Portrait of the author

You could walk past this stockily-built 36 year old of Scandinavian decent, polite, short haired, short trousered on this cruise ship and not notice him amongst the other 2000 guests. And, yes, he can and does circulate freely without challenge. Those few of us who know who he is respect his privacy, and the rest of the ship haven't heard of him.

Who is he? He's Rasmus Lerdorf, originator of the PHP programming language that powers much of this site, and still very much in charge. And, when you have the opportunity to listen to him for a day as I did yesterday, you come to realise that it's no accident that PHP is the great language that it is - he's an excellent captain steering this Open Source ship, and he knows where he's headed and when he's not going too.

"I don't care" is a common saying of Rasmus's. But you have to hear him saying it to put it into context and to understand him. He's written PHP as a templating systems that's now a language for web content and he's done an excellent job. Keep it simple. Keep it easy to use. Keep it on target for the application for which it was designed. Enhance it to support new technologies within its area, but don't try to add and add features to meet everyone's requirements away from the Web and templating. If such features were to be added it would be slowed, obfuscated, harder to use and it would inflate like a balloon. Inflate a balloon enough, and it bursts.

So - if you're using PHP for exotic applications away from the Web, you'll find Rasmus saying "I don't care". You're very welcome to use it, he's not saying don't ... but you can't expect him to support enhancement requests you make. If you're using it (as Leah is here) for a Web Application, Rasmus has your application and your future as his mainstream design goal for the future. And the PHP ship has an excellent captain; I'm delighted to be on his vessel.
(written 2004-11-27 09:09:54)

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