Hi, nicodevries-ga. Thank you for your question.
In short, the combination of PHP and Apache is generally considered
very stable and secure, on any platform. Since the UNIX and Windows
version will be based on the same codebase, and PHP is running on the
same server software, the stability should be pretty much the same.
There are no serious issues with PHP and Apache 1.x on any platform,
Windows included.
Netcraft (http://netcraft.com/), a site dedicated largely to
monitoring the uptime of servers and tracking the software used on
them, recently published a brief article on the growing use of PHP on
the windows platform. According to the article, the following large
companies run PHP under Windows:
- Nokia (http://www.nokia-mobiltelefoner.dk/)
- Valero (http://www.valero.com/)
- Sony (http://www.scea.sony.com/)
- Electronic Arts (http://gamesupport.ea.com/)
(These sites run PHP on Microsoft IIS, not Apache, but it's still a
good example of how PHP is now regarded as a mature and stable
language on the Windows platform. PHP support is better in Apache than
in ISS).
The article can be read in full at
http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2003/08/30/php_growing_surprisingly_strongly_on_windows.html.
One site running a combination of Apache 1.3 and PHP 4.3 on Windows
(http://f4.freespace.jp/, a machine for a large japanese free hosting
service) managed an uptime of over 213 days at one point, which is
pretty good. You can see the uptime graphs at
http://uptime.netcraft.com/up/graph?site=f4.freespace.jp
Unfortunately, there do not seem to be any in-depth comparisons of PHP
running on both platforms.
Another indication of the reliability of the PHP/Apache/Windows
combination can possibly be found at the WebHostingTalk forums
(http://webhostingtalk.com/). Many of the people who post there are
representatives of experienced hosts, and I was unable to find any
negative comments about PHP on Windows.
As to the issues with PHP running thread-safe, the 'core' PHP module
doesn't seem to have had any problems since around version 4.1.0 (the
current version is 4.3.3). You may have problems with old PHP modules
that aren't thread-safe, but most recent modules should run with no
problems.
The only stability issues I could find with PHP are when it's being
run in conjunction with Apache 2. A note on the manual page at
http://www.php.net/manual/en/install.apache2.php warns that you should
not run PHP with Apache 2 on a production server. This is true for
both Windows and UNIX platforms.
The following pages may be of use to you:
Netcraft: PHP use growing on Windows -
http://news.netcraft.com/archives/2003/08/30/php_growing_surprisingly_strongly_on_windows.html
PHP.net: Apache/Windows information:
http://www.php.net/manual/en/install.apache.php#install.apache.windows
I used the following searches:
'php windows stability'
(://www.google.com/search?q=php+windows+stability&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8)
'php windows apache stability'
(://www.google.com/search?q=php+windows+apache+stability&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8)
'windows stability' (only on php.net)
(://www.google.com/search?q=windows+stability+site:php.net&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8)
I hope this was of use. If you have any further queries about this,
please don't hesitate to request a clarification.
-- wildeeo-ga |
