals. Expert php web development India teams can help you build projects within allocated budgets and time schedules.

If you want to outsource php development services or if you would like to hire php developers from top php development companies in India, please contact us at Mindfire Solutions.

Why PHP 6 for Enterprise Level Web Development?

The development as well as evolution of languages is but very natural and PHP 6 is the representation of the language's development as well as growth. PHP 4 or PHP 5 had nothing fundamentally wrong but with PHP 6 some issues that were plaguing the language have been sorted, making the language a lot more user-friendly. With respect to many aspects this version has been like cleanup release. The improved language now features a robustness and ease of use that draws the programmers to it, making it ideal for web development at the enterprise level. Some of the features that make it so functional are given below:

Unicode support- While creating websites, character encoding is something that we hardly think about. The only decision that has to be taken is the way to tell user agent about the encoding used and even this is quite simple enough to do. But while building applications, character encoding becomes a problem and here the Unicode support helps a lot. This enables the language to encode and decode automatically the output and input of script which ensures that both user agent along with database receives the encoding needed but without any additional functions for encoding conversion.

Cleaning up the act- In this version a lot of bugs as well as errors have been taken care of which had previously resulted in problems like security holes and slow scripts. Functions like safe_mode, register_globals and magic_quotes have been take care of. In PHP 6, these features have disappeared; many programmers have breathed a sigh of relief with this. Super globals had some long versions such as $HTTP_COOKIE_VARS and register_long_arrays which have disappeared. The mode dealing with PHP 5 classes' backwards compatibility zend.ze1_compatibility_mode has been taken care of as well.

OO functionality- OO model has been improved a lot which can be said to be this version's biggest improvement. The previous version had improved tremendously and this version just carries this improvement further forward with the addition of namespaces. Those familiar with C++ or XML namespaces have ideas regarding the working of namespaces. These actually provide a method to avoid name collisions among classes and functions but without the use of prefixes for the naming. Objects, variables or functions are grouped under a specific name by this so that class names can be used by developers without any problems despite the fact that the particular name may be used by somebody else multiple times.

Alternative PHP Cache- An application's performance can be improved immensely through caching which speaks for the huge demand for excellent opcode cache in PHP default distribution. With demand there are people to cater to it, resulting in APC or Alternative PHP Cache. This was available already sometime back but this extension has now been included in the core for default caching framework.

Further miscellaneous changes to extensions- Basically PHP can be said to be an aggregation of extensions and whatever form we have; in fact, it consists of all of that put together. These extensions however, change and with that the collection does as well. PHP 6 will follow in the footsteps of PHP 5.1, boasting of a great combination of XML Writer extension for writing of XML files and XML Reader enabled in its core distribution. This will allow people to work easily with XML files.

Dismissal of the library of ereg regular expressions is another change carried on in core distribution. Instead this has been made an extension. The previous functionality of ereg lied in being PCRE's competitor but due to some problems it has been removed from core, making it an extension instead.

Some other new changes have been introduced to the language. Basically huge feature updates have not been followed through but majorly a lot of glitches have been eradicated which has made this language an easy tool to work with for most application as well as website developers. In fact, websites of some of the industry giants are run on PHP, making it all the more an attractive platform for development. You can hire developers from top php application development companies in India who can help you build projects within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide php web development services. If you would like to discuss with a certified php developer from our team, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.

PHP Development - A Potential Technology for Web Application Development

Each web application developer has option to pick from a wide variety of programming languages. But developers across world opt for PHP to build robust web applications by availing a number of advantages. The huge popularity of server-side programming language can also be estimated from the fact that over 21 million websites and web applications are designed using PHP technologies. As PHP can be embedded within HTML effortlessly, the programmers can build high-performance application without writing complex and lengthy code. At the same time, the open source nature of the technology makes it easier for enterprises to curtail web application development cost. If you are planning to switch to PHP programming, it is time to understand its potential for web application development.

What Makes PHP Web Application Developers’ First Choice?

Higher Level of Compatibility

As a powerful web programming language PHP supports major operating systems like Windows, UNIX, Mac and WIN32 QNX. At the same time, it is also compatible with major web servers including Netscape, Apache and Microsoft IIS. Further, the programmers are not required to write longer lines of code, as it can be easily embedded in HTML. A PHP application can also run through an already installed simple local host, and thus does not require any specific Integrated Development Environment (IDE). The compatibility of the technology with major operating systems, webs servers and IDEs makes PHP the best option to build web applications.

