PHP - Language in a Nutshell

Ah, PHP. The language that has powered half the web since the early days of the internet.

It’s the language that’s loved, hated, and sometimes just tolerated.

But why was it created? How has it evolved? And is it still relevant today? Let’s break it all down, with a few jokes and ten code examples along the way.

Why Was PHP Created?

Once upon a time, in 1994, a Danish-Canadian programmer named Rasmus Lerdorf wanted a simple way to track visits to his online resume.

So, like any good developer, he hacked together a bunch of Perl scripts.

Then, realizing he needed something more flexible, he rewrote them in C. He called it “Personal Home Page Tools” (PHP Tools).

Little did he know, he had just created the foundation for what would become one of the most widely used web scripting languages in history.

By 1997, PHP had evolved into PHP 3, a more structured and extensible language, and was officially renamed PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor (yes, it’s a recursive acronym).

From there, it just kept growing.

Major Releases and Evolution

• PHP 3 (1998) – The first real version of PHP as we know it. It introduced a parser that could work with HTML.

• PHP 4 (2000) – Added the Zend Engine, improving performance and scalability.

• PHP 5 (2004) – Introduced object-oriented programming (OOP), making it feel more like a “real” programming language.

• PHP 7 (2015) – Massive performance improvements, nearly doubling execution speed.

• PHP 8 (2020) – Introduced JIT (Just-In-Time) compilation and modern features like attributes and named arguments.

When Was PHP Popular?

PHP peaked in popularity during the early 2000s to mid-2010s, when platforms like WordPress, Joomla, and Drupal dominated the web.

It was THE go-to language for server-side web development.

Even today, despite modern alternatives like Python and JavaScript, PHP still powers nearly 77% of all websites, according to W3Techs.

Comparing PHP to Other Languages

10 Code Examples in PHP

1. Hello World

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<?php
echo "Hello, World!";
?>

2. Variables & Data Types

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<?php
$name = "PHP";
$year = 1994;
$version = 8.1;
$isAwesome = true;
echo "Language: $name, Released: $year, Version: $version, Still Awesome? " . ($isAwesome ? "Yes" : "No");
?>

3. If-Else Statement

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<?php
$age = 20;
if ($age >= 18) {
    echo "You're an adult!";
} else {
    echo "You're still a kid!";
}
?>

4. Loops

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<?php
for ($i = 1; $i <= 5; $i++) {
    echo "Loop iteration: $i\n";
}
?>

5. Functions

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<?php
function greet($name) {
    return "Hello, $name!";
}
echo greet("PHP");
?>

6. Arrays

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<?php
$colors = ["Red", "Green", "Blue"];
foreach ($colors as $color) {
    echo $color . "\n";
}
?>

7. Associative Arrays

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<?php
$user = ["name" => "John", "age" => 30, "language" => "PHP"];
echo "Name: " . $user["name"];
?>

8. Object-Oriented PHP

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<?php
class Car {
    public $brand;
    function __construct($brand) {
        $this->brand = $brand;
    }
    function getBrand() {
        return $this->brand;
    }
}
$myCar = new Car("Tesla");
echo $myCar->getBrand();
?>

9. Handling Forms

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<form method="post">
    Name: <input type="text" name="name">
    <input type="submit">
</form>

10. Connecting to MySQL

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<?php
$conn = new mysqli("localhost", "root", "", "testdb");
if ($conn->connect_error) {
    die("Connection failed: " . $conn->connect_error);
}
echo "Connected successfully!";
?>

Pros and Cons of PHP

Pros:

• Easy to learn and widely used.
• Great for web development (since it’s literally made for it).
• Huge community and plenty of resources.
• Fast performance with PHP 7+.

Cons:

• Historically inconsistent syntax.
• Not the most modern or “trendy” language.
• Security vulnerabilities if not handled properly.

Key Ideas

References

• Official PHP Website
• W3Techs PHP Usage Stats
• PHP Documentation