From PHP4 to PHP5
Why you should migrate
Ivo Jansch <ivo@ibuildings.nl>
Ibuildings.nl BV

Contents
• About me
• The end of life of PHP4
• The benefits of PHP5
• Product support
The migration process
•
• Q&A
Tuesday 25 September 2007 2

About me
• CTO at Ibuildings
PHP consultancy, development & support

Netherlands and UK based

Official representative of Zend

http://www.achievo.org/blog

http://www.ibuildings.nl

• Geek
 Author of several open source projects
 Interested in Internet, Web 2.0, PHP
Tuesday 25 September 2007 3

The end of life of PHP4
• PHP.net official announcement
 PHP4 support is going to end in December 2007
 Only critical security fixes until 8-8-8
 No support for PHP4 after 8-8-8!
• Gophp5.org
 Community effort to migrate projects to PHP5
 No releases for PHP4 after February 5th, 2008
 Supported by major projects such as Drupal, Gallery,
PEAR, phpMyAdmin, Symfony and Typo3
Tuesday 25 September 2007 4

Why migrate now?
• You still have the time to migrate, on your own
terms, with your own planning.
• What if you don't migrate?
• Doom scenario: major security bug discovered in
PHP4 after 8-8-8
 Only solution: migrate
 Migration done under stress...
 Rush job...
 Badly tested...
Tuesday 25 September 2007 5

Benefits of PHP5
• Performance
• Maintainability
• Robustness
• Ready for the future
Tuesday 25 September 2007 6

Performance
Benchmark done by Sebastian Bergmann. Full article at:
http://sebastian-bergmann.de/archives/634-PHP-GCC-ICC-Benchmark.html
Tuesday 25 September 2007 7

Maintainability
• A new object model
 Abstract classes
 Interfaces
 Encapsulation (private, public, protected)
• SPL
• Easier to apply proper architecture
 Cleaner codebase
 Easier to read
 Simpler to maintain
Tuesday 25 September 2007 8

Robustness
• Exception Handling
 Problematic situations handled gracefully
 Error handling not only part of code, but also of design
try
{
// regular code
}
catch (Exception e)
{
// What to do in case of an error
}
 Cleaner code -> increased productivity
& more robust
Tuesday 25 September 2007 9

Ready for the future
• “Web 2.0”
 Web Services
 RSS (XML)
 Ajax
 Mashups
• PHP has core functionality to support all of this
Tuesday 25 September 2007 10

Ready for the future
• Web Services (SOAP)
 Client is as easy as:
$ws = new SoapClient(“http://someweatherservice.com/?WSDL”);
$weather = $ws->getWeather(“Amsterdam”);
 Server is as easy as:
$server = new SoapServer(“calculator.wsdl”);
$server->setObject(new myCalculator());
$server->handle();
• How many lines did that take in PHP4?
Tuesday 25 September 2007 11

Ready for the future
• XML
 1 line of code to parse XML
 OO access to the contents
$xmldata = simplexml_load_file(\"products.xml\");
foreach($xmldata->products as $product)
{
echo $product->manufacturer->name;
}
Tuesday 25 September 2007 12

Product support
• Zend Framework
 PHP5 framework
 Use at Will architecture
 http://framework.zend.com
• Zend Core
 Maintaining your PHP infrastucture
 Keep track of updates
 Get support
• Many third party tools
Tuesday 25 September 2007 13

The Migration Process
2 phases:
• Compatibility migration
 Make things work
 End-of-life reasons
 Performance benefits
• Code migration
 Make use of new PHP5 functionality
 All the other benefits
Tuesday 25 September 2007 14

Compatibility Migration
• Take into account:
 The new object model
 Name clashes
 Some backwards incompatibilities
 Compatibility with new default settings
• Guidelines:
 http://www.php.net/manual/en/migration5.php
Tuesday 25 September 2007 15

Compatibility Migration
• Process:
 Run unit tests (if you have them)
 Do manual tests
 Fix what you find
 Repeat
• Important: change as little as possible
Tuesday 25 September 2007 16

Code Migration
• Take advantage of PHP5 features
 Revise your architecture (OO)
 Implement Exception Handling
 Replace legacy code with PHP5 functionality
• You don't have to do this overnight
 Incremental changes
 Not all features at once
 Refactor
 Weigh benefits and costs
Tuesday 25 September 2007 17

Important
• Take Migration seriously
 Create a planning
 Don't wait until 8-8-8
 Take time for testing
• Get help
 Zend has migration services
 Use the documentation
 Ask the community
 Consider training
Tuesday 25 September 2007 18

Questions?
Use the Q&A box (the one with the '?' icon)
Ibuildings.nl BV

More info
• Visit these websites for more information:
http://www.php.net

http://www.zend.com

http://www.php.net/manual/en/migration5.php

http://www.gophp5.org

http://www.achievo.org/blog

• ivo@ibuildings.nl
• Thank you!
Tuesday 25 September 2007 20