PHP Forum Software Showdown

• November 18, 2006
• James Skemp

Hopefully by the end of the month, I'll have posted six reviews for six different pieces of forum software, that run on PHP (and MySQL).

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Installing Apache 2.0.59 to a Windows-based computer, locally: Part 4

• August 28, 2006
• James Skemp

In the previous three parts of this guide, we setup Apache 2.0.59 and then created the necessary connections to use ActivePerl, mod_perl, ColdFusion MX 6.1, ColdFusion MX 7.0.2, PHP 4.4.2, PHP 5.1.4, MySQL 4.1.18, and PostgreSQL 8.1.3. This time, we're going to bring everything together by creating a number of batch files to fairly easily switch between various Web server setups. What is a batch file? A batch file is basically a way to run a number of Windows prompts at once.

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Installing Apache 2.0.59 to a Windows-based computer, locally: Part 3

• August 26, 2006
• James Skemp

In Part 1 of this Apache 2.0.59 guide, we setup Apache 2.0.59 on a Windows XP SP2 machine. We also setup Perl and mod_perl, attempting to mimic our Apache 1.3.34 install. In Part 2 of this Apache 2.0.59 guide, we setup ColdFusion MX 6.1 and 7.0. This time, we'll be continuing in our quest by adding support for both PHP 4 and PHP 5. In previous guides, we installed PHP 4 and PHP 5, so if you need to install either one, do so with the above directions.

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Dual-installing PHP: Running PHP 5 and 4 on the same local, Windows-based, Apache, server

• July 18, 2006
• James Skemp

In previous guides, we installed PHP 4.4.2 and later moved our installation to a different folder. This time, we'll be installing the current release of PHP 5 (5.1.4) so that we can still switch back to PHP 4.4.2 if we'd like. Downloading PHP 5.x The current version of PHP 5.x is 5.1.4, so we'll begin by downloading that from PHP.net. We’ll want to download the (Windows Binaries) zip file, even though it is significantly larger in size than the installer (the zip file is almost 9 MB, compared to less than 3 MB for the executable), but allows us a deal more flexibility.

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Moving the location of PHP on your hard drive

• July 1, 2006
• James Skemp

In this article, we'll be moving our installation of PHP 4.4.2 from c:\php\ to c:\php4\. We'll be doing this primarily because we may like the ability to run multiple versions of PHP at one time, on our development server. This will pave the way for our future installation of PHP 5.1.4 (or the current version of PHP 5.x). The added benefit is that we'll have an idea of just how many documents are involved in a relatively simple change.

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Upgrading to Zend Optimizer 3.0.1 on a local Windows-based, Apache, server

• June 8, 2006
• James Skemp

In a previous guide, we installed Zend Optimizer 2.6.2 to a local Windows-based Apache 1.x server, running PHP 4.4.2. This time, we'll be upgrading Zend Optimizer from 2.6.2 to 3.0.1. Downloading and backups First, we'll need to download a copy from http://www.zend.com/products/zend_optimizer/. We've already setup an account when we downloaded 2.6.2, so we can simply log in. Of course, if you've forgotten your password you can request assistance, and if you haven't downloaded Zend Optimizer before, you can setup an account.

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Installing PostgreSQL on a local Windows-based, Apache, server

• March 15, 2006
• James Skemp

While we've already setup MySQL, another popular SQL server is PostgreSQL. Like MySQL, PostgreSQL is absolutely free, and will allow us to create databases on our local server. Downloading PostgreSQL We'll be downloading the most current version of PostgreSQL, which is 8.1.3 at the time of this writing. You can download the installation file from http://www.postgresql.org/ftp/win32. We'll want to download the regular zip file, called postgresql-8.1.3-1.zip, and weighing in at 21 MB.

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A local, Apache Web server, on a Windows XP computer

• February 27, 2006
• James Skemp

My intention is to write a number of guides that will help someone build a functional Web server for testing purposes. Since Windows is fairly popular, I've decided to outline how to install Web server programs on it. Since Apache is both powerful and free, I've opted to use it as the core, instead of IIS, or the like. I also plan on keeping the various technologies up-to-date, yet continuing to provide the instructions for past versions used, just in case.

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Installing Zend Optimizer on a local Windows-based, Apache, server

• February 26, 2006
• James Skemp

From Zend's FAQ,

Why use the Zend Optimizer; isn't PHP supposed to be quite fast already?

The standard Zend run-time compiler used by PHP is indeed extremely fast, generating code that is usually 2 to 10 times faster. But an application that uses the Zend Optimizer typically executes another 40% to 100% faster.

So, Zend Optimizer will help decrease the time spent on processing code. If you run the file we created a few steps back, probably called http://localhost/phpinfo.php (which basically runs <?php phpinfo(); ?>), you'll notice a line that says "This program makes use of the Zend Scripting Language Engine: Zend Engine v1.3.0, Copyright (c) 1998-2004 Zend Technologies". This is the standard Zend run-time compiler that is mentioned above. Once we download and install the Zend Optimizer, we'll see some additional lines here.

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Installing PHP on a local Windows-based, Apache, server

• February 22, 2006
• James Skemp

While our previous article walked through adding Perl to our local server, Perl just isn't going to cut it for creating dynamic content. For that, we're going to have to install a more powerful language. As I said quite a few articles ago, if we would have gone the IIS route, we could have the use of ASP. However, since we're going the Apache route, that means PHP is our best choice.

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