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This article is about the scripting language. For other uses, see PHP (disambiguation).
PHP
PHP
Paradigmimperative, object-oriented
Designed byRasmus Lerdorf
DeveloperThe PHP Group
First appeared1995 (1995)
Stable release
5.3.0 / June 30, 2009; 15 years ago (2009-06-30)
Preview release
6.0.0-dev[1]
Typing disciplineDynamic, weak
Implementation languageC
OSCross-platform
LicensePHP License
Filename extensions.php, .phtml
Websitehttp://www.php.net/
Major implementations
Zend Engine, Roadsend PHP, Phalanger, Quercus, Project Zero
Influenced by
C, Perl, Java, C++, Tcl[citation needed]
Influenced
PHP4Delphi, Falcon

PHP is a widely used, general-purpose scripting language that was originally designed for web development, to produce dynamic web pages. It can be embedded into HTML and generally runs on a web server, which needs to be configured to process PHP code and create web page content from it. It can be deployed on most web servers and on almost every operating system and platform free of charge.[2] PHP is installed on over 20 million websites and 1 million web servers.[3]

PHP was originally created by Rasmus Lerdorf in 1995 and has been in continuous development ever since. The main implementation of PHP is now produced by The PHP Group and serves as the de facto standard for PHP as there is no formal specification.[4] PHP is free software released under the PHP License, which is incompatible with the GNU General Public License (GPL) because of restrictions on the use of the term PHP.[5]

PHP has evolved to include a command line interface capability and can also be used in standalone graphical applications.[6]

History

PHP originally stood for Personal Home Page.[4] It began in 1994 as a set of Common Gateway Interface binaries written in the C programming language by the Danish/Greenlandic programmer Rasmus Lerdorf.[7][8] Lerdorf initially created these Personal Home Page Tools to replace a small set of Perl scripts he had been using to maintain his personal homepage. The tools were used to perform tasks such as displaying his résumé and recording how much traffic his page was receiving.[4] He combined these binaries with his Form Interpreter to create PHP/FI, which had more functionality. PHP/FI included a larger implementation for the C programming language and could communicate with databases, enabling the building of simple, dynamic web applications. Lerdorf released PHP publicly on June 8, 1995 to accelerate bug location and improve the code.[9] This release was named PHP version 2 and already had the basic functionality that PHP has today. This included Perl-like variables, form handling, and the ability to embed HTML. The syntax was similar to Perl but was more limited, simpler, and less consistent.[4]

Zeev Suraski and Andi Gutmans, two developers at the Technion IIT, rewrote the parser in 1997 and formed the base of PHP 3, changing the language's name to the recursive initialism PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor.[10] The development team officially released PHP/FI 2 in November 1997 after months of beta testing. Afterwards, public testing of PHP 3 began, and the official launch came in June 1998. Suraski and Gutmans then started a new rewrite of PHP's core, producing the Zend Engine in 1999.[11] They also founded Zend Technologies in Ramat Gan, Israel.[4]

On May 22, 2000, PHP 4, powered by the Zend Engine 1.0, was released.[4] As of August, 2008 this branch is up to version 4.4.9. PHP 4 is no longer under development nor will any security updates be released.[12][13] On July 13, 2004, PHP 5 was released, powered by the new Zend Engine II.[4] PHP 5 included new features such as improved support for object-oriented programming, the PHP Data Objects extension (which defines a lightweight and consistent interface for accessing databases), and numerous performance enhancements.[14] In 2008, PHP 5 became the only stable version under development. Late static binding has been missing from PHP and has been added in version 5.3.[15][16] PHP 6 is under development alongside PHP 5. Major changes include the removal of register_globals,[17] magic quotes, and safe mode.[12][18] The

  1. ^ "PHP Snapshots". The PHP Group. Retrieved 2008-06-18.
  2. ^ Cite error: The named reference foundations was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  3. ^ "Usage Stats for April 2007". Retrieved 2008-07-07.
  4. ^ a b c d e f g "History of PHP and related projects". The PHP Group. Retrieved 2008-02-25.
  5. ^ "GPL-Incompatible, Free Software Licenses". Various Licenses and Comments about Them. Free Software Foundation. Retrieved 2008-02-22.
  6. ^ "Introduction: What can PHP do?". PHP Manual. Retrieved 2009-03-05.
  7. ^ Lerdorf, Rasmus (2007-04-26). "PHP on Hormones" (mp3). The Conversations Network. Retrieved 2009-06-22.
  8. ^ Lerdorf, Rasmus (2007). "Slide 3". slides for 'PHP on Hormones' talk. The PHP Group. Retrieved 2009-06-22.
  9. ^ Lerdorf, Rasmus (1995-06-08). "Announce: Personal Home Page Tools (PHP Tools)". Newsgroup: comp.infosystems.www.authoring.cgi. Retrieved 2006-09-17. {{cite newsgroup}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)
  10. ^ "History of PHP and related projects". The PHP Group. Retrieved 2008-02-25.
  11. ^ "Zend Engine version 2.0: Feature Overview and Design". Zend Technologies Ltd. Retrieved 2006-09-17.
  12. ^ a b "php.net 2007 news archive". The PHP Group. 2007-07-13. Retrieved 2008-02-22.
  13. ^ Kerner, Sean Michael (2008-02-01). "PHP 4 is Dead—Long Live PHP 5". InternetNews. Retrieved 2008-03-16.
  14. ^ Trachtenberg, Adam (2004-07-15). "Why PHP 5 Rocks!". O'Reilly. Retrieved 2008-02-22.
  15. ^ "Late Static Binding in PHP". Digital Sandwich. 2006-02-23. Retrieved 2008-03-25.
  16. ^ "Static Keyword". The PHP Group. Retrieved 2008-03-25.
  17. ^ "Using Register Globals". PHP. Retrieved 2008-04-04.
  18. ^ "Prepare for PHP 6". CorePHP. 2005-11-23. Retrieved 2008-03-24.
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