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Asked: 2026-05-12T17:21:03+00:00

I have historically used a monolithic approach to PHP coding. That is, I write

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I have historically used a monolithic approach to PHP coding.

That is, I write one index.php, with an average size of 70k-250k, and use 

mod_rewrite

to turn the rest of the 

REQUEST_URI

into parameters passed into the index.php to control what is happening.

The alternative would be to write many small php scripts, each specialized to a particular purpose. I’m thinking that some of my more active ajax scripts may benefit from this.

One thing that has kept me in this thought process is I don’t know how using includes, especially conditional includes would affect the performance of the opcode cache.

I have generally avoided includes altogether if possible due to my paranoia about this, but this results in either duplicating code, or staying monolithic.

As I’m using mod_rewrite anyway, converting between the two methodologies should be simple.

I look forward to your comments.

EDIT: One of my target apps currently handles 80-100 page hits per second (I got some decent hardware). Most of those are ajax requests. Everything works and is snappy, but I’ve developed as a php programmer without critique and need it.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    Modular code is easier to understand and maintain. A huge monolithic codebase can become like a house of cards. It works just fine in practice, but changing any of the lower elements becomes impossible. If you split up your code into clear abstractions, it can be much easier to make changes and you’ll save yourself a nightmare if you ever add developers.

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