Date: Sun, 16 Jan 2000 15:04:41 -0700
From: Sara Killingsworth 
Organization: @Home Network
Subject: PHP DevCon Meeting January 20-24 

U.S. Press Contact: 
Sara Killingsworth
480-961-1515
SaraLK@Home.Com


First International Conference for PHP Core Development Team

Conference To Benefit Dynamic Web Page Developers

Tel Aviv, Israel-January 17, 2000 - The PHP Core Development team is
meeting for the first time from January 20 to January 24, in Tel Aviv at
the Tel Aviv Hilton Hotel. The focus of the meeting will be to organize
the team effort for developing and generating interest in the popular
PHP scripting language.
	PHP is a freeware, open-source scripting language used for developing
dynamic web pages for e-commerce and other dynamic Web applications. PHP
has been in development since 1994. PHP 3, released in June 1998, has
rapidly gained popularity, and is now in use in some of the most
prominent sites on the Web. PHP 4, empowered by the Zend engine, is due
shortly after the developers' meeting. It is expected to make PHP an
even more powerful solution for dynamic Web development, by featuring
unprecedented performance and a wide variety of new features.
	Unlike other scripting languages for Web page development, PHP offers
excellent connectivity to most of the common database interfaces
(including Oracle, Sybase, MySQL, ODBC and many others). PHP also offers
integration with various external libraries which allow the developer to
do everything from generating PDF documents to parsing XML. Perhaps the
greatest advantage of PHP, as compared to other scripting languages such
as ASP or ColdFusion, is that it is open source and cross-platform to
adapt to today's heterogeneous network environments.
	PHP is the natural choice for developers on Linux machines running
Apache server software, but runs equally well on any other UNIX or
Windows platform, with Netscape or Microsoft Web server software. PHP
supports OpenLink, Win32 COM, Hyperwave, Empress, GNU recode, and PNG
file formats. It also supports WDDX complex data exchange between
virtually all Web programming languages.

	Zeev Suraski and Andi Gutmans, authors of the Zend engine, indicated
that according to the Netcraft (http://www.netcraft.com) November 1999
Web survey, more than a million Web sites that use PHP. The E-Soft
(http://www.e-softinc.com) Web survey of the same month indicates that
PHP is used on 23 percent of Apache servers, making it by far the most
popular scripting language on Apache servers (which constitute 51
percent of the total number of servers). Suraski and Gutmans said that
they are pleased to host such a distinguished gathering of experts.
Rasmus Lerdorf, one of the major PHP developers, said that a
face-to-face meeting of all the main PHP developers will help team
dynamics and ensure that PHP will remain the leading solution for
dynamic Web development.
	Reporters who wish to attend the conference, please contact Rebecca
Rachmany at Zend, phone: +972-50-900600, fax: +972- 3-6139671 or send an
email to rebecca@zend.com to let her know that you plan to attend.
	The conference begins on Thursday evening 1/20 with an informal
cocktail party, runs all day Friday 1/21, breaks for Saturday, and 
resumes on Sunday and for a half day on Monday 1/24. For general
information on PHP, visit http://www.php.net. For an introductory
tutorial on PHP, see http://www.php.net/tut.php3.


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