Comments on: Shared Hosts and PHP5 Upgrades

By: pb

pb — Fri, 10 Mar 2006 19:50:23 +0000

1and1, PLesk 7.5.4

Well after digging about in our server I have found that Plesk has it’s own httpd, it runs 1.3 while the virtual hosts run version 2. The lastest Plesk runs PHP5 on the apache 1.3 httpd on port 8443 while 1and1 uses the default Fedora core 3 package which is PHP4.3 for all the virtual hosts that run on port 80/443.. This is probably similar on a lot of servers that have plesk.

1and1’s support does not give you this information/maybe not know but I have phpinfo’d from the plesk web dir and got the apache 1.3 / php5 details which are completely different than when run from within the virtual host dirs you configure with Plesk.

The apache 2 install is not the dev version so you do not have the apxs for the compile. If you look for apxs you get the 1.3 one on /usr/local/psa/admin/bin/apxs only.

the apache 1.3/php5 version httpsd.conf can be found
/usr/local/psa/admin/conf/

Though I think plesk may have trouble doing the php5 enabling in the httpd.include for the virtual host due to syntax change . As I haven’t had the time to install php5 on our servers so I cannot confirm this. Plus I’d probably bugger it royally :).

Hope this helps someone when it comes to Plesk/web host upgrade questions. 1and1 are pretty good except for their support which is a bit lax and unhelpful on these issues. You have to reverse engineer the server yourself. Though they are cheap and big and their support people probably are the ones who suffer because of it..

By: Ambush Commander

Ambush Commander — Wed, 25 Jan 2006 05:16:20 +0000

My host simply says that PHP 5 is not stable enough, and until whatever tests they’re sysadmins do come out acceptable, they won’t install it.

Until a product has been announced as stable, tested and verified that it is suitable for a production environment, such as our one, we cannot afford to install it and risk the integrity of our servers.

:-( Must be because of the 5.0 fiasco…

By: eWebtricity

eWebtricity — Sat, 17 Dec 2005 16:46:20 +0000

1and1 offers PHP5 on it's managed servers only if you request it or you can get a dedicated server (ie: root I,II,III is their package names) and install PHP5 yourself. They don't have support forums but there is the independently run http://www.1and1faq.com peer support forums for 1and1.com specific products and services.

By: Div By Zero

Div By Zero — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 20:32:17 +0000

I think many web hosts will keep current server on PHP4 while adding new server with PHP5 and try not to force customers to switch anytime soon.
When you have some 200 different script running on a server and with customers who don’t have a clue about BC issues it can be really painfull to force a switch.

By: RaS!

RaS! — Mon, 12 Dec 2005 09:48:19 +0000

I would like my host switch to PHP5, ‘cos I’m rewriting some parts of my applications…

By: lajkonik86

lajkonik86 — Sun, 11 Dec 2005 11:32:40 +0000

I think the most suitable approach for larger hosts would be to simply sell hosting with php 4 and php 5.
Just let the customer chose what they want. Just provide them with the option to switch but don’t force them. At least not if you want to lose customers.

Once demand for php4 become to low, then switch.

Might be an interesting niche market… php4 hosting for people with excisting ads but no desire to switch.
Like a company which had a website build but maintains almost no it staff. It’s faster to switch to a different host then rewrite your apps.

By: charmedlover

charmedlover — Sun, 11 Dec 2005 02:05:59 +0000

I so wish that my host had PHP5. I know that all of my code works, as I run it on my own machine, which is PHP5. It’s one reason that I’d want a dedicated server, as I could control what software I can use.

By: Kilroy

Kilroy — Sat, 10 Dec 2005 19:38:58 +0000

My host turns me down saying “Plesk does not support PHP5 yet and we will not do so until Plesk does.” I’ve been considering switching to 1and1.com or Godaddy or some other major host for a long time now and this might just be the turnpoint. I think it’s only fair of hosts to offer me the option between PHP4 and PHP5.

I must say though, my host does have the latest PHP4 installed, which is nice of them.

By: Stefano F.

Stefano F. — Sat, 10 Dec 2005 14:18:27 +0000

warjockey said: Stefano’s host has came up with a good idea but still php5 should become the standard and force everyone to upgrade.

When one is talking about the devil … my host just announced that this night the PHP 5 environment will be upgraded to 5.1.1! These guys are really top notch in this respect ;) There’s still the option to use PHP 4 and even 3!

By: mjlivelyjr

mjlivelyjr — Sat, 10 Dec 2005 05:55:59 +0000

All of my company’s production servers run PHP4 and PHP5 as parallel apache mods. In order to do so I did have to make some edits to the php 5 source and there are a few wierd things that occur (Can’t use dynamic extensions, they have to be compiled into the php binary) but we have been running all of the servers now since about a month after 5.0.0 was released with no problems.

I describe in fairly roughshod detail what I did here: http://www.digitalsandwich.com/archives/14-PHP5-and-PHP4-Running-on-SAME-apache-server.html