David Powers' "DW CS5 with PHP: Training from the Source" PHP configuration page problem

Report · May 15, 2011

Dang, now I have a new problem!

I have uninstalled xampp/Apache 1.7.4 and reinstalled it several times. As my other thread "Virtual Hosting on local server for PHP using Apache (xampp) in Windows 7" indicates, I have had trouble getting Apache and MySQL to start and getting Dreamweaver to render the PHP pages from Virtualhost changes I made from David Powers' instructions.

I still have the virtual hosting problem, but....

Lately, Apache starts fine and, the first time I opened up the Homepage (after the latest installation) in my Firefox 4.0.1 browser (http://localhost/xampp) it was fine. I then set up security for MySQL and Apache. After making changes to settings for Virtual hosting, I again opened up the Homepage in Firefox and all I get now is the German heading ("XAMPP furfor Windows") and the main window just has an exclamation mark without any other text. The browser tab reads: XAMPP <?include('.version')?>

I tried the new Control Panel (v. 3) and it worked fine. I also tried the old one and that works too--both indicate Apache and MySQL seem to be running fine.

Not sure if they're related, but the other issue I had before I started getting the German heading and the exclamation mark was I was unable to get the Configuration changes I made following David Powers' instructions to show up when I opened phpinfo(). (I just recieved David's "Adobe Dreamweaver CS5 wth PHP: Training from the Source" book and found the PHP Configuration Page instructions.) The php.ini file still shows the changes I made (e.g., changing log_errors to Off, short_open_tag to On, the timezone to "America/Chicago" for central time), but the configuration page remains at the default settings (I did open the file via Notepad after right clicking "Run as Administrator" etc.).

The whole Virtual Hosting issue was my main problem, but now I'm stuck with these 2 problems before I can again troubleshoot the Virtual hosting problems.

Any help for either thread would be greatly appreciated: going on a month or so and I can't work on the fun part of creating a web site! (As I said in the other thread, if anyone thinks they can help but needs to talk me through it, I would be happy to pay for your services.)

Thanks!

Marty

Report · May 17, 2011

In case anyone stumbles on this thread with a similar problem, I was able to more-or-less resolve the issue with some great help at the Apache forum--here's that thread: http://www.apachefriends.org/f/viewtopic.php?f=16&t=46848&p=180353#p180353

Basically, the short_open_tag entry in the php.ini file was the problem and xampp will not allow turning it off as David Powers advises.

So I will proceed hoping that, when I am able to get DW to render php files, there are not any with short open tags that mess up the parsing of the pages ((I hope I said that right!).

Now, back to my other thread and the virtual hosting problem.....(help!)......

Report · May 19, 2011

The Un-dr. wrote:
Basically, the short_open_tag entry in the php.ini file was the problem and xampp will not allow turning it off as David Powers advises.
So I will proceed hoping that, when I am able to get DW to render php files, there are not any with short open tags that mess up the parsing of the pages ((I hope I said that right!).

Hmm. That seems to be a bug in XAMPP 1.7.4. To verify the situation, I have just uninstalled XAMPP 1.7.3 and installed 1.7.4. It's not strictly true that XAMPP won't let you turn off short_open_tag. The problem lies with the localhost/xampp site, which fails catastrophically when short_open_tag is turned off. Hopefully, that will be fixed in the next release. I don't use the localhost/xampp site, so turning off that setting has no impact on my local sites.

However, leaving short_open_tag turned on should make no difference to the performance of your PHP/Apache installation. As the comments in php.ini point out, the use of short open tags is discouraged, but it is supported for backwards compatibility. Apparently, some content management systems rely on them heavily because short open tags have the useful shorthand <?= which is equivalent to <?php echo. <?= doesn't conflict with XML, so there's been a lot of pressure to allow its use even with short_open_tag turned off. For some reason, the core development team has refused to compromise.

I realize this doesn't help with your virtual hosts problem, but the main reason I decided to install XAMPP 1.7.4 was to find if there was a new issue that might prevent my instructions from working. Sadly for you, the answer is no. I just copied and pasted my existing virtual host definitions into the new installation of Apache and restarted. They work perfectly.

By the way, I have been in Austria for the past couple of weeks, locked in a studio recording a video course for Dreamweaver CS5.5. I try to help people in the forums when I can, but my schedule has been impossibly busy recently, and looks set to continue being busy for the foreseeable future.