Why can't they just start supporting a new extension that is pure PHP and both ways compatible? Like, no template tags, no global weirdly named functions (namespaces!) and a total cleanup of the library? Also maybe drop the $ and use def or let or whatever? Perhaps add a tool to bundle the script with the interpreter, for reliable deployments? You know, for when you grow out of the "shared hosting" phase?
That is MUCH but why not on the very long term? One can dream.
Something like a disclaimer: Last time I seriously used PHP, rumors said that PHP 6 was going to be big. I actually fiddled a bit with PHP 7 too. I wrote a file sharing script (incredibly messy code because the minutes I spent on it are in the same order of magnitude of those I spent on this comment), which turned out to be damn fast and I am impressed. Saying this as a person who enjoys Rust and Go.
That is MUCH but why not on the very long term? One can dream.
Something like a disclaimer: Last time I seriously used PHP, rumors said that PHP 6 was going to be big. I actually fiddled a bit with PHP 7 too. I wrote a file sharing script (incredibly messy code because the minutes I spent on it are in the same order of magnitude of those I spent on this comment), which turned out to be damn fast and I am impressed. Saying this as a person who enjoys Rust and Go.