Taking PHP Seriously
summary
Claim: PHP’s choices around save-and-reload workflow, request-isolated shared‑nothing state, and simple per-request concurrency materially cut bug cost and speed development. Evidence: Facebook runs tens of millions of lines of PHP, ships code ~10× weekly, invested in an HHVM JIT that hits ~5–15× interpreted PHP, and built Hack, an opt‑in gradual type system (hh file header, strict mode optional). Implementation costs show up too: ~30% of generated JIT code relates to reference counting and each request pays ~10 ms bootstrap.
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chapters (28)
- 0:00Introduction
- 0:43Why PHP
- 4:02PHP Updates
- 5:27PHP Criticism
- 6:22Objective Reality
- 8:49Criticism of PHP
- 10:37Value reference semantics
- 11:39Reference counting
- 12:52Inconsistent library
- 14:06Unforced errors
- 14:37Three important things
- 15:23Programmer workflow
- 16:35State
- 18:21Concurrency
- 20:49PHP is an emergent property
- 21:43PHP is not happy with Java
- 22:21Type systems
- 22:58Hack
- 24:38Workflow
- 26:29Cheat Sheet
- 27:16Type Inference
- 27:51Type Check
- 29:11Language Checklist
- 29:44Competitive Position
- 30:32Dynamic Algo Languages
- 31:00Shoutouts
- 31:32Question mark ends
- 33:34HVM
