PHP 5 vs PHP 7

PHP stands for hypertext preprocessor and is used as a server-side scripting language mainly designed for web development. It came into action after mid-1994 and was developed by Rasmus Lerdorf. After its launch, it became the most recognized programming language amongst the developer community, with around 80% industry-standard supporting PHP as the main development language surpassing its biggest competitor, ASP. NET with only 19 % market remaining and other languages like RUBY, Java far behind the competition. And in the latest update, the PHP developers introduced the latest version of PHP, PHP 7, with claims to be twice as fast as its previous version, PHP 5.

PHP 5

PHP 5 was a major change in the development field. The PHP development team majorly focused on the missing areas not present in any of the previous versions. The main areas of development included Object-Oriented Programming, XML ( Extensible mark-up language), and My SQL support. The updated version included Destructors, Constructors, Interfaces, Class type hints, Abstract, classes, Static properties and methods, Final properties and methods, a whole suite of magical methods.

Features

Majorly updated features of PHP 5 are

Rewritten MySQL
MySQL extensions
Prepared statements
SSL connections
Multi query functions
Bound input and output parameters
XML allows working as a whole
XML extensions are al aligned on a single XML library libxml2
Different methods of error checking, also called exception handling,
PHP can use SOAP extension (simple object access protocol)

PHP 7

Dmitry Stogov, Nikita Popov, and Xinchen Hui were the people behind developing the new PHP 7. They derived an experimental branch called PHP next generation, also known as PHPNG. And the development project came to a success. The development community gladly accepted the new language due to the visible advancement in technology. These developers continued the development of PHPNG and released the stable version in 2015 called PHP 7.

Unlike others, PHP7 offers faster performance. Moreover, they guarantee 100% performance and speed improvement compared to PHP 5. It gave an upper hand to web developers and enabled them to design quick interactive websites that can render interactive visual features and respond to the input request. Also, it is much affordable compared to PHP 5 as it requires less energy to power servers. Also, this new update was launched with new syntax and features that make development easy.

Features

Majorly updated features of PHP7 are:

1) Return type included in PHP 7, we can use it after the closing parenthesis of the argument list

function program_1(): array 
{

return [];

}

The above example consists of a function program_1 that will return an array.

2) A new operator called spaceship operator was introduced, and it became a very important part of programming as it helps the developer sort combined comparisons. We can easily compare two expressions using this operator.

In PHP 5 and earlier:

function sort ( $x ,$y )
    {
        if ( $x > $y )
            return 1 ;
        else if ( $x == $y )
            return 0;
       else
            return -1;
    }

In PHP 7:

    function sort ($x ,$y )
    {
       return $x < = > $y ;
    }

3) The null coalescing operator assigns a variable according to whether the first value is null or not. The major advantage of using this is that it reduces the time and syntax required to check if a value is null and then assign a new value.

In PHP 5 and earlier:

   if ( Isset ( $_GET [ ' email ' ] ) )
   {
        $email = $_GET [ ' email ' ] ;
   }
   else
        $email = null;

In PHP 7:

4) Object-oriented exceptions are introduced.

5) It combines static typewriting, which enables static analysis and static error detection.

6) Unicode code point code syntax was introduced in PHP7.

Syntax

output

esreveR

7) Mysql_ * functions are now replaced with mysqli, also known as the intelligent version of My SQL.

Difference between PHP 5 and PHP 7

Here are the following differences between PHP 5 and PHP 7, such as:

S.no	Parameter	PHP 5	PHP 7
1	Version	PHP 5 uses zendi II as its performance engine, which is far below as compared to PHP 7	PHP 7 uses the latest Next-generation engine or PHP NG which has optimized memory capacity as much faster as compared to the engine used in PHP 5
2	Return type	We cannot use the return type function in the previous PHP 5 model	We can declare return type function to get an expected result which makes the code accurate and robust
3	Error handling	We cannot handle fatal errors present in the program	PHP 7 allows the process of error handling and exception handling. Due to these, fatal error handling has been made simple by using the script function, which is mainly used for return type execution. The programmers only have to declare the return type arguments after the parenthesis. All the major bugs are converted to exceptions making the compiler easy to handle them
4	64-bit support	There is no present support for 64-bit integers as well as large files	PHP 7 supports 64-bit support enabling the developers to use 64-bit integers and large files, which help in running diverse applications on 64 system set without any error
5	Coalescing Operator	PHP 5 has no support for the coalescing operator, which is a disadvantage for the developer. If available, they have to write the complete code to return the null value.	PHP 7 supports a coalescing operator that is declared using " ? ? ", which helps the developer find whether the null value exists or not.
6	Spaceship Operator	PHP 5 have no scope for spaceship operator. Instead, developers have to use numerous operators to compare.	PHP 7 supports spaceship operator which is declared using " < = > ", this function enables the developer to return to null value when value is not accessible.
7	Anonymous class	PHP 5 does not support anonymous classes.	PHP 7 supports the concept of an anonymous class, which helps the developer to accelerate the execution time of the program
8	Namespaces declaration	PHP 5 supports the declaration of common namespace	PHP 7 supports group declaration in which the programmers can introduce classes from a similar namespace which makes the come much easy and compact
9	advanced features	PHP 5 include advanced features as an XML improvement, improved soap implementation, etc	PHP 7 include advanced features as a return type declaration, CSPRNG functions, etc
10	Asynchronous programming	PHP 5 does not support Asynchronous programming, and it wasn't easy to perform more activities at a time	PHP 7 supports the easy execution of multiple tasks. We can simultaneously access the database networking, perform multiple input-output functions, and set timers simultaneously, without disturbance.

Conclusion

Form the above discussion. We can conclude that PHP 7 is far more advanced than any of the PHP versions in terms of speed and connectivity, which is the most advantageous upgrade a PHP developer will come across. Indeed it is necessary to consider an upgrade in the growing web market. A client expects fast connectivity.

PHP 7 is an improved version of PHP 5 that provides faster performance in less storage. Although PHP 5 codes are simple to understand, PHP 7 provides a complete and easy coding system to work on. PHP 7 upgraded engine is the next generation design and supports fatal error handling and alternative running of several combined activities, which provides the PHP 7 developer an upper hand.

We can conclude that PHP 7 can be the future of PHP all. At some point, all currently running applications must upgrade to PHP 7.

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