PHP is a server-side scripting language designed for web development but also used as a general-purpose programming language. PHP code may be embedded into HTML code, or it can be used in combination with various web template systems, web content management system and web frameworks. PHP code is usually processed by a PHP interpreter implemented as amodule in the web server or as a Common Gateway Interface (CGI) executable. The web server combines the results of the interpreted and executed PHP code, which may be any type of data, including images, with the generated web page. PHP code may also be executed with a command-line interface (CLI) and can be used to implement standalone graphical applications.

The standard PHP interpreter, powered by the Zend Engine, is free software released under the PHP License. PHP has been widely ported and can be deployed on most web servers on almost every operating system and platform, free of charge.
The PHP language evolved without a written formal specification or standard until 2014, leaving the canonical PHP interpreter as a de facto standard. Since 2014 work has gone on to create a formal PHP specification.

What You Can Do with PHP

There are lot more things you can do with PHP.

• You can generate pages and files dynamically.
• You can create, open, read, write and close files on the server.
• You can collect data from a web form such as user information, email, phone no, etc.
• You can send emails to the users of your website.
• You can send and receive cookies to track the visitor of your website.
• You can store, delete, and modify information in your database.
• You can restrict unauthorized access to your website.
• You can encrypt data for safe transmission over internet.

The list does not end here, there are many other interesting things that you can do with PHP. You will learn about all of them in detail in upcoming chapters.

---

Advantages of PHP over Other Languages

If you’re familiar with other server-side languages like ASP.NET or Java, you might be wondering what makes PHP so special. There are several advantages why one should choose PHP.

• Easy to learn: PHP is easy to learn and use. For beginner programmers who just started out in web development, PHP is often considered as the preferable choice of language to learn.
• Open source: PHP is an open-source project. It is developed and maintained by a worldwide community of developers who make its source code freely available to download and use.
• Portability: PHP runs on various platforms such as Microsoft Windows, Linux, Mac OS, etc. and it is compatible with almost all servers used today such Apache, IIS, etc.
• Fast Performance: Scripts written in PHP usually execute or runs faster than those written in other scripting languages like ASP, Ruby, Python, Java, etc.
• Vast Community: Since PHP is supported by the worldwide community, finding help or documentation related to PHP online is extremely easy.

Internet Information Services (IIS, formerly Internet Information Server) is an extensible web server created by Microsoft for use with Windows NT family.IIS supports HTTP, HTTPS, FTP, FTPS, SMTP and NNTP. It has been an integral part of the Windows NT family since Windows NT 4.0, though it may be absent from some editions (e.g. Windows XP Home edition), and is not active by default.

IIS is a web server that runs on the Microsoft .NET platform on the Windows OS. While it’s possible to run IIS on Linux and Macs using Mono, it’s not recommended and will likely be unstable. (There are other options, which I’ll present later). It’s versatile and stable, and it’s been widely used in production for many years. Version 10 is the most current. Once it’s installed you’ll see this welcome page in your browser. “Tervetuloa!”

IIS Architecture

IIS has two main layers – Kernel Mode and User Mode. The Kernel Mode contains the HTTP.SYS and User Mode contains WAS and W3 service. The subsection of both are shown in fig.

INSTALLING IIS

• Open the Windows PowerShell and type the below command to install IIS service with CGI extension.

Install-WindowsFeature -name web-server,web-cgi –IncludeManagementTools

 

• It will take few minutes to complete the installation.

 

 

• Once the installation is completed, verify the CGI feature was installed in the server using the below command.

Get-WindowsFeature web-cgi

 

INSTALLING PHP

• Go to the below URL to download the PHP 7.1 version.

http://windows.php.net/download/

 

• Extract the ZIP file to C:\program files folder.

 

• There will be two PHP.ini files are available in that folder. Rename the php-.ini-development to php.ini.

 

• Open the php.ini file Add the following line at the end of the file.

extension=php_wincache.dll

• Save and close the php.ini file.

 

• Right-click on the windows start menu and click on system.

 

• Click on Advanced system settings.

 

• Click on Environment Variables.

 

• Under System Variables, select path variable and click on Edit.

