PHP, or Hypertext Preprocessor, was initially created by a Danish-Canadian programmer, Rasmus Lerdorf, in 1994 as a personal project. Lerdorf developed PHP as a set of Common Gateway Interface (CGI) scripts to track visitors on his personal website. However, the language quickly gained popularity and was rewritten and released as PHP/FI (Forms Interpreter) in 1995. This version of PHP was able to interact with databases, making it an ideal language for web development. As the internet continued to grow and evolve, so did PHP. In 1997, Andi Gutmans and Zeev Suraski rewrote the codebase of PHP, resulting in the release of PHP 3, which introduced a new parsing engine and improved performance. This marked the beginning of PHP’s journey towards becoming a leading web development language.
In the early 2000s, PHP gained even more momentum with the release of PHP 4, which included a number of new features, such as support for object-oriented programming (OOP), improved database integration, and improved error handling. This propelled PHP into the mainstream and cemented its position as one of the most popular languages for web development. Around the same time, the first version of the PHP-based content management system (CMS), called PHP-Nuke, was released, allowing for the creation of dynamic and interactive websites.
However, it wasn’t until the release of PHP 5 in 2004 that the language truly solidified its place in the web development world. This version introduced significant improvements, including a new object model, improved error handling, and enhanced support for XML. The introduction of PHP Data Objects (PDO) also made it easier to work with databases, making PHP an even more powerful tool for web development.
In more recent years, PHP has continued to evolve and adapt to the ever-changing landscape of the internet. The release of PHP 7 in 2015 brought significant performance improvements, making websites built with PHP even faster and more efficient. It also introduced new features such as the spaceship operator and improved error handling. The latest version, PHP 8, was released in 2020 and includes even more improvements, such as a new just-in-time (JIT) compiler, which further enhances the speed and performance of PHP.
Today, PHP is used by millions of developers and powers over 79% of all websites that use a server-side programming language. It has become a cornerstone of web development, thanks to its versatility, ease of use, and constant evolution. Its open-source nature also allows for a vast community of developers to contribute to its growth and improvement constantly. From its humble beginnings as a personal project, PHP has truly evolved into a leading web development language and will likely continue to do so in the future.
