What is PHP?

PHP stands for ‘Hypertext Preprocessor’. It is an open-source language that is often used for the development of dynamic websites and web applications. PHP was initially built to help individuals make personal web pages and also generate HTML codes. Over time the scope and usage of the language have expanded. Now, it offers a wide range of functions, options along with a range of web services.

What makes PHP Popular?

Almost 79% of the world’s websites are made from PHP and it is ranked amongst the top 10 popular programming languages. So what makes PHP so popular? 

• Technically the attribute that makes PHP unique is the fact that the code is executed on a server that is embedded into the HTML. This code is then sent to the user directly, rather than getting executed on the visitor’s browser. This way PHP focuses on the server-side of the development.
• PHP is helpful in building cross-platform applications. 
• Another major advantage of PHP is that it can easily work on all major OS like Windows, macOS, Linux, Unix, and more. It gives the ability to the developer to go for a web server or OS that is most suitable for their needs.. 
• PHP also makes it easy to scale up websites or applications, customize them based on the project, business, or company requirements. 
• Website and web applications built on PHP have a quick and responsive UI (User Interface).
• From a developer’s point of view, PHP is easy to learn, runs on a wide range of web servers, has a large number of frameworks, and has great support due to the extensive community. 

Clearly, PHP makes sense both for developers and enterprises.

While PHP is easy to learn and execute, to build robust websites or web applications it will be essential to have developers who have an in-depth and practical understanding of the language. This becomes even more necessary when working with remote PHP developers.

Since it is an open-source language, the pool of PHP developers is also wide, and choosing the best out of them can be an uphill task. In the subsequent sections of this article, we will talk about how to hire remote PHP developers, the skill sets, the experience required, and more. Read on…

Hiring Remote PHP Developers – Key Tips

In the world of web development, PHP has earned its place because of its ability to do a wide range of things. PHP can help in data encryption, send and receive cookies, generate a variety of content, used for image outputs, PDF, and Flash movies. 

PHP tools are powerful and precisely are the center of WordPress development. Not just that they are also used by huge websites like Facebook, Wikipedia, Etsy, Slack to name a few. So, irrespective of the scale of the website required, PHP is a good choice. Though while outsourcing the web development project and hiring remote PHP developers, the skills and experience you look at will depend on the scope of the project.

So, let’s understand what are the roles and responsibilities of a PHP developer and the skills you should evaluate while hiring remote PHP developers.

Roles & Responsibilities of a PHP Developer

While hiring a remote PHP developer it becomes essential to lay the roles and responsibilities of the PHP developer. So that it becomes easier to evaluate and set objectives right at the beginning.

Here are some basic responsibilities that you can expect the PHP developer to perform and you can set the expectations when you are hiring remote PHP developers.

• Efficient development and implementation of website or web applications, meeting timelines and quality standards set by the company.
• Ensuring that the website is compatible across various platforms, browsers, and various software program versions.
• Ensuring that the website or web application developed is easy to scale up when needed.
• Using the latest tools, technologies within the PHP ecosystem to ensure that the website is in line with the latest industry standards.
• Collaboration and cooperation with stakeholders of the project to ensure timely execution of the project including implementation of various changes required at various stages.

Skills to Evaluate While Hiring a Remote PHP Developers

A skilled PHP developer will not just have a basic understanding of the language, they will have in-depth and practical experience of working with PHP and building websites or apps for various OS or web browsers. Beyond this, they will also be proficient in maintaining the code, troubleshooting, and doing QA when needed. The skill sets and experience you look for will also depend on the complexity of the project. Below are some of the skill sets that you must look for while hiring a remote PHP developer –

Basic Skills to Evaluate When Hiring Remote PHP Developers

The basic skills that any PHP developer should have will be –

• In-depth understanding of the language, updates, and frameworks that come under PHP.
• Knowledge of JavaScript, HTML, and CSS.
• Understanding of control systems like – SVN/Git.
• Hands-on experience in working with CMS like Drupal, Joomla, WordPress, etc.

