PHP, Classic ASP and ASP.NET, and soon Ruby owe their success to shared web hosting. I honestly believe that shared hosting is more important than being "enterprise ready" when it comes to web development.

Shared hosting and success

Shared hosting is the reason that the internet became an economic force. It allows those with great ideas, business drive and marketing sense to build from scratch their dreams and inventions. It allows small companies to make themselves part of a global market place. Shared hosting has allowed individuals to express freespeech and for many to gain a freedom of expression that never would have existed otherwise.

The new web

The platform for the growth of blogging, communities and small trade is perched on the shoulders of the shared hosting industry. The recent boom of Web 2.0 technology and the growth in popularity of programming language frameworks is in great part due to the shared hosting industry taking the technology to the little people, the small business owner, the hobbyist, the student and anyone that has five dollars in their pocket.

Ignored and bored waiting

So why is it that certain parts of the IT world ignore shared hosting and it's needs? Ten years later Java is still not a shared hosts dream come true. Java has in fact brought on more nightmares than dreams. This is probably the reason why Java hosting costs double as much as PHP or ASP.NET hosting and is only half as stable. The Java Virtual Machine just does not make for a dependable webhosting environment. So despite the invention of the Java web scripting language, Groovy the Sun has not made any significant contributions to the web hosting industry. Java is also making it very easy for Microsoft push ASP.NET to the shared hosting level and help ASP.NET techonolgy to regain some of it's previously lost glamour. ASP. NET is shortly going to become as popular as classic ASP once was because it is becoming more and more shared hosting friendly.

Popularity is no guarantee

Python for all of its popularity and pluses is still not a shared hosting programming language. Though Python has made good strides towards becoming more of a web development language with the development of the Django framework. It has done nothing to improve its ease of everyday use. A framework is not what the man on the web is looking for. A framework can be just another item that the average shared web host will not install because of difficulties in deployment, maintanence and setup for the shared hosting user. What Python needs is for Python Server Pages to run via a secure and fast exe.

Frameworks and application servers?

Someone needs to speak with the Sun and Python core group and explain to them that a framework that has to be installed on to a server is not shared host friendly. That a web scripting language that is dependant on an application server like Tomcat or Zope is what makes shared hosting companies avoid them. What is nice and friendly is simple embedding of script code in HTML. This is what every web language should strive for before moving on to frameworks and application servers. Because if there is no embedded HTML possiblity interest by the groups mentioned in earlier paragraphs will be very low. This is where Ruby will make its break-through even though Rails is where the marketing is happening. eRuby and its little sister ERB are destined to make Ruby a contender for a top spot in the popularity polls.

Face lifts vs. Functionality

Perl has had forever to come up with a good solution to embedding Perl in to a HTML page. There is always talk of Perl being dead. I am even guilty of saying this but the truth is Perl is not dead. It only is suffering from being at the top and now is being pulled down to the same level as the other obscure web development languages like Java. I will tell you a secret. If they want to save Perl from wallowing into obscurity then the solution lies not in making it easier to read. The solution lies in being able to use Perl just like you would use PHP or ASP. If they stopped development on Perl 6 tomorrow and made Perl.exe interpret script embedded in HTML the usage spike would go high enough to give the Zend boys nightmares.

The secret for success

The fact is the way for all of the previously mentioned languages to compete with PHP as a web language is for them to be like PHP. What all of these languages have in common are

• Failing to provide a CGI interpreter that allows true embedded scripting for use in templating and simple application development.
• Having a long internet history without making the changes necessary to compete with ASP or PHP and giving the excuse of "enterprise ready" as a reason for not being web ready. In other words being satisfied that the language can be used as a CGI. Which really sucks!
• The need for dedicated servers for large applications.

Small jobs is big enterprise

I am humoured when ever a holy war rises upon on the vertues and usefulness of web programming languages. OOP usually comes up along with robustness. But what good is all the power and flexibility if it cannot handle the small jobs also? Enterprise capabilities may be important to the large companies but they are not of any interest to the man on the web. While it is proving to be impossible for these "enterprise ready" languages to push down to shared hosting level. It is becoming increasingly easier for languages like PHP and Ruby to push their way into the enterprise.

Quite frankly I am a bit relieved that not all web programming languages can be like PHP. Just think of trying to make a choice between six or seven equally easy to use web languages. Just think of how hard it would be to make that choice. Hmmm...just think of how wonderful it would be to have those choices.

Happy Publishing!

This article brought to you by the Hiveminds Magazine - Staff. Contact us if you want to post an article or announcement anonymously