Web Design & Marketing Blog

What Language Should My Website Be In?

Category: Blog

Written by Matthew Millet

The title of this article is a question that I'm often asked by business owners and entrepreneurs who are looking into investing in a web application or requiring a web presence for their ventures. Many business minded individuals figure that the first step in getting their web development done is to figure out what language they want their website to be in. This is probably the first and foremost mistake that I have watched business pioneers make when it comes to choosing technology solutions. Don't tell a web developer how you want them to get you your results, just tell them what results you want right now and where you plan to go with it in the future.

I've been paid hundreds of dollars to consult with entrepreneurs regarding the development of their .com dream, and every time the people I was meeting with had previously consulted with another expert who had recommended languages, web servers, or database systems for their web application. When the hammer hit the nail these investors and business pioneers were willing to lay tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars on the line based on what understanding they had regarding the technology that should be used to make their dreams into a reality. Maybe these other consultants aren't to blame for the horrible misunderstanding of those that had hired them, maybe they are. From the context of my story up to this point I'm sure you realize that I'm going to let you know that they did not have a thorough enough understanding of the technology required to create their product to decide what language, platform, or frameworks would be best to deliver it to the world. What's worse, they've squandered hundreds of dollars in consulting and research to get this false understanding.

But wait, why do so many developers get religious about a language or platform?

The answer to this question is that we are nerds. We nerds love to waste countless hours arguing the inductive reasoning behind the most trivial of decisions. I've been known to throw down a slur of acronyms and 6 syllable words at the mere mention of using emacs instead of vim. Don't know what those are? The point I'm trying to flesh out and persuade you towards is this: if you don't know what those words mean, you shouldn't care. If you need a consultant to explain to you at a hundred dollars an hour why they don't think Java for server side scripting is dead, and PHP script kiddies are n00bs, then you should decide not to care about whether Java, Ruby, C#, or PHP is better.

You aren't going to understand these things after some brief consultation. Some very brilliant, experienced, and educated people will tear the proverbial throats out of some other very brilliant, experienced, and educated people over what language, web server, or database system is best for what applications. I've even argued with a boss of mine for perhaps an hour about how much white space looks neatest between lines of code. It's what we nerds do. I may be making a judgment here that has been influenced by stereotype, but I'm going to go out on a limb and state as fact that business owners and start up entrepreneurs don't want to waste hours of their time and money on arguing how much white space looks neatest.

Okay... so what language should my website be in?

This is the stretch I'm trying to sell you on. I know it may be hard if you have spent buckets of money and resources on consultants who very persuasively tried to sell you on what language or server they may have legitimately thought was best, but you do not want to spend time and money on deciding what database system to use, what language to use, or what web server to use. A good development staff (or a good developer for you mom and pop entrepreneurs) will know what low level technological solutions to implement to give you the solutions you need for now and the future if you tell them what you need now and in the future. If you don't have a good development staff (or developer) then it doesn't matter what language you decided to hire someone to make your site in anyways.

Now that I've given the context of the problem a little more light (I hope) I'm going to confess that the intention of this article is not to start a language or operating system flame war. I'm not saying this to be all mushy, but the reason all of the big database systems, languages, and web servers are issues of such contention is that they can all accomplish a great deal in their own ways with their own strengths. The bottom line is to get things done. These two words will be your best friend when it comes to communicating with a web developer: specification requirements. I'm going to say it again: specification requirements. I use those words 20 times a day.

Specification requirements are what you want the product a web developer develops to do. Some people don't like making a complete list of all of the things a product has to do because it's hard, but a good developer will help you make them. Notice that I said help. If they could just guess every feature you wanted and could make it themselves, then what are you there for?

I once consulted an entrepreneur struggling with a website that cost hundreds of thousands of dollars and still didn't do what he wanted. I spent a few hours trying to explain to him he needed to make a list of all of the things he wanted his site to do. Then I pocketed hundreds of dollars and walked away from the project forever without giving him anything he could use. I gave him what he asked for, don't get me wrong. I didn't rip the guy off. I tried. He refused to listen to me, because he thought he understood the development process. Why did he think he understood the development process even though he didn't know what specification requirements, the very beginning of the development process, were? Because he spent way too much money on development up to that point to keep his pride and admit he had no idea what he was doing. Not having any idea what you are doing is okay. It might be scary, but really, it's okay. You're fine. The reason people like me have a job is because you don't know what you're doing. What I'm asking you to do for your own sakes, since you are my employers, is to be okay with the fact that you don't know what you're doing.

Remember this axiom we developers use to describe the client (client is a slur in some circles) “the client is always wrong: they don't ask for what they want, and what they want is not what they need.” Is this true? Too often. You don't want to be the client that wants something they don't need, and asks for something else entirely.

Okay, so if we don't decide what language our site will be in, what do we do?

The answer to this question is, I regret to inform you, the least favorite answer I've ever given a client: that depends. But don't close your browser window yet, hear me out, I'll get to the point already.

If your site has to do a lot of new things then you need to find a developer or development team you trust, make a full list of all of the things that the product has to do, check on the progress regularly to be sure that the developers are heading in the direction you want them to, and be super happy because you got everything you wanted done in the most efficient way possible.

If your site doesn't have to do anything new then your job is a lot easier. I've had a client come to me saying he wanted a shopping cart, and wanted me to bid against a company offering to set one up for just over a thousand dollars. I showed him Zen Cart and his nephew set it up for free. I had a friend who had a client hand him a full specification requirement list that was 100% satisfied by Excel. He was nice enough to tell this woman to put her check book away and showed her how a spread sheet could do all that she wanted and saved her thousands of dollars. I've had people come to me with some very large dreams, and we're shocked when I showed them all that a hosting service/CRM like Lexy Sites could do for them. Sometimes they saw features that they didn't even know they wanted.

Wait, you guys are that important!? So how do I find a good one of you?

Yeah... about that. If your site is simple, no problem. Find a freelancer if you have something that needs a few hours of work you can't figure out on your own (like installing Zen Cart), or get a hosting service that offers site set up like Lexy Sites from VivaNet 2.0.

If you're site is a bit more complex, then you need to do a little bit of shopping around. Please, don't pay a consultant to try to explain things to you that you don't understand. You won't understand them in two hours, and I'm telling you, you don't want to understand them. Ask your contacts if there are developers or firms that they trust, and hire them. Results is what you want, try not to get caught up in our nerdy crap about how many times we hit enter between lines of code.