Mid-level Skills to Evaluate When Hiring Remote PHP Developers

If you are looking to hire remote PHP developers with mid-level experience, beyond the above-mentioned skills sets you should look for the below

• Experience in working with frameworks like  Laravel, Symphony, YII2, etc.
• Ability to analyze product requirements and work accordingly.
• Experience in implementing various databases like SQL/MySQL.
• Experience in the implementation of back-end features for ensuring improved app performance.
• Ability to troubleshoot a code.
• Proficiency in OOP or Object Oriented Programming.
• Knowledge and practice of development standards, like Don’t Repeat Yourself (DRY) that help in easy code refactoring and debugging.

Expert-level Skills to Evaluate When Hiring Remote PHP Developers

If your project requirement is complex then you might look to hire remote PHP developers who are beyond the above-mentioned skill sets have expert level skills sets that include –

• Knowledge and understanding of all the latest PHP frameworks.
• Ability to steer the project and use frameworks that work best for the project requirement.
• Experience in working and collaborating with various stakeholders.
• Knowledge of the end-to-end development project and notice and point out gaps beforehand.
• Understanding of development processes like Agile.

Soft Skills to Evaluate When Hiring Remote PHP Developers

More often project owners ignore soft skills while hiring for technical roles. But they are extremely critical, especially in the remote world. While hiring remote PHP developers you must look for the below soft skills – 

• Ability to have clear and concise communication.
• Understanding of the business objectives.
• The acumen for quick problem-solving.
• Ability to collaborate with various stakeholders and steer the project.
• Efficient time management skills.
• Basic understanding of UX/UI design.

In Conclusion

PHP is the language of choice for enterprises and developers alike for developing a responsive website or web application. Factors like – open-source, easy-to-learn, ability to help in building robust and responsive websites and apps, a large community of developers, etc. will contribute to its rising popularity in the future too. 

While outsourcing the PHP development of a website or app it will be essential to hire remote PHP developers who can leverage and make the best use of the wide range of frameworks, features, and benefits offered by PHP. At EngineerBabu, we help you hire remote PHP developers for all scales of projects. Over the years, we have worked with numerous businesses from a variety of industries and domains. As a team, we helped them build best-in-class websites or web apps based on PHP. If you want to hire PHP developers for your website or web application, reach out to us.

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In 2021, PHP is empowering more than 79% of the world’s websites. Hence, it ranked one of the top 10 most popular programming languages globally. PHP is usually preferred among developers due to its easy syntax and simple to learn. In addition to that, it runs on almost any web server, has various frameworks to make development easier, and has a tremendously large developers community.

PHP development is used for many Content Management Systems (CMS) and e-commerce platforms such as WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, ZenCart, and Magento, etc. During the previous decade PHP has witnessed the introduction of several modern-day frameworks such as Laravel, CakePHP, CodeIgniter, and Zend. All these frameworks are specialized for leveraging scalability, customization and speed capabilities in software development. Overall, this makes the whole development process quite easier and quicker which makes developers to work freehand or as the remote PHP developers.

What PHP Development can do?

PHP is known for doing multiple things. PHP isn’t simply restricted to output HTML, however can be utilized to finish a wide range of assignments. For example, PHP can be used in data encryption, send and receive cookies, produce page content, and can even be used to output images, Flash films, and PDF documents. 

The PHP development tools are incredibly powerful to be at the focal point of WordPress. However, WordPress is one of the biggest blogging platforms and is yet widely used by large sites, such as Facebook, Wikipedia, Slack, Etsy, and many more.

In the software development world, PHP is viewed as one of the most widely used and renowned programming languages. On the other hand, it is also one of the most disputable programming languages out there. Let’s check out the major reasons to hire remote PHP developers and why this trend has evolved in the span of a decade.

7 Reasons To Hire Remote PHP Developers

1. Flexibility and Cost-Effectiveness

Among the various platforms available today for web development, PHP web development gives you the most cost-effective alternative. Commonly, for business leaders attempting to make a website on a minimum budget. Hence, the idea of working with PHP is profoundly valuable. In addition to this, now working with developers has also become very flexible and one can easily hire Remote PHP developers for their business endeavors. 

