Introduction to PHP – Why do so Many Companies use this programming language?

Fun Fact

PHP has a blue elephant as mascot. The name of the PHP mascot was strategically changed to elePHPant.

6 Reasons for PHP – That’s why Antelope and ElePHPant go side by side

#1 – PHP is the language of e-commerce.

If you were to randomly choose 1,000 e-commerce developers, most of them would be PHP developers.

Why is that? All common open source shop systems are implemented in PHP. Therefore, the number of developers with experience in PHP is much higher than in other programming languages. This makes it much easier for Spryker and other digital companies to build a world-class e-commerce IT team with PHP.

#2 – PHP is easy

PHP programming is very similar to the English language structure, and can run on any system. It is very easy to write a PHP script and the code can be easily customized – this helps to run websites efficiently.

#3 – PHP is for free

Since PHP is an open source framework, it is free to use. It is also easily accessible for new programmers, as it is supported by a variety of documentation. There is no subscription fee, so, all in all, creating a website based on PHP is very cost effective.

#4 – PHP is diverse

You can run PHP on any platform such as Windows, Linux or UNIX and also integrate MySQL and Apache. This allows organizations to easily leverage multiple infrastructures.

#5 – PHP is flexible and scalable

PHP is perfect for web development and therefore ideal for setting up online stores. There is no need to restart the server to update the code, it remains flexible and scalable. PHP is also able to meet increasing demands in managing the content of a website. Functionalities can be added at any time without great effort. Other OOP languages such as Java or C++ could also be used when using PHP.

#6 – PHP works well with any CMS

PHP code can easily be embedded in HTML5 markup or HTML. The code can also be integrated into a variety of web frameworks, web content management systems (CMS) and web template systems. The benefit: those can always be optimized for individual needs – that’s why popular content management systems like Joomla, WordPress, etc. are based on PHP. Optimal content management is the key to an individual UX for the website visitor.

5 Surprising Facts about PHP

#1 – PHP was not developed as a programming language

PHP was first used in 1995. It was developed by Rasmus Lerdorf to manage his own personal website. He tried to develop a Common Gateway Interface (CGI) to work with web forms, which resulted in PHP.

#2 – PHP wasn’t always an acronym for hypertext preprocessor

When PHP was developed, it was an acronym for Personal Home Page. It was originally known as PHP/FI, which literally stands for Personal Home Page/Forms Interpreter.

#3 – Over 5 million developers use PHP

Although the actual global number of PHP developers is not officially confirmed, Zend estimated in 2017 that there are more than 5 million PHP developers.

#4 – 79% of all websites are based on PHP

According to VpnMentor, there are over 1.24 billion websites in the world. According to estimates by W3Techs, more than 980 million of these websites run on PHP.

#5 – Twitter and Facebook use PHP

And these are not the only big names in the elePHPanten herd: other popular online brands like Flickr, Wikipedia, WordPress and many more are based on PHP.

In a Nutshell: Why Should you use PHP?

Over the last three decades, PHP has become one of the most important programming languages in the world. The reason: PHP is very flexible and meets the demands of developers and users like no other programming language.

Are you keen to learn more and get a deep dive into the world of PHP code? Contact us today!