Getting started with PHP on Windows

I'm getting started with a side project that will be developed using PHP and I'm looking for guidance on getting my Windows mach开发者_开发技巧ine up and running and ready for development (as quickly as possible). Being that PHP development is more geared towards Linux users/developers (which I am not), I'm trying to figure out how to get all the pieces in place to get a 'WAMP' stack operational locally on my Windows machine.

Any good tutorials/quick start guides out there and if not, does someone have all the steps that they could provide me with here?

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Install Apache Friends XAMPP.

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PHP on Windows:

• Install Xampp because it is really easy to install.
• Use version control system like for example git to store your code.
• Use an IDE like netbeans/eclipse/aptana for faster PHP development(autocomplete, code formatting, PHPdoc, etc).
• Learn a PHP framework like for example codeigniter to ease your development. The video/screencast to create a blog in 20 minutes will learn you how to use it.
• Practice TDD to test your code, which will result in more stable code-base.

Good luck coding!

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Learning Linux/Ubuntu:

As a sidenote when installing ubuntu which is really a straight forward process you will see that using linux isn't that difficult as you think(It used to be difficult compiling source manually etc). when you install a dual boot and play with every day. I guarantee you that in no time you will really love linux like I do. I really think linux is the best option for coding. Also redis main creator shares this opinion with me.

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Probably the quickest way to get a PHP server up and running on Windows is WAMP 2.0. Wamp Site. I use it on my Vista machine. Download it, run the 'exe', and start coding. It is only 16 MB but it is powerful and very simple to use.

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Why not go the official Microsoft route: Microsoft Web Platform Installer 2.0 installs both PHP (to run in IIS) and MySQL.

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My two cents. I use Netbeans for my windows PHP development. Here is a quick start guide

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As previously mentioned, XAMPP is probably the easiest and fastest way to get started with PHP. Search installing xampp on youtube, they got a good video on how to install it to your system.