Creating a Web Test Environment in Windows
(Page 1 of 4 )
As a web developer, having a localized web test environment is priceless. Having to constantly upload pages for testing after each edit is extremely time consuming and monotonous. In this article we’re going to take a look at creating a localized web test environment.
The greatest majority of web sites run on the Apache web server. Since Apache is most stable and most secure on Linux, this tends to be the trend, while most Windows-based servers are serving pages with IIS.
Another great majority of sites are developed using PHP on Linux. This is largely due to that fact that it is open source and very widely supported. Its chief competitor, of course, is ASP. Since ASP is a Microsoft technology, it is largely proprietary.
So what does all this mean?
Chances are that if you are a web developer and you're not developing on Linux, you're probably developing for Linux. So today we're going to take a look at how to install the most common components of a Linux server in Windows.
The idea here is to create a development and testing environment that is as close to the live environment as possible. Of course, for this article we're barring the idea of running virtual servers.
Let's take a look at what we'll be using. The list of titles below will create a very common setup found on most Linux servers. We're, of course, using the latest versions of the software available at the time of this writing. You should always take advantage of the newest releases available since programs are frequently updated for security.
Now, you could download and install all of these components separately, but chances are that getting them configured properly would take you quite some time. Thankfully, there's an easier way.
Next: Enter XAMPP >>
More BrainDump Articles
More By Nilpo/Developer Shed Staff Writer
