[Udo]

As someone who did a lot (and still does some) server-side development in PHP, I disagree about the newbies part, I think it's deceptive.

Doing PHP right is challenging, and for bigger apps it requires more insight into the internals of the server and the client than, say, a comparable application written for Ruby on Rails. PHP certainly gives you enough rope to hang yourself, and while I personally do enjoy the length of rope it gives me, it's also very clear that newbies have no chance of making the right decisions given this tool.