PHP Optimized for Windows Server 2008

Stony Stevenson writes "It used to be that popular PHP applications would run more poorly on Windows Server than on a Linux or Unix servers, for which PHP had been optimized. Specialist in the PHP language Zend Technologies now says that's no longer the case. The Zend Core commercially supported form of PHP has been certified by Microsoft as ready to run 'with performance and stability' on Windows Server 2008, said Andi Gutmans, co-founder and CTO of Zend. Previously, PHP 'didn't run as well as it should on Windows,' said Gutmans, despite the fact that 75% to 80% of PHP users were developing on Windows workstations."

In Short

[TheRealMindChild]

So, in short, they aren't using cygwin anymore to compile it.

Light on details

[Anonymous Coward]

It would have been nice to know the areas that they optimized to get the performance increases. Unfortunately the article is a little light on the details.

Other incapatiblities

[Freexe]

There are still many other compatibility issues between PHP on Windows and Linux that make it hard to push things from a Windows box straight to a Linux box without extra testing.

Misleading

[MojoRilla]

This is misleading.

75% to 80% of PHP users were developing on Windows workstations.

And how many of these applications are being deployed on Windows? Probably not that many. Windows isn't a great server operating system.

Re:Misleading

[liquidpele]

exactly. I develop php apps on windows, have dreamweaver upload them to Linux, and then test it out through my browser. Saying most people develop a web application on OS XYZ is like saying 95% of people prepare their food in the kitchen while implying that is where they also eat it.

Re:Marketing

[Constantine XVI]

Sounds like IIS 7 (in '08) has something called FastCGI which they used to get the better performance.

PHP on Windows

[corychristison]

... like Ruby on Rails?

Just kidding. Seriously, though, it said "commercially supported form of PHP". Be sure to take a big mental note of that.
Commercial == fee's. Based on Zends track record of charging for things, it's not going to be cheap for single developers... I have a feeling it'll be in the area of $800-$1500 per CPU or something silly like that [zend.com]... in which case, why not just use a UNIX/derivative?

Why not Apache?

[edmicman]

We run a .NET shop here, but even I wonder, why not just install Apache on Windows? Errrrr, or why not just go the easy route and put up an Ubuntu LAMP server? Everything I work on is in Windows, but I just don't see the benefit of running PHP on Windows...what does [Microsoft say] the Windows platform offers for PHP that running it on freely available platforms doesn't?

Re:FastCGI != Apache Module

[Firehed]

PHP's security isn't so much a problem compared to non-security-conscious developers working with it since it's so damn easy to pick up. If you're running stuff like $query="INSERT INTO `users` (`name`) VALUES '${_GET['name']}';";, it really doesn't matter what language you're using.

Re:Misleading

[dedazo]

Windows isn't a great server operating system.

Not for PHP applications, no. Good enough for light testing, but not production.

.NET-based applications on the other hand, work great. Server 2003 and 2008 now are great platforms for them. So when you say "isn't a great server", I expect you mean "for the language/technology I choose to work for", much as Mono-based apps are not exactly mainstream or very well tested in Apache.

Re:Misleading

[richlv]

actually, it is misleading. it does not have any reasonable connection with the fact itself/article.
well, unless those developers run windows 2008 server on their workstations.

Re:Misleading

[kripkenstein]

This is misleading.

Only if you have problems reading English. That sentence clearly speaks about development, not deployment.

No, he was right on the mark. You are correct that the sentence clearly says development. But the point is that mentioning development in this context is misleading. It doesn't matter where code is written, it matters where the code is run, if you are talking about the performance of the code. TFA is misleading in that respect. It seems their point has an underlying assumption that development and production should be on the same OS or something like that; under that assumption the quote makes sense. It's a faulty assumption though.

Re:Misleading

[jsebrech]

And how many of these applications are being deployed on Windows?

My company's PHP based software runs over 95 percent on IIS servers. We have a single customer that uses linux for their web server platform (a university). We're talking about big customers here, like Siemens and ISS (one of the world's largest cleaning firms), with dozens of servers each running our platform, all of them Windows servers.

We've been deploying PHP on fastcgi the whole time. ISAPI has never been stable, and CGI has always been too slow.

Tthe situation changes for non-intranet web apps. Those tend to be linux-hosted because people tend to outsource their hosting. But for in-house hosted software, most of the time you have to fall back on the existing network team, who is usually specialized in windows, so they tend to prefer windows-based web servers, even if it's just for the sake of uniformity.