With remote PHP developers, organizations can minimize the expense of developing their website and make it highly affordable for them. As, the charges of remote PHP developers could be quite less as compared to hiring a full–time employees team.

One of the other reasons why you should adopt PHP development is the ability to hire remote PHP developers who can offer flexible services. You simply need to request for price quotes during the execution of projects and appreciate readiness when they render services to clients.

2. Innovation and Support

The meaning of hiring remote PHP developers is evident as it drives advancement and innovation for organizations. With the creative and passionate approach of remote PHP developers, they are exceptionally famous in the field of web development.

Additionally, you can get support from the developers online community. It involves a group of exceptionally experienced developers having the knowledge of codes, modules, and training. Getting the required assistance from the online community also helps to eliminate the hindrances in the area of PHP application development. The association of an online community likewise guarantees that the remote PHP developers play their part satisfactorily for the development of websites.

3. Compatibility with Web Browsers and Enhancing ROI

Millions of Internet users usually surf websites or search for products or services through different internet browsers. Likewise, the website of your business should work properly on various platforms and internet browsers. It is just when you access the skill of expert PHP developers who can design a dynamic and enticing site. The website should work on various internet browsers and assist you with getting the feedback or reviews of a huge number of clients and users.

Competition is unavoidable for businesses to sustain into the market. Each company takes a vow to outsmart the other with their quality product, services, and attractive websites. Thus, entrepreneurs need to make essential investments for technological innovation to get excellent results and generate more benefits.

Among the responsible driving factors for enabling business websites. PHP is profoundly valuable and you should definitely hire remote PHP developers to make it possible. Apart from that, the availability of this platform at reasonable rates. Along with that the capacity to provide significant results to users to generate more ROI for their respective organizations.

4. Can Save Money

It’s not necessary that employing IT professionals and specially hiring remote PHP developers is costly. For such cases, you’re not only searching for somebody to do a standard job. Rather, you require somebody who will assist you in scaling your business. Building a site isn’t that easy as it sounds, you need to deal with numerous relevant aspects. Thus it is important to hire remote PHP developers that are capable and expert in their craft. 

One of the advantages of hiring remote PHP developers is that you save a lot of money. You will recruit such developers who are expert and live in such urban areas where the cost of living is low. Besides, you don’t have to pay for office space and all of what that includes.

5. Can Access Global Talent

In business, saving cash is always appreciated. However, bad  recruits cause organizations to lose huge amounts of money, energy, time and overall it’s the most exceedingly awful feeling ever. Whereas, great recruits can make your organization fly. Hiring remote developers isn’t only about saving cash, however it’s about approaching top IT talents.

Many organizations used to hire remote developers while getting into the worldwide talent pool while looking to hire remote PHP developers. Also, it isn’t a result of the reduced payroll costs. Evidently, 70% of organizations reviewed demonstrated that they were expanding their horizon outside of their nearby area to explore the global talent, instead of just saving the money.

6. Can Hire Productive Remote PHP Developers

Usually, remote developers are productive too, in terms of their work/tasks. There are many studies that show how remote developers or employees are more effective than onsite laborers. This basically depends on the event that they have the fundamental tools and equipment to work remotely, however by and large, most remote developers are more useful. 

They don’t get distracted by the disturbances of the workplace and they are in their own environment. A study with 353 employees. Revealed that 39% of the employees occasionally working remotely- they were 77% more productive than on location employees.

7. Motivated Remote PHP Developers are Easy to Reach

At the point when you hire remote PHP developers, you’re not just hiring a freelancer for your venture. You will get a full-time and motivated employee. They are exclusively committed to the requirements and requests of your organization.

It’s significant not to allow the physical distances to deter you from hiring remote PHP developers. With the existing time management software and quick communication modes (like live talk or texting), you can collaborate with representatives just like you would with an employee on the opposite side of your building.

Average Charges of Remote PHP Developers

One of the first things to perceive when discussing the average charges of remote PHP developers is that there are a wide range of components that can make it hard to precisely anticipate the amount PHP developers would be paid. 

For example, there is a distinction in the nation where the web developer is working from. Regardless of whether they are remote PHP developers or an in-house PHP developer. The expertise and experience level of the web designer, and the difficulty level of the job or project venture that they are doing. 