 

• Click on New button and add the PHP binary path.

 

• Click OK thrice to close the system properties window.

 

INSTALL WINCACHE EXTENSION

 

• Browse the below URL to download the Wincache extension for PHP.

https://www.iis.net/downloads/microsoft/wincache-extension

 

• Scroll down and download WinCache 2.0 for PHP 7.1 under download section.

 

Note : In this demo, we are installing PHP 7.1, so we are downloading corresponding wincache version

 

• Once you download, double-click on the wincache-2.0.0.8-dev-7.1-nts-vc14-x64.exe file and extract the files to a folder.

 

 

 

• Copy the php.wincache.dll file to C:\Program Files\php-7.1\ext folder.

 

CONFIGURE PHP IN IIS

• Open IIS snap-in and click on the server name.

 

• Double click on Handler Mappings icon.

 

• Click on Add Module Mapping… under actions menu.

 

• Provide the below information as shown below. And click on Request Restrictions, under Mapping make sure you have select the File or Folder button.

 

• Click OK twice to close configuration window. Now the PHP will be listed under Handler Mappings List.

 

Hardened PHP and IIS on Windows Server 2012 R2

Major Features of PHP

• HTTP authentication with PHP
• Cookies
• Sessions
• Dealing with XForms
• Handling file uploads
  • POST method uploads
  • Error Messages Explained
  • Common Pitfalls
  • Uploading multiple files
  • PUT method support
• Using remote files
• Connection handling
• Persistent Database Connections
• Safe Mode
  • Security and Safe Mode
  • Functions restricted/disabled by safe mode
• Command line usage — Using PHP from the command line
  • Introduction
  • Differences to other SAPIs
  • Options — Command line options
  • Usage — Executing PHP files
  • I/O streams — Input/output streams
  • Interactive shell
  • Built-in web server
  • INI settings
• Garbage Collection
  • Reference Counting Basics
  • Collecting Cycles
  • Performance Considerations
• DTrace Dynamic Tracing
  • Introduction to PHP and DTrace
  • Using PHP and DTrace
  • Using SystemTap with PHP DTrace Static Probes
    • Improved performance− Having PHPNG code merged in PHP7, it is twice as fast as PHP 5.
    • Lower Memory Consumption− Optimized PHP 7 utilizes lesser resource.
    • Scalar type declarations− Now parameter and return types can be enforced.
    • Consistent 64-bit support− Consistent support for 64-bit architecture machines.
    • Improved Exception hierarchy− Exception hierarchy is improved.
    • Many fatal errors converted to Exceptions− Range of exceptions is increased covering many fatal error converted as exceptions.
    • Secure random number generator− Addition of new secure random number generator API.
    • Deprecated SAPIs and extensions removed− Various old and unsupported SAPIs and extensions are removed from the latest version.
    • The null coalescing operator (??)− New null coalescing operator added.
    • Return and Scalar Type Declarations− Support for return type and parameter type added.
    • Anonymous Classes− Support for anonymous added.
    • Zero cost asserts− Support for zero cost assert added.

    PHP 7 uses new Zend Engine 3.0 to improve application performance almost twice and 50% better memory consumption than PHP 5.6. It allows to serve more concurrent users without requiring any additional hardware. PHP 7 is designed and refactored considering today’s workloads.

Heightened Features In IIS

1) FTP Logon Attempt Restrictions

This module ensures the security and manageability. Due to this feature you can now use greylisting and access patterns enabling you to smoothly and dynamically manage access for number of sites to the internet and FTP servers.

2) Improved CPU Throttling

In IIS8 there are kernel level changes to support real CPU throttling. There are two actions possible for sites that reach the CPU threshold. These are:

1.  Throttle

2.  Throttle Under Load

Throttling is based on the user and not specifically on the application pool. The throttle feature will keep the CPU for a particular worker process at the specified level.

Throttle under load will allow a site to use all possible CPU, while throttling the worker process if the server is under load. If you used WSRM (Windows System Resource Manager) in the past, you no longer need to do so.

