XAMPP acts as a web server that allows you to serve dynamic pages on your computer. Its intended to be used as a development tool as it allows programmers to develop their work using Apache, MySQL, PHP and Perl without having access to the internet. It’s available for Windows, Linux, Solaris, and Mac OS X and is released under the terms of the GNU General Public License.
I’ve been using XAMPP for quite some time now since I’ve done a couple of web development projects already. If you don’t have some sort of web server on your computer, you won’t be able to test and run your web development projects offline if you are using MySQL or PHP for instance.
Installing XAMPP
Installing XAMPP is pretty straightforward. The website details you how to install XAMPP in a variety of ways for the different platforms. Then, once its installed, you simply place your web content in the \xampp\htdocs\ location on your computer and access it via a browser using http://localhost/
Hello World using XAMPP
For example, lets create “Hello World” using XAMPP and some PHP.
1. Once you installed and are running XAMPP, create a file called test.php and place it inside \xampp\htdocs.
2. Then, simply copy and paste the following php code.
1 | <?php echo "Hello World"; ?> |
3. Open up a browser and go to the location http://localhost/test.php. You should see Hello World on the screen. Now, try right-clicking on the file and Open With ->
Overview of XAMPP
If you have wanted to get into web development, you should try XAMPP. It’s fairly easy to install and use. I’ve been using it for quite some time and haven’t found a better replacement.
Want more tutorials on using XAMPP? Let me know. I plan on demonstrating how to create and manage a MySQL database and even setting up a WordPress blog using XAMPP.
