Why I stopped creating PHP projects with Wappler and why you probably should too

Coffee Lounge
61

I’ve been a customer of GoDaddy and SiteGround for years & years. I’ve done a lot of investigation of review sites. I don’t just grab any old “review” site. You can judge by the details, for one thing. I weed out the newbies that are blaming a company for their own mistakes.

You don’t see GoDaddy or SiteGround publishing BAD reviews. The only way anybody knows anything outside of the marketing departments verbiage is through independent forums.

I don’t by default trust everything I read. I know a lot about Bot sites & crap “reviews”,

1 Like
62

This has become quite a thread :slight_smile:

One other thing that will make a huge difference to getting us old PHP devs to harness NodeJS is the ability to migrate easily within Wappler. Take an existing Wappler project and be able to change it from PHP to NodeJS and have all the SC converting done.

If that is added, most will switch (unfounded guess with no reliable stats to support it!).

63

That would be amazing and the fact it is not present(because it is complex) is the only reason I advocate for people to start their next project only.

1 Like
64

node works on shared hosting - we use chemicloud.com’s shared hosting which supports nodejs apps in shared hosting.

2 Likes
65

Still it is more expensive compared to the options I gave.

image
image1125×947 591 KB

But even if more expensive it is still cheap. So the myth that nodejs shared hosting is expensive is debunked.

Still I would go for a cheap VPS where I can probably run twice as many websites with twice the traffic as on shared. But if people are afraid of VPS you gave a perfect and valid option.

2 Likes
66

yes, its expensive than VPS options you’ve shared coz cPanel license is expensive.

we’ve grown used to cPanel!

but would really like to try out caprover or similar PaaS.

2 Likes
67

I think the other issue you have is you are then expecting people to support their underlying infrastructure.

Shared hosting has the benefit that hey I just go here upload some files create my dB and I’m good to go. The hosting company takes care of everything else below the application pretty much.

Using vps (which I do prefer and use myself) brings about its own issues. Ensuring software is up to date, ssh locked down, debugging and supporting their own DB, performing backups etc etc

So I think a solution where it’s basically managed node is awesome for people to then stop having to worry about the underlying infrastructure and software security etc. They can just then focus on their app. Just me 2 cents

2 Likes
68

Here’s the list I found last week.
https://hostadvice.com/lp/hosting-services/nodejs/

I’m going to try HostComet first so that I can learn development with Node.js via Wappler.
https://www.fastcomet.com/nodejs-hosting

1 Like
69

Why not Heroku? The free tier($0) is more than enough to learn nodejs(besides your local setup of course).
Unless you want to test the waters of a shared hosting of course.

1 Like
70

Very interesting topic, thanks JonL.
In my opinion, with Wappler we don’t have to worry about which server language the application is written in, this is the SC task. Until we are faced with the publication of the project.
Why I am for PHP support:
I am far from administering * nix servers, and I am afraid to take VDS solely for the reason that, due to incorrect settings, I will pay for someone’s mining.
What could be easier (in my case) to create a virtual host on my Synology NAS (supporting only nginx/php), indicate in DNS domain name NAS IP. The development and testing environment is ready.
To do this with Node. js, I need to install a container, associate a virtual environment with a physical one, forward ports, give access to the container from the Internet.
Roughly the same applies to publishing, I can publish my project to any iron))).
If I have the opportunity to deploy my project under Node.js easy as PHP, I promise to forget about PHP.
Due to our federal laws, if I collect personal data of users, then my server must be located in the data center located in my country, so this personally stops me from using DigitalOcean, Heroku etc.
I watch the tutorials here on project deployment and envy my colleagues in Wappler.
From what I’ve read here, this is generally a common problem.
Mr.Rubi, nshkrsh talk about caprover, possibly support by Wappler-s will make it easier for ordinary users to deploy applications to node.js on any VDS/VPS, and the Wappler team focus on a single server-side language.

2 Likes
71

What I’ve seen since working with gitlab and github and checking out javascript and css library-dependencies of different frameworks and different propietary javascript branches is DEPENDENCIES!

PHP is SIMPLE to develop with compared to relying on the “full stack” javascript families.

When you have finally loaded all of the libraries necessary to make a “simple app” work go look at every line of code that has to synch up & be processed to make the app function.

The different js frameworks with ui libraries, fonts, css, image handling classes, blah blah woof woof to make a one-page node based app function across browsers & devices is monstrous.

