Automated translations from PHP to Java
Numiton offers an automated alternative to migrating PHP codebase. This way, established applications can benefit from the advantages offered by Java in its enterprise-level capacity.
Some of the risks inherent to any software migration are avoided by using an automated translation tool. Our nTile PtoJ product performs variable type inference, objectualization and other operations in a uniform manner, the resulting appearance and behavior being identical to what the users already know.
Of course, the human factor still plays an important role in the post-translation phases: application fine-tuning and functional testing. The speed and accuracy of the entire process surpass however those of a manual translation.
One of the applications we have migrated this way is the well-known forum engine phpBB. The translation result, nBB2, powers our own forum and was recently donated to the open-source community as a SourceForge project.
There are many technical and business aspects related to software migrations in general and from PHP to Java in particular. The purpose of this blog is to discuss them.