Why PHP ?
Why PHP, this tutorial discuss about why should we use PHP? Learn the Basic features of PHP scripting language.
Why PHP, this tutorial discuss about why should we use PHP? Learn the Basic features of PHP scripting language.Why PHP?
Reasons to use PHP are given below:
1. PHP is open source, free to download and use : PHP is free and you can download the setup from http://php.net/downloads.php site. Open source is a development method for better quality, higher reliability, and lower cost. Open source does not mean access to the source code, it has following features also:
- Free Redistribution
- Source Code
- Derived Works
- Integrity of the author's source code
- License must be technology neutral
- License must not restrict other software etc.
2. PHP is cross platform : That means it can be run on several operating system like: Windows, Unix, Linux etc.). Cross platform means is a term used for computer software that can be implemented on multiple computer platform. It can be divided in two parts: One requires independent compilation for each platform, and other can be run on any platform without any special compilation or interpretation.
3. PHP is compatible with many server : PHP can be run on any popular server like: Apache, IIS, etc. Web servers are computer programming which are responsible for handling HTTP requests from client side (Web agents like Internet Browsers like: Internet Explorer, Opera, Mozilla Firefox etc.) and serving them HTTP responses. Virtual hosting, large file support are the main features of web servers. Every webserver has an IP address and possibly a domain name. If you enter the URL http://www.roseindia.net, this sends a request to the roseindia.net server, then this server fetches the home page and returns it to your Internet browser. Any computer can be a server, all it need to have a web server software installed in it.
4. PHP supports popular database servers : Database server is a computer program that provide services to other computer or computer program. One of the strongest and most significant feature of PHP is it supports a wide variety of database and it can be use with any database like:
- Oracle
- Sybase
- DB2
- MySQL
- SQLite
- IBM DB2
- dBase
- mSQL
- FrontBase
- InterBase
- Ingres
- Informix
- Hyperwaveand many more.
PHP also has a database abstraction extension (named PDO) allowing us to use any database supports this extension. PHP also supports ODBC (Open DataBase Connectivity ) that means any database supporting this standard can be connected with PHP.
5. PHP has extremely useful text processing feature: For parsing and accessing XML documents PHP 4 supports DOM and SAX standard. It has following text processing feature:
- POSIX Extended regular expression
- Perl regular expression
- Parsing XML documents
6. PHP is easy to learn : PHP is extremely simple for newcomer, but offers many advances features for professional programmer.
7. PHP supports a wide range of protocol: PHP supports many protocols like: LDAP, IMAP, SNMP, NNTP, POP3, HTTP, COM (on Windows) and countless others. PHP also supports WDDX complex data exchange, Java objects, and CORBA.