Curtail Application Development Cost

With more and more companies venturing into web application development, the business has become complex and competitive. At the same time, the ongoing recessional phase of the economy has made it essential for enterprises to explore options to reduce project overheads. Unlike other proprietary web programming languages, PHP is open source, and can also be used free of cost. Also, PHP enables users to process real-time data by using content management systems like Joomla, Wordpress and Drupal, without paying any licensing fees. The open source nature of PHP is also contributes towards increasing its popularity.

Optimize the Application’s Performance and Scalability

PHP is further used by developers across the world to build a variety of complex, interactive and high-performing web applications. Many programmers even choose PHP for both front-end and back-end development to optimize user experience without putting any extra effort. The language is further effective in ensuring maximum capability of the code in its functionality as well as execution. At the same time, PHP is considered to be more scalable and reliable, in comparison to other server-side programming languages, for developing custom web applications. As the language work seamlessly on the conventional LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL and PHP) stack, it becomes easier for programmers to optimize performance by connecting and aggregating individual components. As the stack does not consume more system resources, the process also contribute towards reducing the time required for loading and executing the web application.

Also Usable for Building Mobile Applications

Many reports have highlighted the constant growth in the number of users accessing internet on their mobile devices. So a web application must be compatible with major mobile operating systems to become hugely popular. Along with developing a variety of web application, PHP is also used by programmers to build mobile apps for mobile platforms like iOS, Android, Windows and Blackberry. The language further enable developers to build both backend-code and front-end user interface at a time, while taking advantages of distinct data sources, cloud services, CRM systems and social networks.

Easy to Learn and Use

The beginners have to put some amount of time and effort to learn a new programming language. In comparison to other web programming languages, PHP is much easier to learn. So the beginners can easily switch to PHP development. The simple command functions and logical syntax further makes it easier for developer to create and optimize applications by describing exact features and functionalities. Also, the developers having prior experience in C and Perl will find PHP much easier. The similarity of syntax will further enable them to write code within a very short span of time.

A web application developer also has options to use customized PHP frameworks to build a variety of robust web applications rapidly. At the same time, the beginners can further avail the support of a large community of developers, along with accessing a large collection of documentation, tutorials, FAQs and online help. Expert PHP developers India teams can help you build projects within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide custom PHP development services. If you would like to hire php programmers from our team, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.

Compare, Ponder and Choose- The Right PHP Framework

With more and more local businesses going online, web application developers often find it a daunting challenge to impress clients. Along with optimizing the performance, scalability and aesthetics of the website, it has also become essential for a programmer to complete the project at a rapid pace. Therefore, most developers use PHP frameworks to build a powerful web application at a rapid pace without writing lengthy code. The frameworks further allow programmers to reuse code for projects of similar nature. A programmer also has option to pick from a wide variety of PHP frameworks. So each developer must know some of the widely used PHP frameworks to choose the right option according to the specific needs of his project.

5 of the Widely Used PHP Frameworks for Web Development

Symfony: As a full-stack framework, Symfony is popular among beginners due to its simple and easy-to-use nature. The novice web developers also have options to access a wide range of books and tutorials to resolve problems. The latest version of the framework comes with a comprehensive library of classes written in PHP 5, components, tools, test suites and template engines, along with architecture to build complex websites at a rapid pace. The programmers can further use the command line generators to start new projects quickly, while availing the advantages like automatic code generation. But a user has to put some amount of time and effort to understand Symfony, as it is different from other PHP frameworks. 

Zend: As an open source framework, Zend allows programmers to build a variety of web application and web services using the new features of PHP 5.3+ like namespaces, lambda functions, late static binding and closures. It is also popular due to its own IDE and web browser support. Zend is also widely used by programmers across the globe due to its effectiveness in form creation and data filteration. With more than 15 million downloads, Zend framework has become synonymous with PHP web application development. However, the innovative and advances features make Zend complex. So the beginners often find it difficult to start using the PHP development framework. But the framework is the best bet for programmers who are familiar with the software.

