Laravel is a PHP based framework for developing web apps with sophisticated and elegant syntaxes. Developers often refer to Laravel as one of the best among other top-notch PHP frameworks such as the Symphony and Yii among others because of its accessibility and excellent tools for developing reliable apps. This post is a comprehensive review of Laravel to determine what it is, the effectiveness and compares it with other frameworks.
How does Laravel Work?
Laravel framework was introduced in 2011 and has grown to become one of the most popular frameworks in use today. It is the most applied PHP framework with more than 30,000 developers applying it from all over the world. As a framework, Laravel is a structure for creating your own programs. This means developers apply it to create the actual structure of the preferred apps. Also, it helps the developer to connect to different APIs.
Laravel handles everything for the developer starting with web serving to database management. It is also used in HTML generation. The typical operation entails interaction via a command-line that not only generates but also manages the entire Laravel project environment. Using Artisan, command line tool, the developer can generate database schema stubs and skeleton codes. Artisan also handles configuration management and database schema migration.
Areas of Laravel Application
Laravel framework will deliver the best results when applied in the following areas;
(i) When to use Laravel
- Creating web chats.
- When handling anonymous functions (closures that help to create shorter codes).
- Designing and managing databases.
- Laravel is highly effective in handling proxies through load balancers and reverse-proxies.
- Laravel Lumen can be used to create API server in applications.
- It is ideal when developing features for enhancing the security of a new app. It utilizes salted and hashed passwords as opposed to plain texts. Besides, it applies SQL statements that make injection related attacks almost impossible.
(ii) When not to use Laravel
- Though Laravel is very effective in creating new apps development, it is less desirable for data streaming. Data streaming requires a framework that can process files as they are getting uploaded. In such a case, it is advisable to consider technologies like NodeJS.
Comparing Laravel with Other Frameworks
To address the different challenges of crafting quality sites and apps within short timelines, many frameworks alongside Laravel have been designed. How do they compare to Laravel? Here is a close PHP framework comparison to establish how effective they are compared to Laravel.
(i) Symphony PHP Framework
Like Laravel, Symphony is a PHP framework designed for complex enterprise level projects (large scale applications). The latest version allows developers to design scalable sites that are more flexible to differing enterprise requirements. It is very critical to note that the two frameworks support Scaffolding, accept multilingual content, and full text search cross-platform features. However, Laravel goes beyond Symphony because it is mainly used for MVC apps.
Advantages of using Symphony
- The main benefits of Symphony is that it allows scalability that enables Propels optimization, reducing the objects for hydration, and keeping the queries low using joins.
- When implemented properly, the cumulative speed is the total for all individual features speeds. This means that symphony is the fastest of all the other frameworks
- Symphony is highly adaptive to developer’s needs and provides optimal performance.
- It comes with reusable components that help to cut down overhead costs.
(ii) Yii PHP Framework
While Laravel is a framework created for designing web apps with sophisticated syntax, Yii is meant for developers who are interested in swiftness. Both frameworks are designed on MVC model wide controller and allow developers to implement large enterprise frameworks such as CMS and forums.
Advantages of using Yii?
- It is created on MVC Model-view-controller patterns.
- It is a full-stack framework that generates multiple turnkey solutions.
- Yii can take a higher number of requests per second compared to other frameworks.
- It is easily scalable. This makes it easy to modify multi-level caching support and NoSQL Database.
- It is easily compatible with other codes from third parties.
- It comes with great caching features such as APC and XCache.
(iii) Cake PHP Framework
This is among the most popular PHP frameworks today because of its great features and ease of authentication.
Advantages of using Cake PHP
- It is very easy to learn and apply in simplified apps development.
- Useful for enterprise website applications because it is based on MVC.
- The framework does everything from site location to configuration.
- It comes with ready to use templates.
- It is designed with special testing features that make assessment simple and really fast
(iv) A Closer Look at Laravel
For many new developers the main question is; why choose Laravel? While the outlined PHP frameworks have proven effective in one area or another, Laravel has demonstrated its uniqueness and attractiveness to developers. The framework is considered the best when working on MVC type of applications at both entry and enterprise levels.
Advantages of using Laravel
- The Laravel framework is key in assisting developers to enforce constraints that occur between different databases using top level builder mechanisms.
- Many developers prefer the framework because it comes with one of the easiest versions for controlling migrations.
- The framework is fitted with the auto-loading system. This means that a developer does not require manual maintenance or inclusion paths. The automated system is also great for generating new tools with the help of IoC container.
- The process of authentication is very simple in Laravel compared to other frameworks. The inbuilt system only requires the user to configure the system’s models, controllers, and database migrations.
- Top security features that make the framework supported apps surer. The framework uses SQL injection with PDO parameters, Cross Site Request Forgery tokens, and Cross site scripting to guarantee developers of extra security for their apps.
- The process of declaring events in other application frameworks is the length and very involving. However, the system has been highly simplified in Laravel because developers can use event object to declare apps.
Laravel Disadvantages
In Laravel development, it is important for the user also to explore the main disadvantages and gauge them against other frameworks pros. Here are the main disadvantages of Laravel
- Laravel is relatively new and, therefore, many developers might opt for an older and relatively mature technology such as Python.
- Laravel is a lightweight framework. This means that it’s inherent support is poorer when compared to other frameworks such as Ruby. However, this problem has been addressed using various third party tools.
From the comparison, the best PHP framework is Laravel because of its simplicity and diversity of tools. The robust features including Artisan features make configuration management easy and apps development fun. Though Yii comes close to Laravel, the later remains ideal and, therefore, the most preferred by developers.
A comparison of Laravel with Other Technologies
When working on web apps, it is important to understand all the available technologies and pick the one that guarantees better results based on your needs. While Laravel stands taller when compared to other PHP frameworks, how does it score against other technologies such as Ruby on Rail, NodeJS, Python, and Java?
- Ease of App Development: Laravel PHP framework came out in this review to be very easy to use the framework because of rich features and tools. It operates on the same level with NodeJS because developers coming from other systems such as Ruby on Rail or Python can easily learn Laravel and grasp its functionality easily. Its auto loading templates, however, make it one of the best among other frameworks.
- Addressing Errors: Laravel stands tall compared to other technologies when it’s about error handling. The closest, NodeJS, still features inconsistencies though it has tried to address them in the latest version. Other technologies such as Go require the developer to manually test and correct errors. However, Laravel has special tools and automation that make it easy to identify errors and fix them promptly.
- Frameworks’ Performances: Laravel has demonstrated its superiority in performance compared to Python and Go. Laravel handles for the web developer beginning with web serving to database management. This ease of operation makes creating an app structure easy, fast and fun. However, NodeJS is somehow better than Laravel on performance because it can handle concurrent requests with no limitations.
- Database Management: Laravel uses advanced query builder system to enforce constraints that arise between multiple database objects. It also has a simplified management for migrations that greatly eases the developer’s work. Ruby on Rail come very close to Laravel because of its database schema migration support for enhanced management. In NodeJS and Go, these features are still in infancy.
Every enterprise has its own needs and requirement and from the above detailed study about Laravel and its comparison with its counterparts, it is clear how Laravel has made an impact on the world with it’s diverse functionality. The above comparison explain which technology or framework fits which business and how Laravel can play a very significant role in technology selection.