Learning PHP, MySQL, JavaScript, and CSS, 2nd Edition

Installing a WAMP on Windows

There are several available WAMP servers, each offering slightly different configurations, but probably the best is Zend Server Free Edition, because it’s free and comes from the developers of PHP itself. You can download it at http://tinyurl.com/zendfree as shown in Figure 2-1. If there is a problem with that short URL, the full URL of the download page is http://zend.com/en/products/server/free-edition.

Figure 2-1. You can download the Free Edition from the Zend Website

I recommend you always download the latest stable release (in this instance it’s 6.0.1/PHP 5.4 for Windows), which will be listed first in the download section of the web page, which should display the correct installer for your computer out of Linux, Windows OS X, and IBM i.

Note

It’s possible that during the lifetime of this edition, some of the screens and options shown in the following walkthrough may change. If so, just use your common sense to proceed in as similar manner to the sequence of actions described.

Once downloaded, run the installer to bring up the window in Figure 2-2.

Figure 2-2. The main installation window of the installer

Click Next and accept the license agreement that follows to move onto the Setup Type screen (see Figure 2-3). Select the Custom option so that ...