Yii: Within a very short span of time, Yii has joined the league of the best and widely used PHP frameworks till date. It also targets most of the small problems that other frameworks ignore. Along with being future-friendly and highly functional, the framework further allows developers to solve new problems arising during the coding phase. It also saves the time of programmers by simplifying some of the repetitive tasks like creating, reading, updating and deleting the code. A programmer can automatically generates the base code, and saves developers from writing longer lines of code. However, the beginners do not have options to access books and tutorials related to Yii as the framework is comparatively new.

Codeignitor : The easy-to-use to features of the PHP development framework has made it popular among both experienced developers and beginners. It also provides a comprehensive architecture and a simple yet elegant toolkit to rapidly build robust web applications. As Codeignitor is designed with an MVC folder, it makes easier to separate business logic from presentation without putting any extra effort. At the same time, the lightweight software further enables developers to optimize user experience by integrating third-party applications. A developer also has option to access good documentation, and avail the assistance of a large community to solve problems immediately. However, the Codeignitor allows freeway coding that is prone to various types of errors.

CakePHP : CakePHP is widely used by web programmers to build, deploy and maintain a variety of complex web applications at a rapid pace. The framework further allows programmers to avail several advantages by writing PHP4 compatible code. A programmer can avail several advantages by using this PHP development framework including high performance, large-scale monolithic libraries, standard hosting compatibility, minimal configuration, and clear documentation. The beginners can further avail support by accessing tutorials, message boards and groups. But CakePHP is designed with a set of strict conventions that affects its flexibility. 

A web application developer has option to pick from a large number of PHP frameworks. Each framework is further designed with a set of features and functionality to enable programmers to build websites at rapid pace. But a programmer must understand the pros and cons of each PHP framework before choosing the right option. It is also important to pick a PHP framework by keeping in mind specific needs of the web development project. While thinking to outsource php development projects, clients are looking at developers who have solid expertise in specific framework and not just generic PHP.

We provide php web development services. If you would like to hire php developer from our 100% certified team of PHP developers, please contact us at Mindfire Solutions.

PHP App Development Matters the Most

PHP is widely used by developers across the world as a server-side scripting language to build robust websites and web application. At the same time, many programmers also use PHP as a general-purpose programming language. Since its inception in 1995, the language has been installed on millions on websites and web servers.

Unlike other web programming languages, the PHP code is interpreted by the web server through a PHP processor module. So the code written using this scripting language can be embedded directly into the HTML source without requiring any external file.

As PHP is open source, it can be used by small, medium and large enterprises without paying any licensing fees. If you are exploring server-side scripting languages for your web development project, it is time to understand why PHP app development matters the most.

Significant Advantages Offered by PHP App Development

• Free to Use: An increase is noted in the number of enterprises opting for open source technologies to reduce application development cost. As an open source programming language, PHP complements the budget of all enterprises. So the language is the best option when one is exploring ways to bring down the website development cost. Further, the PHP developers understand how to optimize the usage of this free-to-use platform. The faster access ramp provided by the language makes it easier for programmers to implement innovative ideas.

• Compatibility across Operating Systems: Each website or web application, nowadays, needs to be compatible with major browsers and operating system. As the choice of platform varies from one user to another, programmers have to ensure that the application is working flawlessly on all operating system. The PHP web applications work on widely used operating systems like Windows, LINUX and UNIX with optimized functional efficiency. The cross operating system compatibility makes PHP the best option to develop web applications.

• Better and Efficient Integration: Programmers often integrate several technologies to optimize the website’s performance. Further, they explore options to deliver content to the users in a form desired by them. PHP supports both HTML and HTML5. So the programmers can easily include innovative features to make the web application more interactive and engaging. At the same time, the PHP application can automatically generate output in several file formats including PDF, Flash, XML and XHTML. The support for multiple file formats will make it easier for the website to impress users by delivering the output as text, PDF or video.

• Option to Enable GZIP: In addition to supporting several file formats, a web application also needs to render the files at a quicker pace. So programmers explore option to execute the script in a faster and quicker way. While developing PHP application, developers have option to enable GZIP to execute the script and render files quickly. As the PHP files are directly deployed in executable format, a compiler can execute the script more quickly. Further, the GZIP compression will reduce the size of compiled code to reduce the time required for script execution.

• Build Robust Ecommerce Websites: PHP is effective in building both static and dynamic websites. It is also being used widely to build robust ecommerce websites. Normally, the ecommerce websites are more complex, and also designed with third-party integration. Along with allowing users to browse through the products and services, the online portal must enable them to make payment in a fast and secure way. PHP is used to optimize the look and feel of the web store. At the same time, the scripting language further allows developers to seamlessly integrate third-party applications developed using different technologies.

