Many web developers utilize PHP, which is an open-source server-side scripting language. It’s also a general-purpose language that may be used to create a variety of applications, including GUIs (GUIs). In this tutorial, I’ll walk you through the basics of PHP so you can get a better understanding of how it works. You’ll be able to write your first Hello World application in PHP before the end.

 

What Does PHP Mean?

 

The acronym PHP stood for Personal Homepage at first. But now it stands for Hypertext Preprocessor, which is a recursive acronym. (It’s recursive because the initial word is an abbreviation, therefore the complete meaning isn’t conveyed by the abbreviation.) PHP was released for the first time 26 years ago. It is now on version 8, which was launched in November 2020, however version 7 is still the most popular. The Zend engine is the most widely used implementation of PHP. Other implementations include a parrot, HPVM (Hip Hop Virtual Machine), and Hip Hop, which was developed by Facebook. PHP is mostly used to create web servers. It works in a browser and may also be run from the command line. You can see your code output in the terminal if you don’t want to show it on the browser.

 

Advantages of PHP:

 

PHP has several features that have helped it become so successful, and it’s been the language of choice for web servers for almost 15 years. Here are a few of PHP’s advantages:

 

1. Cross-Platform: PHP is platform-independent. You don’t need a specific operating system to utilize it because it works on all platforms, including Mac, Windows, and Linux.
2. Open Source: PHP is open source. Everyone who wishes to develop on top of the original code can do so. One of the reasons why one of its frameworks, Laravel, is so popular is because of this.
3. Easy to learn: PHP is not hard to learn for absolute beginners. If you already know how to program, you should be able to take it up quickly.
4. PHP syncs with Databases: You can easily connect PHP to all Databases, relational and non-relational. As a result, it can quickly connect to MySQL, Postgres, MongoDB, or any other database.
5. Supportive Community: PHP has a very supportive online community. The official literature includes instructions on how to use the features, so you can quickly resolve your issue if you get stuck.

 

Who Uses PHP?

 

PHP is used by many well-known organizations and IT behemoths to run their servers and create amazing things.

 

1. Facebook: Facebook’s website is powered by PHP. As a result, the company gave back to the community by releasing Hip Hop for PHP, a PHP implementation.
2. Wikipedia: one of the world’s largest sources of information on any topic, Wikipedia is built in PHP.
3. CMSs (Content Management Systems): WordPress, the most popular content management system in the world, is written in PHP. PHP is also included in other content management systems such as Drupal, Joomla, and Magento. Shopify is also based on PHP.
4. Web Hosting Platforms: Many web hosting platforms, like BlueHost, Siteground, and Whogohost, use PHP to run their servers.

 

Interested in some of our courses?

You can learn Programming With PHP.