In any case, there are still methods of calculating the average payment of remote PHP developers by searching it on google or some reliable freelance portals like Supersourcing. However, the payment figure would fluctuate between full-stack developers, junior developers to remote PHP developers. In addition to that, with the nation from where you’re going to hire remote PHP developers. 

In comparison with pay rates of other programming languages, PHP’s pay rate is low due to a couple of reasons. First and foremost, PHP is easy to use and fast to learn. There are numerous beginner and fresher PHP developers out there. On the other hand, with more experience and expert level coding abilities, the compensation for PHP developers can increase significantly. 

In spite of the lower compensation, there is a great demand for PHP developers. It implies that there are great opportunities to secure great paying positions. And hire remote PHP developers that are expert in their job.

Conclusion:

If you are also looking to hire remote PHP developers, then you landed at the right place. EngineerBabu is a team of expert developers that work dedicatedly and remotely on your venture. For any assistance or query, you can reach out to us. We are here to help you to take your business to a new level.

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The objective of the project  ‘Find a mentor’ is to create a platform for online learning and knowledge sharing. ‘Find a mentor’ project will create a bridge between the domain experts and people who want to learn a new skill or gain some new knowledge. The sole purpose of ‘Find a mentor’ is the ability to facilitate knowledge sharing from an experienced professional mentor to the various industry professionals.

Online mentors will be able to post text messages, images, videos and audios on ‘Find a mentor’ platform and professionals or learners will be able to react to these posts. Professionals would have to follow the online mentor’s account in order to connect with him, see his posts and ask him questions to have a doubt free online learning. Mentors can also block malicious followers. Individual profiles will be maintained for mentors and the professionals on the ‘Find a mentor’ platform. It will contain all their basic details, such as name, contact details, education, interests and their professional details such as the current workplace, work experience, skills, etc.

‘Find a mentor’ Project Vision

The vision for ‘find a mentor’ is to create a professional platform for online learning connecting mentors and professionals. This platform will help thousands of young professionals to seek formal expert guidance from skillful professional mentors. Our solution to this problem will be to make this platform such that it will provide the best user experience.

Recommended Reading: Mentrio – A community to find the right Mentor

Primary users for the platform will be the mentors and the professionals. A mentor’s main role will be to share his knowledge by his mentorship program in the form of posts, discussions and answering the questions asked by the learners. A professional’s main role will be to gain knowledge, initiate discussions and ask questions. To initiate online learning, both the online mentor and the learning professional need a professional environment that is provided on the ‘Find a mentor’ platform.

What makes ‘Find a mentor’ different from other platforms?

Despite having one knowledge of one domain, people are always eager to learn new things and for this, they need a professional mentor who can guide them and share their experience in their respective industries. A mentorship program can be a great way to share knowledge and help someone become successful in their personal or professional life. But many professional mentors are often too busy to commit to regular meetings, or they have a hard time connecting with people seeking help. On ‘Find a mentor’ platform, prospective mentors and mentees can be matched, based on similar interests, location, and availability.

At all stages of one’s career, professional mentors play an important role. Unfortunately, for many people, finding a great mentor remains a challenge.

For finding a mentor, people usually visit different portals and most of them are paid, in the market, there are 100s of portals but mentees usually go through a bad experience with the quality of mentorship programs offered on them. So people are usually afraid to use these portals because no one wants to spend their hard-earned money on an online learning program which is not fruitful for them. One can’t judge the program or the mentor on the basis of review because some platforms provide fake reviews and ratings to attract the user.

Another biggest problem is the availability of a mentor, because being an employee of any industry, they always face trouble finding the right mentors for business due to lack of time and resources. On this platform, we provide an equal facility to both user experts(mentor) and mentee(professional) to explore the things that we are offering in our platform. Mentors can organize live conferencing for sharing the industry knowledge and people who are following him/her can watch live video and add the comment. Mentees can ask the question from their preferred mentor and send them a reminder.

In every industry, there are around four types of people:

First, the type of people who just started their career and are in an early stage of a professional career and require mentors for business.

