PHP Introduction | PHP Definition
PHP is web server scripting language, introduced by Rasmus Lerdorf in 1994. PHP is one of the very popular web server scripting language, because it is simple and open source.
PHP was Created in 1994 by Rasmus Lerdorf, initially PHP was a simple set of Common Gateway Interface (CGI) binaries written in the C language. Over time, more functionality was developed in the PHP, and PHP becomes much larger and richer language.
PHP is very simple in learning and it can be embedded in classical HTML web page syntax. PHP is the language in which many popular CMS (Content Management System) are developed, like WordPress, Joomla and Drupal etc.
PHP is used to developed dynamic and data driven web applications. The other similar languages used for web server scripting are Java and c#.Net etc.
PHP is a open source web scripting language and it is royalty free, means anybody can download and use it for web development.
PHP Full Form or Stands for
PHP Full Form is Hypertext Preprocessor. The PHP file is stored with the file extension of .php (my-file.php) whereas the HTML file is stored with the extension of .html (my-file.html). The important point is that when a user request for html file the server send the html file as it was stored in the server hard-disk, and when a user request a php file the server first process the file and then send the processed file to the user.
The Full Form of PHP clearly shows the server behavior of preprocessing the php file first, and processed result is delivered to the user.
PHP was originally developed by Rasmus Lerdorf in 1994, and it is used for their personal website homepage. And with reference to this fact PHP originally understood as Personal Home Page. Later the PHP development is handled by a group known as The PHP Group, and now PHP redefined as the “Hypertext Preprocessor”.
Note: PHP 7 is the latest version of PHP, and it is released in 2014.
Features of PHP Language
PHP is very simple and can be used with very little knowledge of web server technologies.
PHP can be used to develop dynamic web sites or dynamic web pages.
PHP is mostly used with MySQL database and one can easily perform common database operations like write, read, update and delete rows in the table.
PHP is used to receive the web form data on the web server. And you can develop the form processing scripts in PHP with ease.
PHP language syntax can be easily embed in the HTML syntax, and after preprocessing the php file becomes a plane is mostly used with MySQL database and one can easily perform common database operations like write, read, update and delete rows in the table.
PHP language can be used to develop membership or user access control based web applications.
Implement and Support of PHP
PHP can be used with many different Operating Systems like Windows, Linux, Mac OS X etc.
PHP can be installed with the help of XAMPP package, which is a multiple technology in a single package. With the help of XAMPP, your personal computer can become a PHP web server. XAMPP is also support the MySQL database, which is one of the popular database used with PHP.
PHP is fast and light weight server side scripting language. It supported by most server technologies like IIS and Apache etc.
A PHP web page file can contain many language and technologies like HTML, CSS, JavaScript, jQuery, Bootstrap etc.
A PHP web page need to be stored with .php extension, if you wants the server to preprocees the web page with PHP engine. In case if you have stored the PHP web page with .html extension, the server will not preprocess and send that web page as it is to the user.
PHP is used to develop many CRM (Customer Relationship Management) softwares, like SugarCRM and ZohoCRM.
Caution: One PHP application can have both type of web pages, static and dynamic. To improve the speed performance of web server you can store some file with .html extension. The files stored with .html extension are static files, because .html files are not preprocessed by the server.