Decided to bite the bullet and learn PHP, which is used for nearly everything at my job. My starting voyage was to mess around with “pure php”, as in, no frameworks, no libraries, not even javascript, just the basic server with v8.3 running and some (currently very shitty) CSS styling.
So, I decided to go with a 2 step process: first, a site for me to post my stuff, with the possibility for external users to make accounts and leave comments. Step 2 would be making a forum where said users can interact. Before I began coding anything, I wrote down the database specification, though it’s still “open for debate”. I also didn’t pay attention and made all tables as MyISAM initially instead of InnoDB, which made me lose all foreign keys, thankfully easily remedied given the small size of the project.
Thus far, I’ve got the user creation, listing, login (with hashed password), post creation and post viewing working. Visitors, normal users and admin see different links and forms, depending on pages, all with inline php code in appropriate pages - for instance, (unlogged) visitors don’t see a comment box when reading a post. I’m currently working on the user edit page.
Anyway, why do I think I’m doing a lot of “wrongs”? For starters, I’m not using classes. At all. Functions are being added “globally” to one of 3 include somepage.php; that are in every page; every database related function - select all, select 1, update, are all in the db.php file. So, every page load is also loading the entire list of database functions, plus a bunch of html-automation related functions, even when none of them are used. Since PDO::fetch() returns an array with mapped keys (ie: $result['column1']), I feel like I have “no good reason” to use classes, especially as I’m still putting some finishing touches on the tables. I mean, I can access the relevant data with $bla['column_name'];, which is all I need thus far.
A lot of the resulting html comes from echo, some of it from functions to handle it more easily, like passing an array so a “global” function of mine returns it as neatly organized <td> elements.
There is no MVC, just good ol’ <a href> and <form method=post> where they need to be. All my forms’ actions call a separate php page that’s just code to handle the form, always as POST, in order to check blank fields, size and character constraint, etc.
I’ve no doubt that, as is, my project has a number of security holes, though cross-site scripting and session poisoning are not among them. I did try sql injection and couldn’t get it to work, so good on me.
As awful as this project might be against “the real world” use, I feel weirdly proud of what I’m achieving. Is there a name for this feeling, of pride for something you know is subpar?
Ahhh, self doubt, my old friend…
“There is probably a better way” is a fairly common feeling. In fact there probably is a better way. But at some point you need to be pragmatic and be happy with “good enough”. Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good (enough) as they say…
That said - follow your intuitions as well that things could be done better. Don’t be afraid to just re-write a bunch of things to see if an idea works better. Like grouping things from some “common.php” into domain specific functionality (dates.php, db.php, etc.). Or re-working how your front-end works. Maybe read other code or ask for code review from people more experienced, or even from an AI (yes, yes, I know, but they can be useful).
One problem you can find yourself in is that you’ve created code that’s very difficult to understand, but since you’re “in it” right now you understand it completely. If you put the code down for a week or two and come back to it you may find it very difficult to re-learn. If using classes, creating a DAO layer, or some other pattern helps to make your code easier to read then it’s worth following.