Second, the type of people who have already started their career and reached a mid-level after working 5 to 6 years in any industry, at this time, they want to learn new things in order to take the company to the next level and can teach them their junior. Learning from an experienced professional mentor from the same industry is always better than learning by oneself.

Often people don’t have time after office hours. They have to take care of family and spend quality time with them. People rarely get time to learn new things. So the idea of ‘Find a mentor’ project is basically to connect professionals to experts for learning and exploring new things that are happening in the industry.

Third, the type of people who have the knowledge of their respective industry may become the mentor to professionals. Mentors can reply to the question which was being asked by their mentee, on the platform we connect the mentor and mentee so that mentee can ask the question which he may have and after a certain time mentee can poke them in order to send them a reminder.

Fourth, the type of people who can play a dual role, i.e;  being registered as an expert, can switch the profile as professional and can follow other experts.

USP of ‘Find a mentor’

1. Professionals are directly able to interact with the mentors and ask them questions.
2. A professional can ask a maximum of 2 questions to a particular mentor so that the mentor would not be stuck on one person only and can interact with other professionals as well.
3. Mentors may sometimes forget to answer the questions asked by the professionals due to their busy and hectic lives. Thus, the latter can “Poke” the former to remind them about answering their asked questions.
4. Poking can be done only 2 times to maintain professionalism and to prevent mentors from getting annoyed.
5. Mentors can stream videos live in their posts using YouTube.
6. Mentors can host a Webinar in their posts using YouTube.
7. A person can have both a Mentor and a Professional account for the same Email-ID/Phone no.
8. Privacy of the Mentor is maintained as their posts and activities can only be seen by the people who follow them(Professional can follow a Mentor only if the Mentor approves).

User Persona for ‘Find a mentor’

User Persona: Mentor

User Persona: Professional

Prototype and Usability Test

I created high fidelity wireframes, altogether 20 screens for the usability test. Below are some samples.

Feature List

1. Onboarding
   1. Established Audience (EA)
      1. Social Sign up/Sign in
      2. Password-based Sign up/Sign in
   2. Audience (A)
      1. Social Signup/Sign in
      2. Password-based Signup/Sign in
   3. Posts
      1. Share
      2. Like
      3. Unlike
      4. Comment
      5. Like and Dislike over comments
      6. Comment over comment
      7. Create a new post
   4. Resources in posts
      1. Images
      2. Text-based posts
      3.  Events
         1. Date
         2. Time
         3. Location
         4. Name
      4. Webinars using youtube
      5. Live video streaming using youtube
      6. Uploaded videos – preferably from youtube
   5. Follow and Linking
      1. Followers
      2. Privacy of posts and resources
   6. Payment and Subscription ( Optional, if you don’t want in current phase)
      1. Unlock premium content
      2. Payment for content
   7. Question & Answer Section
      1. 3 question from each Audience
   8. Poke EA
      1. only 2 times max
   9. Personal Profile
      1.  EA
         1. Name
         2. Image
         3. Follow button
         4. No. of followers
         5. Education
         6. Short Introduction
         7. Current Workplace
         8. Work experience
         9. Skills
         10. Interests
         11. Contact details
             1. Email ID
             2. Phone no.
      2. A
         1. Name
         2. Image
         3. Following
         4. Education
         5. Short Introduction
         6. Current Workplace
         7. Work experience
         8. Skills
         9. Interests
         10. Contact details
             1. Email ID
             2. Phone no.
   10. Notifications
       1.  EA
          1. New followers
          2. New like on post
          3. New comment on the post
          4. New share on the post
          5. Questions by audience
       2.  A
          1. Answers on asked questions
          2. Reply on comment

If you are also planning to start a similar project, we would be happy to work on that too. Feel free to talk to us. Our team at EngineerBabu is experienced in delivering excellent apps and software. We have been developing similar apps and our mobile app developers can help you build the same. Since we have been delivering IT solutions to a wide range of clients, we know the errors that come in the way and how to solve them. If you have any kind of doubt then we are there for your help. Feel free to reach out to us even if you are in the ideational stage. To read more blogs and success stories, visit our website.

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