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I am just stuck a little in making a choice between PHP chart Lib and JavaScript Chart Lib. I do understand that PHP if for the server side and Javascript for the client side. My problem is what difference does it make when using their charting libraries. Is it performance issue or what?

I want to understand the difference in using PHP chart Libs and JavaScript Chart Libs. Please am not looking for examples of their chart libraries. I am looking for why i should choose one over the other.

I tried to google 'php chart vs javascript chart' but didn't get any links that can give me the difference.

EDIT 1

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If this question has been answered before, then point me there.

2)

Am developing the application for internet

EDIT 2

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I have found out about PHPChart PHPChart which has both PHP source code and JavaScript source code. If anyone has experience in that library, does it may be solve the problem of server side load (bandwidth issues) etc.. I am thinking since it has both the PHP and JavaScript source then it may be the best to use. Am just assuming. :-)

Thank you very much

Eddy Freeman
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  • Could you update your question to include whether you're developing for an Intranet or Internet? You can make some assumptions about Intranets if the clients are well known – Brad May 08 '12 at 16:13
  • Do you know about Highcharts.js or Google Charts API? – Florian Margaine May 08 '12 at 16:21
  • :-) I just read something about Highcharts now. I don't want Google Charts API since clients data needs to be sent to Google(clients may feel uncomfortable with it) and also i want the library to be local. – Eddy Freeman May 08 '12 at 16:24
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    Here's my take. From my experience, if you are a PHP programer and but not so strong in JavaScript, http://www.PHPChart.net would work out greatly to your advantage because with PHPChart you are essentially creating client JavaScript charts, but only in PHP. It could save the day and get your HTML5 charts and graphs done quickly and not to have to worry about underlying JavaScript that has notoriously painful learning curve for many newbies. I thought it was brilliant. – devXen Mar 12 '13 at 07:06

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Both ways of creating graphs have their own pros and cons.

If you decide to do it using PHP, first you need to make sure that you have all the required graphical libraries installed (e.g. GD, which might not always available on shared hosts).

Assuming you have them, the first negative thing in my opinion is that you will end up with static images. Of course, it's not always a bad thing, as that ensures compatibility with all the clients, be those with or without javascript support, however, it takes away the dynamics of graphs generated on the client side using javascript. Your users won't be able to zoom, move, slide, full screen or do anything that they could with the likes of Highcharts or Flot.

Another con is that images take up more bandwidth than, say, JSON. The bigger you want to have your graph, the more colors it contains, the longer your clients will have to wait till your page loads. And just because those loads are not asynchronous, they will have to wait for the images to load before they will see the rest of the page.

With javscript libraries everything is different though. You only request the data required for your graph and you only request it when your page loads. The amount of data is usually smaller than an image would be plus you can compress your output with GZ to make it even smaller. Users will see nice spinners informing them that the graph is loading instead of some incomplete webpage.

Another thing to take into account is - what if you decide to show a nice table with data in them below each graph? If you chose to render images on the server, you would end up having to add new functionality just to get the data. With JSON, however, you just make one call, render the graph and display the table. Maybe calculate totals or do whatever you want with it. Hand it out to people as an API if you wish, after all :)

If you ask me, I would definitely go with client-side graphs as most of the devices have nice HTML5 support nowadays and being able to display a graph on an Android phone, or an iPhone or an iPad shouldn't pose a problem. If you only need images and you don't wish to expose the original data, go with PHP.

Andris
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  • Thanks for your awesome answer. I like it alot – Eddy Freeman May 08 '12 at 18:19
  • Bear in mind that a cached image could well be quicker to load than executing code to generate JSON or XML even if it is small. It will require database access and processing, so strictly speaking time to load a page cannot only be defined in the number of bytes sent to the browser – Brad May 08 '12 at 20:08
  • @Brad I agree. Forgot about caching images. It's not as easy as it sounds though as some browsers might ignore headers and either request the resource again or not request it at all. A quick search led me to this question on SO: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/865484/how-do-different-browsers-handle-caching-for-static-content-without-an-expires-h. I know it's old but even now you never know what those browser developers are doing. Especially if it's about Firefox :) – Andris May 10 '12 at 19:06
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Here's what I see :

Using PHP

  • Increase load on the server for the request
  • Will work everywhere
  • Also, like someone said here and made me think of it, you can cache the image that PHP give you, reducing bandwith (no lib to download) and reducing load (cache)

Using Javascript

  • Decrease load but increase the bandwitch and addition http request (to load the JS lib)
  • Will work where JS is available

But remember, PHP take more load then an HTTP request.

Also, always remember, Javascript is made for effects and specials stuffs you need to display.

David Bélanger
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  • @hamczu Well a PNG image generated by PHP can be maybe 15-20kB and a good JS lib can be over 80kB even compressed... – David Bélanger May 08 '12 at 16:17
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    Except the js is cached the first time the page is hit. It is unlikely that the graphs will all be cached however. Not to mention that for several graphs, you only need the library once. Not for images. – Florian Margaine May 08 '12 at 16:20
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My opinion is that having a server side solution (i.e. php) takes away any browser compatibility issues you may have with a client side solution (i.e. javascript) and hence support issues.

A benfit of using JS is that it does offload resources from your server to the client because you may only have to generate some light weight data (e.g. JSON , XML) and the rendering occurs on the client. You will have to investigate how many hits your server is likely to get, etc to determine if resource is an isuse with PHP or JS.

However, using Php to create images of charts you can always get around the performance/resource issue by using a cache of the image files and serving from the cache (it's a just a folder of images) instead of generating a new one. Whether you cna use a cache will depend on your usage. If clients require up to the second data and its always changing, obviously a cache may not be of use.

Brad
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There is one PHP render advantage that no one told about. Since sometime you need to include chart as image into PDF, DOC, XLS etc. file or email it – you have no other way except to render chart on server and store it as image to be inserted.

zelibobla
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For data manipulation you use PHP.
For visual and behavioral effects you use JavaScript.

For that reason, you should use Javascript as its designed for visual behavior. Plus it will put less load on your server as all processing will be client side. As more people use your application simultaneously, it will start to slow down as your server will be doing a lot more then it has to.

Hope that helps :)

Farhan Ahmad
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