• Use Loads of Tools and Databases: Most developers love to use the tools and components provided by PHP. Some of these tools enable them to test and debug the application in a hassle-freeway. At the same time, some tools like Google Maps and FirePHP make it easier for them to optimize user experience without writing lengthy code. Similar to the tools, a developer can also avail several database specific extensions. For instance, a programmer can use Open Database Connection Standard or PDO to connect to a database.

A developer also has option to choose from a wide variety of php web development frameworks including CakePHP, CodeIgniter, Zend, Qcodo, PEAR and PHPSpec. The frameworks come with loads of tools and functionalities to enable programmers to build a robust website without writing longer lines of code. Further, the frameworks make it easier for enterprise to evaluate the performance and scalability of the web application as part of their test-driven development plans.

We provide php development services. If you would like to hire php developers from our team, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.

Lamp Development for Developing Dynamic Websites

Many developers look for innovative open source software to develop dynamic websites at rapid pace. Often developers have to adjust their code to make the internet application compatible with most operating systems, web servers, databases and browsers. But some free and open source software like LAMP enables web developers to avail advantages of several platforms. In fact, the term LAMP is an acronym that represents the first letters of Linux, Apache web server, MySQL, and PHP, Python or Perl.

However, the combination of the software included in a LAMP package may vary based on the web scripting software. The huge popularity of LAMP has further encouraged many companies by launching customized packages with different combination of web server, database, software language and operating system. For instance, the developers using Microsoft Windows platform can use the WAMP package that runs seamlessly on IIS. So a company can easily customize the open source product to meet specific requirements of its project.

What Makes LAMP the Best Choice for Dynamic Web Development?

Innovative Development Tools

Most developers look for customized tools to avoid longer lines of code. The use of tools also contributes towards shortening the project timeframe. As a LAMP package includes Linux, Apache, PHP and MySQL, each developer has options to choose from a wide variety of tools to complement the needs of the internet application. Along with providing a huge amount of flexibility and freedom to users to implement their ideas, the tools also make it easier for them to optimize the look, feel and performance of the website without putting any extra time and effort.

Options to Build Platform-Independent Web Applications

The constant changes in the choices of modern users have made it essential for programmers to explore creative options to make the internet application dynamic. To become hugely popular, each application needs to be compatible with major operating systems, web servers and databases. Also, the choice of scripting language is also selected according to the nature of the application. So each programmer has to write and edit the code to optimize the performance and scalability of the website. With LAMP, a developer can easily develop web application that can avail the benefits provided by some of the widely used databases, web servers and programming languages. So the web application becomes effective in targeting users across the world.

Easy to Write Bug-Free Code

To become popular, a web application also needs to be bug-free. While writing the code, many programmers explore options to make it bug-free. The LAMP stack makes it easier for developers to write bug-free code. The option is more important for the enterprises that are yet to adopt the agile testing methodology. The stack will ensure that the code remains bug-free, and the programmer is not required to spend time in identifying and fixing bugs. The early identification and fixing of bugs also help the enterprise in launching the website as per the predetermined schedule.

Easy to Deploy the Web Application

Along with developing a bug-free web application, the programmers also need to deploy it in an exact manner. Many programmers find it more challenging to deploy a website. They also find it a daunting challenge to the programming language seamlessly with the database and web server. But the LAMP package does not require programmers to put any extra time and effort for integrating the programming language, web server and database. As PHP is used by the product as a standard Apache module, the developers can deploy the LAMP web application in a hassle-free way.

Build Applications Locally

Many companies prefer developing websites locally. They want to develop and test the web application locally, before deploying it onto the web. The features and tools provided by LAMP allow enterprises to build the website locally. Also, the performance of the application can be evaluated and optimized before deploying it online. The local development feature also saves resources, and contributes towards keeping the project cost under control.

As LAMP is an open source product and can be customized easily, it can complement the requirements and budget of all types of enterprises. Without investing a huge amount of money, an enterprise can use the product impress clients by building dynamic websites and web applications at a rapid pace. You can hire developers from top php application development companies in India who can help you build projects within allocated budgets and time schedules.

We provide php development services. If you would like to discuss with a certified php developer from our team, please get in touch with us at Mindfire Solutions.