Hi everyone, A few years ago, I started a website without really making any plans. For my template, I created header and footer pages, and used PHP to include these files into every single page. I'm starting to hate PHP now because of all the mess it creates, and realized that to move away from PHP (I'm leaning towards Perl), I would have to alter every single page of my website. I guess I don't really mind doing that this one time, but I want to make sure I never run into the same problem again. So my question is: What is the best way to structure a website? I know some people use something like "example.com/?page=pagename" which would take away the redundancy of the include statements in every page, but I don't know if this is good practice. Should I just install a CMS to do this stuff for me? Thanks.
If you want a easy solution, yes. Wordpress, Drupal, or Joomla. You can make friendly url's like my-site.c0m/my page/article-name vs. my-site.c0m/page-name.
I did the opposite, I got away from perl and went with PHP. I didn't go with a CMS, instead I created a header and footer file like you. The index.php is used to fetch the other pages. If you click on either of the websites in my signature below, you will see the url for the pages look like horsegalleria.com/horse or horsemodels.com/faq. These are not folders, but rather the php files to be included between the header and footer. This simplified my site and you can't tell I running PHP. Another advantage, you can place your php files outside of the htdocs folder. The only php file I have that apache can see is index.php.
Don't want to start a flame war with Perl enthusiasts but there doesn't seem to be much of a future there. Maybe Python?
Thanks for the replies everyone. The reason I want to switch to Perl is because I already know it. Why would you say that there isn't a future for Perl? HorseGalleria, that seems like a really nice way to arrange your website. Would something similar to that work with Perl?
The issue here isn't php - its your structuring of your code so I dunno why you're blaming PHP for the 'mess' it creates. PHP is only as good or as bad as the coder! And as you've said you created a site without really making any plans. We all did the same in the start I find PHP and the Smarty Templating engine great. Seperate out the code from the design and all you have to do is include your pages in the main template. Great if you got tons of some modules on the same page.
Yes, it would be very easy to do the same in Perl. I'm using a switch statement in my PHP code, but Perl 5 introduced a switch like statement called "given/when", or you could use "if/else" statements. If you want to see my index.php file, let me know and I will PM it to you. Don't be concerned about Perl going away, it isn't. Perl 6 has been in the works for some time. I wouldn't use Smarty for a simple site, it just adds another layer and you would need to learn Smarty. I have a 3rd party shopping cart using Smarty and as I look at the code, I keep asking myself, why did they use Smarty when native PHP would work just fine. To me, it adds bloat to the code and it runs slower. The should have used a MVC framework. My HorseGalleria site use a MVC no-framework framework to eliminate the bloat and complexity. The same no-framework framework could work with Perl also if your site gets more complex. Here is some info on it: http://toys.lerdorf.com/archives/38-The-no-framework-PHP-MVC-framework.html
You're right. I'm sorry. The changing to Perl part was irrelevant to this question. (I had decided to add that extra phrase right before submitting the post! Bad idea!) I just wanted to know if whether or not a CMS would be a good choice to me. I think I feel more comfortable writing the code behind everything so I'll stick with not using a CMS for now. HorseGalleria, MVC seems like just concept I need! Thanks! I will definitely look into it!
I recommend you make a index.php file with a structure like this: - include(header.php) - include(menu.php) - include(<link clicked in menu.php>) - include(footer.php) This way you don't have to put any code in your content pages. You don't have to do this in PHP, it should be possible in Perl too. You can make your menu manually, or you could make a script that reads a folder with all your content-pages and puts them in the menu automatically.