03 - Installation and configuration of PHP

PHP can be installed and configured on many platforms including Linux, windows, Mac etc.

Before we can install PHP on any platform, we need:

  • A server with enough RAM.
  • A machine with any OS installed (Unix, Mac or Windows).
  • A working, dedicated internet connection.

 

There are two ways of installation of PHP on web-server.

 

The first way is using PHP's direct module interface, called SAPI.

It can be used for almost all the web-servers which currently exist for eg. (Apache, Microsoft IIS etc)

The second way is to implement PHP as an CGI processor, which means that we must set up the server to use the command line execution of PHP. It can process the PHP file requests on the server.

Installation on windows

Web developers prefer to run Apache and PHP on their system, so that can easily test their scripts and programs before deploying on web server.

Step 1: Download and install Apache 2.2 web server on your machine.

 Apache is a web server and can be installed in the following manner:

  1. Go to http://www.apache.org/dyn/closer.cgi  and click on the HTTP server link

Fig - Download Apache

  1. Click on “Download from a mirror” to choose FTP site for download.
  2. Click on the Win 32 Binary (MSI installer) link to download.
  3. Click the MSI file to initiate the installation wizard for the Apache software.

Step 2: Download and install PHP 5

  1. Extract the binary archive file to C:\PHP location.
  2. Remove any old PHP.INI file from your windows directory, if available.
  3. Configure your PHP.INI file. For this either we should move the PHP.INI to our windows directory i.e. ”C:\WINDOWS”  or we can configure PATH environment variable to include “C:\php”. In case of Apache earlier versions we have to do this.
  4. Enable short open Tags

       In PHP.INI file search line:

           Short_open_tag=off

 

  It is mandatory to enable this tag to on otherwise PHP tags “<?php  will not be recognized

  1. We have to enable magic_quotes_gpc=on, so that special characters like (\, ‘) can be acceptable in web forms.
  2. If there is requirement of automatically declaration of global variables, we have to enable register_globals=on in PHP.ini file.
  3. Display Errors settings: If we want PHP to display error messages in browser window, we have to set display_errors=on
  4. Session path setting: In php if we want to save session files, there is a folder session.save_path setting which can be set in windows at “C:\tmp” location like as

          Session.save_path=”c:\tmp”

Step 3: Configure Apache to run PHP

For the configuration of apache, we need httpd.conf file. This file is present in apache installation directory under the conf folder. Open this file and add the lines after the LoadModule statements:

         LoadModule php5_module “c:/php/php5apache2_2.dll”

Add the following line after the AddType line:

         AddType application/x-httpd-php.php

Add PHP location:

         PHPIniDir “c:/php”

After adding above lines, we have to restart the Apache server.

Packages available in one pack included Apache, PHP, MySQL are XAMPP (Mac version) that includes MySQL, PHP and Perl, WAMP Server (Windows version)

We can download these packages from the following links:

For XAMPP

       http://xampp.en.softonic.com/ 

For WAMP

       http://www.wampserver.com/en/

PHP installation on Windows

PHP is the most widely used server side scripting language in web development. PHP go well with Mysql, apache and linux platform. We can install PHP on our local system to create web applications.

Nowadays PHP can be used in many of the packages implicitly like: XAMPP, WampServer and Web Developer. In these packages all the features are automatically configured which can be changed also according to our requirements.

Manual installation and configuration is recommended for deeply understanding of system.

Manual Installation of PHP

  1. Download the installation files

      First of all, we should download the latest version of PHP 5 package from the link below:

       www.php.net/downloads.php

Fig - Manual Installation of PHP

  1. We have to install PHP to C:/php, so firstly we create a folder named php and extract files into this folder.

 

  1. After installation, we must configure php according to the requirements. For the configuration, we use php.ini file. We can open this file using any text editor.

      Major configuration those are normally done:

            extension_dir= “C:phpext”

            extension=php_curl.dll

            extension=php_gd2.dll

            extension=php_mdstring.dll

            extension=php_mysql.dll

            extension=php_mysqli.dll

            extension=php_pdo.dll

            extension=php_pdo_mysql.dll

            extension=php_xmlrpc.dll

     If we want to use email feature in our websites, we can use mail() function, we should configure SMTP server as:

            [mail function]

            ; for Win32 only

            SMTP=mail.myisp.com

             smtp_port=25

             ; For Win32 only

             Sendmail_from=abc@gmail.com     

 

  1. Edit path environment variable

      Now we must set the path environment variable. For this we should follow steps:

      Go to control panel

      Select system-> Advanced system settings-> Environment variables

      Select Path option and click on Edit button

      Enter ;C:php at the end of line

      Click OK

Fig System Properties

 

Fig _ Environment Variables

Fg - Edit System variables

  1. PHP and Apache setting

      Open configuration file httpd.conf of Apache

      Then set

      DirectoryIndex index.php index.html

     Add following lines at the end of the file

Fig - configuration file httpd.conf of Apache

#PHP5 module

LoadModule php5_module “C:/php/php5apache2_2.dll”

AddType application/x-httpd-php.php

PHPIniDir “C:/php”

Save file and restart apache

Fig - Save file and restart apache

If everything is fine, we can test PHP file

For this create a file named index.php in Apache root page (htdocs) and add a line in this file:

   <?php phpinfo(); ?>

Open browser and type http://localhost/ in URL.

If everything is configured correctly then PHP version page will be displayed that will show all the configuration settings of PHP.

fig - WampServer Config

PHP installation on Linux

When we use LAMP following steps required:

  1. Install Apache

     Open terminal by selecting Application -> Accessories ->Terminal

     Type line sudo apt-get install apache2 on terminal and press enter.

     Enter your password and press Enter.

     After successful installation of Apache we should test it

     For this open any browser and enter following URL http://localhost/

     And it will display a message “It Works!”

  1. Install PHP

    Open Terminal window and type following line:

    sudo apt-get install php5 libapache2-mod-php5 and press enter

    Then restart apache using following command

    sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

    Testing PHP

    Type following command on terminal window

    sudo gedit /var/www/testphp.php

    this command will open a file testphp.php

    type following line in that file

    <? php phpinfo(); ?>

    Now open any browser and type following URL

    http://localhost/testphp.php

    It will show the page where complete information about php will be displayed.

 

  1. Install MySql

       Open terminal and type following line:

       sudo apt-get install mysql-server

       We should change the bind address as: 127.0.0.1

       Type command mysql –u root

       It will open mysql prompt and then type command

       mysql> set password for ‘root@localhost’ = password (‘<any_password>’);

       type following line on terminal

       sudo apt-get install libapache2-mod-auth-mysql php5-mysql phpmyadmin

       open php.ini file and type following line:

       gksudo gedit /etc/php5/apache2/php.ini

       uncomment the following line

       ; extension=mysql.so  as extension=mysql.so

       Restart apache using following command

       sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

       open apache2.conf file and add the following line at the bottom of the file

       include /etc/phpmyadmin/apache.conf

       restart apache

       sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 restart

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