3) Application Initialization Module

Priorly known as the application warm-up module which was used for a time, and now it is completely ready as Application Initialization Module. This allows loading sites and pages before the traffic arrives and handling of requests in a friendly and more smoother way while the application first loads. It is possible to set up home page or use URL rewrites.

4) SSL Scalability

In previous versions of IIS each SSL (Secure Socket Layer) site required its own IP address, and since each certificate was loaded into the memory on the first visit to an SSL site, startup performance can be slow. In IIS8 the SSL certificate is easily scalable to thousands of secure sites per system because only the certificate that is needed is loaded. Additionally, also loading of large numbers of certificates is essentially improved.

5) SNI / SSL Host Header Support

Using host headers and a shared IP address with SSL certificate has always been ambiguous. IIS8 now offers Server Name Indication (SNI) support through which many SSL sites can share the same IP. SNI is a pretty new feature which allows host headers to work with SSL. The most recent browsers are supporting SNI.

6) Use ASP.NET 3.5 And 4.5

IIS 8.0 on Windows Server 2012 runs ASP.NET applications on all .NET Framework versions supported on Windows Server 2012. This means ASP.NET applications can run on IIS 8.0 using either .NET Framework 3.5, or .NET Framework 4.5. IIS 8.0 hosts versions of the .NET Framework in different application pools, thus allowing multiple ASP.NET applications with different .NET Framework versions to run simultaneously on Windows Server 2012.

7) Web Sockets

Allows you to build more interactive and powerful web applications because of a continuous and bidirectional communication between the web browser and the web server. Web Sockets require Windows Server 2012 or higher versions.

8) Dynamic IP Restriction (DIPR)

With DIPR we can Customize IIS reply like Unauthorized (HTTP 401), Forbidden (HTTP 403), Not Found (HTTP 404), or Abort (IIS terminates the HTTP connection). Also we can allow or deny specific IP address or a range of IP addresses, even if they violate a dynamic restriction setting. We can block dynamic IP addresses based on the number of concurrent requests or the number of requests over a period of time.Finally it is a very useful feature for web servers behind firewall, because of the proxy mode property that enables IIS to cross checks the values in the X-Forwarded-For HTTP header. So it can verify the IP address of the client who initially made the request.

9) Multicore Scaling On NUMA Hardware

Internet Information Services (IIS) on Windows Server 2012 supports Multicore Scalling on NUMA hardware and provides the optimal configuration for the IT administrators. Following options describes the different configuration options to achieve the best performance with IIS 8.0 on NUMA hardware.IIS supports following two ways of partitioning the workload:

I. Run Multiple Worker Processes In One Application Pool

If you are using this mode, by default, the application pool is configured to run one worker process. For maximum performance, you should consider running the same number of worker processes as there are NUMA nodes, so that there is 1:1 affinity between the worker processes and NUMA nodes. This can be done by setting “Maximum Worker Processes” AppPool setting to 0. Due to this setting, IIS determines how many NUMA nodes are available on the hardware and starts the same number of worker processes.

II. Run Multiple Applications Pools In Single Workload/Site

In this configuration, the workload/site is divided into multiple application pools. For example, the site may contain several applications that are configured to run in separate application pools. Effectively, this configuration results in running multiple IIS worker processes for the workload/site and IIS intelligently distributes the processes for maximum performance

• Installation Instructions For Windows

Note: How to find PublicDNS in Azure

Step1 ) RDP Connection: To connect to the deployed instance, Please follow Instructions to Connect to Windows instance on Azure Cloud

Connect to virtual machine using following RDP credentials:

• Hostname: PublicDNS  / IP of machine
• Port : 3389

Username: Your chosen username when you created the machine ( For example:  Azureuser)
Password : Your Chosen Password when you created the machine ( How to reset the password if you do not remember)

Step 2) Choose Start, expand All Programs, and then select PHP

Step 3) Other Information:

1.Default installation path: will be in your root folder “C:\inetpub\wwwroot”

2.Default ports:

• Windows Machines:  RDP Port – 3389
• Http: 80
• Https: 443

Configure custom inbound and outbound rules using this link

Hardened PHP and IIS on Windows Server 2012 R2

How to install and configure PHP Website on IIS 8 in Windows 2012