Let's talk about node.js. A lot of people are saying that node.js is the future. That it will take over PHP which means also Laravel. For those of use who love Laravel and have invested time and resources in learning it - should we be worried? Can node.js really replace PHP on the server? What does that mean for Laravel? What are you thoughts on this?
People have always been saying that X is the future and Y is on the way out. Over the longer term (as in decades+) sometimes they are right but mostly things just carry on - some people will move to a different language stack, some will stay, some will arrive.
Whether it's 'rails is the future - php is doomed!' or 'node is the future - php is doomed!' or 'golang is the future - node is doomed!' - it all comes and goes. I think I lost track of number of times I'd heard that C was doomed sometime around 1985 and yet here we are all using tools written in it.
Use the tools and languages you like, the ones that make sense in the context you're working in - keep an eye on the landscape around you and experiment with new things sometimes. Will PHP be around in another decade? Probably. Will it be as popular & will Laravel still be around? Maybe.
I haven't heard anyone talking about Node.js being the future. Node is in its very early stage and is still a work in progress, and right now it doesn't even come close to Python, Ruby or PHP.
Laravel and Symfony are actively developed and are the ones that revived PHP as a language and its community and are very good tools for prototyping web apps.
Now, I don't personally think Node.js will take over. And that you shouldn't be worried... but don't put all your eggs into one basket. Don't go all-in Laravel and nothing else. As a good software engineer, you should be competent enough to get a job in software development in any language. If all you can do is simple websites in Laravel with no other engineering knowledge, I suggest trying to learn a bit CS fundamentals and/or other tech stack.
I also think that the beautify of Laravel syntax doesn't even come close to how complicated and difficult the syntax of Node.js is for beginners. So I'm willing to sacrifice some speed in the name of beautiful/elegant code.
