FastCGI / Java Servlets

[Malgrim]

Hi,

I used to develop client side applications and am now on the brink of starting my first server based project, at least on a larger scale. Therefore I searched the web for the best way to do that and was a little surprised, that almost all web application in use, seem to be written in script languages (PHP, ASP, JSP, Perl, ...). Ok, I understand that these are the obvious choice, if the application is mainly about displaying some content. They are easily learned and simple to write. But I'll have to deal with a couple of hundred of users simultaneously, with most of the requests producing a lot of server load but little output.

Now, from all I read there seem to be 3 ways:

1.) Java Servlets (w/ or w/o JSP)

2.) PHP+eAccelerator or something alike (I'd expect to be the slowest)

3.) FastCGI + compiled programs (C/C++, whatever)

I ruled out ASP for other reasons.

What I'd like to know is, have any of you ever compared those options with respect to performance and/or development complexity? Any reason's why I should pick one over the other? And why ist that last option so unpopular?

Any experiences shared in building that kind of web application will be appreciated.

thanks,
Malgrim

[chazzy]

Your load issues have more to do with the performance of the server it runs on. Most frameworks provide for clustering. Any of the above will be able to deal with 'couple of hundred of users' simultaneously.

Complexity wise, java or php apps will be much easier to write than C/C++
Performance wise, C/C++ then Java (since even java is compiled)

You're probably a bit mislead as well. JSPs are compiled code. YOu can either run a JSP compiler (jspc) or let the app server compile the code for you. It's not interpreted on every request like PHP is.

I haven't seen anyone use FastCGI + C/C++ in a long long time.