Easy to get started, then what? I didn't learn how to structure big projects until I moved to better languages that encourage (through defaults) better practices.
Predictable !== well defined. If you have to look through a chart for equivalence, it's unpredictable to the programmer. But this is a theme for all of PHP, you can't deduct equivalence, function names and function arguments orders, you have to memorize or peruse the manual. Sure, it works, but it has drawbacks.
The requirements for a huge (often overgeneralised) enterprise application are very different from a little script for personal or small-community use. There are far more of the latter than the former, and those wanting to "get started with web programming" are going to start out with that too.
"I didn't learn how to structure big projects until I moved to better languages that encourage (through defaults) better practices."
Do you think that PHP is the only language where developers look to other practices in other language communities to learn different/new/better/changing practices? Every good developer is aware of patterns and structures in other languages/platforms - I dare say it's almost the definition of a good developer. I would not regard a Ruby developer who'd only ever done Rails projects as a 'good' developer, regardless of how clean/elegant the code seems.
Predictable !== well defined. If you have to look through a chart for equivalence, it's unpredictable to the programmer. But this is a theme for all of PHP, you can't deduct equivalence, function names and function arguments orders, you have to memorize or peruse the manual. Sure, it works, but it has drawbacks.
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