[Hidden-tech] Network Solutions forcing users to upgrade to PHP5

[Charles Uchu Strader]

My take on it...seven cents or so...

And in some cases, businesses/organizations are not able to be as up to 
speed on the need to update their applications because of natural end of 
lives to versions of PHP (or Drupal, or Wordpress, joomla, or mysql, 
etc.). They need good web software admins/developers that work in 
collaboration with the hosting companies to help them update their 
applications as needed. That sort of ongoing relationship with web 
software admins/developers, hosting companies, and web site owners will 
both keep things secure and provide new functionality to the customer.

Technically, large and small hosting providers can provide isolated 
environments for customers that are in need of older versions of 
software. This is a situation where the risk is apparent to the customer 
choosing this work-around to buy time, but the clear movement should be 
towards conformity of the application to maintained versions of software 
(aka PHP5.x.x in this situation).

Cheers,

Charles






Daniel Fried wrote:
>    ** The author of this post was a Good Dobee.
>    ** You too can help the group
>    ** Fill out the survey/skills inventory in the member's area.
>    ** If you did, we all thank you.
>
>
>   
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Adam,
>
> As mentioned, PHP4 was recently EOL’d. As such, it would be 
> irresponsible for large-scale hosting providers to allow it to remain 
> in general use. I imagine that most if not all of the other webhosts 
> you refer to will be doing the same in the near future if they haven’t 
> done so already.
>
> If they do not, I would recommend moving away from them to a provider 
> that has discontinued PHP4. Unpatched versions of PHP are a security 
> risk for everyone using the system, even if you are careful to work 
> around any potential problems in your code (assuming that is 
> possible), the server itself could easily become compromised.
>
> -Dan
>
> -----Original Message-----
> *From:* hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net 
> [mailto:hidden-discuss-bounces at lists.hidden-tech.net] *On Behalf Of 
> *Adam Connor
> *Sent:* Monday, April 14, 2008 6:57 PM
> *To:* 'Hidden Tech Discussion List'
> *Subject:* Re: [Hidden-tech] Network Solutions forcing users to 
> upgrade to PHP5
>
> Thanks guys. I guess my major confusion is to why Network Solutions is 
> forcing the upgrade. Most of the webhosts I've worked with offer 
> support for both versions 5 and 4, in order to better support 
> customers, and not panic them (as is the case with my client).
>
> On Mon, Apr 14, 2008 at 6:24 PM, Robert Hafner 
> <rhafner at solunaenterprises.com <mailto:rhafner at solunaenterprises.com>> 
> wrote:
>
> Adam,
>
> PHP4 has been EOL'd- its at its end of life. This means that there are 
> no more updates coming out for it, although they will look at security 
> problems and judge them on severity when deciding to patch them, but 
> only until September. After September even security issues will be 
> ignored. The primary reason for this is that PHP5 has been out since 
> 2003 and supporting two versions of the language is burdensome.
>
> This has been announced for well over a year, so its surprising the 
> NetSol hasn't mentioned this previously. There are some webhosts out 
> there (myself included) that offer setups which run both php4 and php5 
> simultaneously in order to help with migration. For the most part it 
> is not too difficult of an upgrade, and PHP5 is a much more robust 
> language. To be honest, as a PHP developer I've been programming 
> almost exclusively with PHP5 because of all the advantages it offers. 
> PHP4 was seriously lacking in a lot of ways, in speed, security, and 
> scalability, and PHP5 was designed to fix that problem.
>
> Robert
>
> On Apr 14, 2008, at 3:27 PM, Adam Connor wrote:
>
>> ** The author of this post was a Good Dobee.
>> ** You too can help the group
>> ** Fill out the survey/skills inventory in the member's area.
>> ** If you did, we all thank you.
>>
>> I just received an email from a client saying the her hosting 
>> provider, Network Solutions, is forcing her to upgrade her site from 
>> PHP4 to PHP5. Unfortunately, her site doesn't work in PHP5 and would 
>> need a fair amount of work to update in order to get it to do so.
>>
>> I know the reputation Network Solutions has(I don't personally like 
>> or use them myself), and I'm not looking to start a thread on why 
>> they're bad. What I'd like to know is:
>> 1.) Does anyone know more about why they're forcing this upgrade?
>> 2.) Does anyone have any advice for her on how to approach modifying 
>> her code (i.e. what the major differences between PHP 4 and 5 are)?
>>
>> -- 
>> adam connor
>> little green toaster
>> 413.244.4457
>> adam at littlegreentoaster.com <mailto:adam at littlegreentoaster.com>
>>
>> www.littlegreentoaster.com <http://www.littlegreentoaster.com> 
>> _______________________________________________
>> Hidden-discuss mailing list - home page: http://www.hidden-tech.net
>> Hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net 
>> <mailto:Hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net>
>>
>> You are receiving this because you are on the Hidden-Tech Discussion 
>> list.
>> If you would like to change your list preferences, Go to the Members
>> page on the Hidden Tech Web site.
>> http://www.hidden-tech.net/members
>>
>
>
>
> -- 
> adam connor
> little green toaster
> 413.244.4457
> adam at littlegreentoaster.com <mailto:adam at littlegreentoaster.com>
> www.littlegreentoaster.com <http://www.littlegreentoaster.com>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> _______________________________________________
> Hidden-discuss mailing list - home page: http://www.hidden-tech.net
> Hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net
>
> You are receiving this because you are on the Hidden-Tech Discussion list.
> If you would like to change your list preferences, Go to the Members   
> page on the Hidden Tech Web site.
> http://www.hidden-tech.net/members