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."

Comments

In Short

[TheRealMindChild]

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

FastCGI != Apache Module

[Foofoobar]

As a CGI you still have to make extra system calls that you don't have to make as an apache module. Running under FastCGI is a good first step but it still doesn't make it as fast as running it as an Apache Module. In a recent post on Slashdot about how Microsoft is learning from open source, they claim they made IIS more modular like Apache but this is not the case as PHP proves otherwise they could run it as a module.

I applaud the effort to embrace open source languages though and hope they continue along this path of self improvement.

Re:FastCGI != Apache Module

[arodland]

In my testing (Perl, not PHP, but I don't think it particularly matters here), a "real world app" ran 98% as fast under FastCGI as under mod_perl -- and FastCGI is easier to deploy, easier to maintain, and (in the simple case) better on memory. Is it really worth chasing that extra 2%?

Of course, in the case of PHP, there's an extra incentive. I don't trust PHP's security or sanity for shit. So I'd much rather have it running in its own process with its own permissions than have it dynamically linked directly into my webserver :)

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

[Santana]

This is misleading.

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

Re:Misleading

[muszek]

Food? Are car analogies not good enough for you?

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.

Nothing to do with optimization

[dedazo]

PHP on IIS5/6 had to run as a CGI application, because their ISAPI handler implementation was historically crappy and unstable under load. CGI under the thread-oriented (as opposed to process-oriented in *nix) pipelining model of Windows was usually not a good performer. IIS7 introduced FastCGI, which is what Zend used to "certify" PHP to run on Server 2008. But FastCGI is not an optimization, it's a new execution mode for IIS. Nor was PHP modified (AFAIK) in any way to run effectively on FastCGI. Python apps also run very well on it (which personally is more exciting to me than PHP).

Re:Optimise your spell check

[oxidiser]

It's a British spelling. Like my handle (Oxidiser) or Aluminium.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

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... 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:Why not Apache?

[RipSUp]

They don't want your LAMP to become a WAMP, they want it to become a WIMP (Windows/IIS/MSSQL/PHP)

Re:Why not Apache?

[jjrockman]

Don't you mean Windows IIS MySQL PHP/Perl? Or, WIMP for short.

If you have to contact sales to find out the price

[symbolset]

Then the answer is: "More than it's worth."

Re:Optimise your spell check

[FyRE666]

President Bush? Is that you?