And on build or rebuild every part of the dependencies has to go check to see if it is using the latest version & then replace the previous version with the new if you have created a hybrid or Progressive Web app.

Plus, deeply buried within one js file is some gizmo whose files have been modified by the developer or alt-fork developer and now STOP your app from working or loading completely because deep, deep within the myriad of co-depencies created by all the separate projects where this goodie is hosted someone has uploaded a newer version of the js files and BROKEN apps all over the globe.

So, caching strategies are so important because the total code load for a Node based app is so huge Caching takes on a dominant role in serving the application to a browser or device.

Go through any full-stack app and count up all the dependencies that rely on accessing perhaps hundreds of thousands of lines of code from multiple sources on different hosts around the world.

And for a developer it can be quite a needle-in-a-haystack search once an error is reported to finally pinpoint even WHY the error occurs because of so many dependencies that make references to even deeper libraries created, maintained, modified 2 hours ago in Sydney.

Anyway, this is why the tech biggies are working so hard with Artificial Intelligence and neural-learning because it is getting incredibly tough with every Advancement in web technologies for a mere human brain to track how to best engineer solutions for online communications apps.

https://www.oreilly.com/radar/the-future-of-programming-part-2/

2 Likes
72

I partially agree with you, but partially disagree. I’ll explain.

Yes, indeed, virtual hosting removes all infrastructure issues from the developer. Deploy and forgot. But it works well with PHP, because:

  1. We can simply migrate to any other hosting, because PHP is everywhere.
  2. We can easily install LAMP/WAMP on VDS/VPS or local server and everything will work.

The key is that this is very easy to do. A developer with almost any level of training is able to migrate a PHP project anywhere.

What do we have at the moment with nodejs? We made an effort and were able to find a satisfactory virtual hosting offer. We have placed our nodejs projects there. But then there was a need for migration, and alternative virtual hosting does not suit us, what to do? If it is necessary to transfer the project to a specific server at all? The complexity of the task increases geometrically compared to PHP.

I think the best thing to do is to find a universal way to host nodejs projects anywhere. And make this method simple and convenient. Then the hosting issue will be closed.

3 Likes
73

Thanks, JonL !

74

SiteGround where I have quite a few PHP/MySQL projects have often heard from me over the past few years.

To Siteground Tech & Support Personnel :wink:
I’ve said something like this –
Since I already have so many databases used by my php application WHY oh WHY can I not simply click a Button, ie, Export this “website” to a Mobile App?

For SiteGround this is internally a fairly simple process to give me another folder for Mobile (js stacks).
Where I have immediately configured the Node to MySQL connection script.
I get to use exactly the same database structure for SQL queries used in my Website php app.
Or, I can duplicate the schema for a NoSQL database on my Mobile App project and test the Queries I’ve already written.
and go from there using much of the html and forms with bootstrap divs, etc and browser-side javascript functions already existing for my php hosted forms and reports.

Even the service worker file can be generated from the existing php pages as a start before I do further changes, mods, tests and see what else I have to add or modify for a working mobile app for android, ios, etc.

Etc., etc. I tell SiteGround they are missing huge opportunities to upsell existing Clients using PHP.

1 Like
75

It not that I could not find a cheap hosting with Node.js but it’s about having a reliable provider speaking german, picking up the phone when I need support, haveing long-term relationship with my provider and being able to resell hostings.

I haven’t come along any need to move over to Node.js so far, as we’ve concentrated on realizing websites with solid serversided and well working client-sides code, all build with a reliable and easy to use tool.

Now as we’ve come to a point where our (quite huge) Wappler CMS is more or less finished, we might focus on pros of using Node.js. But it’s still necessary the all of the upcoming Wappler versions support php.

5 Likes
76

With support you mean bug fixing but not new features right?

77

What would you call a new feature?

78

Websockets for instance or templating.
Anything that is not already available in PHP as of now unless it’s an old feature that was not fully finished.

79

Your in danger of blowing your credibility with that one JonL

My shared reseller platform offers cloud based servers, up to 8 vCPUs / 8gb ram (autoscaling), unlimited bandwidth, unlimited SSD storage (Samsung)

There is some very high spec shared platforms out there

I go back to what i previously said, Node is great but PHP is far from dead

3 Likes
80

Hehe If I cared about my credibility I wouldn’t have started this thread.

That being said I was talking about your average shared hosting aka “godaddy”.

PHP is not dead, it’s dying. The numbers back my statement.