QA: Future of PHP/Mysql?

Future Of PHP/Mysql?

Iam a php/mysql developer. I wanna know whether staying in php and mysql forever would affect my future. Most s/w people are in either java or dotnet. Iam novice in both of them. I love php and i dont wanna shift from it. Please tell me whether staying as a php developer is good enough to have a settled future in spftware industry. Pro's and Con's respected.

I've found that when working with clients, they're more concerned that their ultra-modern website shows off the latest technology, and thus far I've been able to blend those with PHP quite nicely. Examples...

Multi-user Flash applications (not just movies) that communicate with a PHP/MySQL driven server via XML packets.

AJAX on the client side, with data being compiled and manipulated by PHP on the server end.

it doesn't matter in which field u r working as a programmer ..... what matter is .... to be perfect in ur work ...... if u r in PHP ..... be sure that u can handle any project in PHP ...... in IT industry ..... ofcourse java and .NET are better than PHP ..... but there is one fact that in this industry ...... future is bright for any programmer ...... beause there are lots of company for PHP, java and .NET programmers .... which also pays good ..... and at last future is bright for IT persons

I am a Perl programmer myself which as you know is similiar to PHP. I often hear other programmers at my job asking the same thing and I think that there will always be a need for programmers in every language. Look at how old COBOL is and there are still jobs out there with people making lots of money. Sure there aren't as many COBOL jobs as there are Java jobs but they're out there. Java and C# and .NET are all fine and dandy but there are still loads of Unix servers out there all of which are equipped and ready to roll with Perl and PHP. It doesn't hurt to know the new stuff but it also doesn't hurt to stay with the old.

PHP is a very good language and is used all the time in industry. Most Yahoo properties actually use PHP in some form or another. According to statistics, more than half of dynamic pages on the internet are written in PHP.

If you know MySQL, you can pretty easily learn any other database language. I personally had only used MySQL until I recently needed to learn Oracle, which is basically the same as MySQL plus a few extra little things and some quirks.

However, I do recommend learning Java. Although PHP has many uses, there are some areas where Java really excels. I think that you'll find that once you know one programming language, it really isn't too hard to learn another since all the concepts still apply. Java is used more for backend systems, especially for enterprise applications.

In summary, you'll be perfectly fine with just PHP/MySQL, but taking the time to learn new languages such as Java, C#, etc really give you an edge on the competition in the job market and can definitely contribute to your career.