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Best PHP Framework for Social Media Start-up platform?
Hi guys,
We are developing a social network with some nice new features not seen yet. We are only two small elements away from our invite beta but we have come to see some challenges.
We have developed our own framework but recently we have been talking about moving to something opensource - like Laravel Framework.
Laravel came recommended to me by a friend but i wanted to hear what other developers might have of experience in this matter.
You can see our project live at www.nerdloop.com to get a view as to what it is we are creating and what framework might be good for it.
What are your experiences with use of PHP Frameworks??




The tutorials alone sold me when my boss pointed my attention to SilverStripe.
https://docs.silverstripe.org/en/3.3/tutorials/
While it is not a platform per se - check out http://www.getstream.io for handling the newsfeed and follow/following functionality. Also, for Notifications. They have a PHP client, and a Laravel framework integration.
I'd like to recommend Symfony 2 (or even 3, if you'd like), as it is a fast and component-minded framework that's the base of Laravel, allowing you to fully extent it for your own use. Also comes with a bunch of 'core' components, allowing you to debug, backtrace and analyse your code in your browser. Might take a little more time than a 'normal' framework to get used to it, but certainly worth the time! (www.symfony.com)
Thanks for your reply. I have used Symfony 1 i guess it must have been and we ended up with being restricted when we expanded - so I haven't looked at it since to be honest :) But I will give it a look as you recommend. Maybe stuff has changed for the better :D
I had a similar reaction based on a few Symfony 1.4 projects I had worked on (started by other developers). Symfony 2 and 3 are really fantastic in comparison, much more modern and very modular. A lightweight option by the same dev is Silex, which uses Symfony core components but has it's own routing and "controller" (routes) system.
Thank you for your input. I will have my guys look at symfony to see what the new versions might offer compared to the other options. :D
I'd go with laravel.
Seconded. I have tried a couple frameworks for PHP, and laravel definetely seems like the one that is the easiest to structure for larger scale applications. However, if you (OP) are going to use it for a major project, please do evaluate a couple of alternatives (by making some small apps with them) first. Don't take our word for it ;)
Too late - i will totally hold you accountable :)
Thanks for the reply. Looks like several ppl like laravel and some recommended lumen version. Out goal is to get a little more tracking and FW security to make new coders get in the project faster.
It looks like Laravel is the preferred and Phalcon for when we grow up and succeed. :D
Thanks. We have been told Laravel, Lumen and Phalcon.
Phalcon looks awesome BUT, then we need someone with C-code knowledge hehe and right now we are looking for some php backend and app ppl - i dont think going C would be a smart start move.
But nice to see laravel is promoted and used. We had heard of it but never looked at it that deep.