Platform for web development?

PHP view Kohana, Zend Framework.

Completely agree with the previous answers, but here are a couple of nuances:
1. When choosing a platform, think about the future of the project, view the cost of specialists in your chosen platform. (Say Ruby is more expensive than PHP, Java sometimes more expensive .NET and etc.)
2. The ability to use automated tools, Object Relation Mapping to Database (ORM). Java & .NET provides the UI to work (I won't go into the details some more, some less).
3. Evaluate the community of your chosen platform (say PHP/JAVA/.NET have vysokoklassnym and a huge community, just behind Ruby/Pylons/Python).
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Assistance in the design may provide, if bored do not Wake. :)

My choice ASP.NET (DBMS, you can leave or go to MSSQL). Maximum comfort for the developer and high performance.
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This technology is part of the platform Microsoft.NET and allows in short terms to develop quality web solutions. The use of technology ASP.NET gives developers a number of advantages: a convenient development environment and the testing of compiled code, a large set of controls, class libraries, etc.

If you use Delphi Prism — be able to use existing knowledge on the use of Delphi development ASP.NET applications.

Write what you know. If I recommend Pylons, then this project is not going anywhere.

If you are already familiar with PHP choose the and framework. At the moment a very popular Zend Framework, CodeIgniter, Kohana is well developed and Yii. Which one is better to take — just read the official resources of each of them where you will understand the explanation then, and take it :)
If you are really ready to learn something from scratch and it is important for you without reference to platform — Django (Python) or Ruby On Rail. Each of them is essentially the same framework (roughly speaking), i.e. provides a wonderful all sorts of ready-made templates and frameworks. Django for example is very good in terms of Google App Engine can be many things simplify even more.
I would personally chose the product after reading the diagonal of official resources, especially Russian language versions. Look at the availability of documentation, consistency of access and consistency of the description (section open at random and browse, understood / not understood something)... anyway — go for it.

The main task to meet virtually all popular (they have listed) with the relevant JAPANESE (there are also) web frameworks. Languages can be divided into two broad classes: compiled (albeit in a bytecode) with strict static typing — Java, C# and interpreted (albeit byte-code :) ) with nonstrict dynamic typing — Python, PHP, Ruby. If used to write in Pascal, the first you must to learn will be easier, and second, as a rule, is a more compact code (and, logically, less development time).
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Personally, I would choose between Java and Python. From learning C# would have abstained due to strong binding of the most popular framework for it to a specific OS family (Mono is not an analogue .Net — they support multiple overlapping APIs for cross-platform you will need to use only the crossing), from PHP in mind a large number of "legacy" features of the language itself and its standard libraries of Ruby — a rather small community, IMHO.
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You can still see server-side Javascript (not to study another language, but without JS you are unlikely to do), but then I really have nothing to say, except that there is node.js and it is focused on asynchronous processing model.
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>The problem is compounded by the fact that it is necessary to work with magnetic stripe readers and other tricks.
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Not experienced, but something tells me that the server platform there is practically nothing depends