I use mainly PHP for web development, but recently, I started thinking about usi

Question

I use mainly PHP for web development, but recently, I started thinking about using Google App Engine. It doesn't use PHP which I am already familiar with, so there will be a steeper learning curve. Probably using Python/Django. But I think it maybe worthwhile. Some advantages I see:

Focus on App/Development. No need to setup/maintain server ... no more server configs
Scales automatically
Pay for what you use. Free for low usage
Reliable, it's Google after all
Some concerns though:

Does database with no joins pose a problem for those who used App Engine before?
Do I have to upload to Google just to test? Will it be slow compared to testing locally?
What are your thoughts and opinions? Why would you use or not use App Engine?

Explanation / Answer

Be careful around thinking that it's reliable just because it's from Google. Computer systems do go down and GAE is no exception. One particular case is described here. The reason I post this article and not any of the other ones on the same subject is that it's describing recent problems, not something from a year or two ago.

Automatic scaling and pay for what you use models can also be problematic if your app gets popular quickly. Admittedly, for many that's not really an issue, but it is something to be aware of. You can't really tell people to not come to your site because you don't have the money to pay the bill that month.

Personally, I'd probably stay away from GAE (and cloud services in general) at this point. I haven't found server configuration to be particularly cumbersome in the past (and on a shared hosting account it's not really my problem anyway) and I like staying in control of my data. If I ever hit the point where I need the scaling capabilities of the cloud providers, then I'll look into it again. Till then... cheap common hosting is better.

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