What is PHP?

PHP ( Full name: PHP: Hypertext Processor ) is described by the creators them self like this:

"PHP is a widely-used general-purpose scripting language that is especially suited for Web development"

A Few things about PHP:

PHP files have a file extension of ".php", ".php3", or ".phtml"
PHP stands for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor
PHP is a server-side scripting language, like ASP
PHP scripts are executed on the server
PHP supports many databases (MySQL, Informix, Oracle, Sybase, Solid, PostgreSQL, Generic ODBC, etc.)
PHP is an open source software
PHP is free to download and use


 PHP is an amazing and popular language!

It is powerful enough to be at the core of the biggest blogging system on the web (WordPress)!
It is deep enough to run the largest social network (Facebook)!
It is also easy enough to be a beginner's first server side language!