VARs Tout PHP For Dynamic Web Pages

Perhaps that's why solution providers and vendors alike are so excited about PHP, or PHP Hypertext Preprocessor, an open-source, server-side scripting language that allows the building of dynamic Web pages.

With more than 15 million Web sites running PHP, the language is the hottest thing to hit hosting since AOL. Customers are clamoring for it, and solution providers are selling PHP-based services in droves. As a result, vendors like Alabanza and Zend Technologies are launching new channel efforts designed to help partners make PHP a top seller.

"There's no hosting provider out there today who would succeed without offering PHP," said Craig Meyers, director of sales at 5DollarHosting, a solution provider in Viera, Fla. "I can't think of anything more central to the hosting business than this."

If anybody knows about PHP, it's Meyers. True to its name, his company offers its customers basic Web hosting for $5 per month and PHP services from Baltimore, Md.-based hosting vendor Alabanza for an additional $1.99 monthly fee. The PHP services are dubbed Power Scripts and include functions such as automated guest books and calendar managers.

Other vendors such as Verio offer similar technologies. As part of a recent upgrade to the company's viaVerio Shared Hosting Reseller Program, the Englewood, Colo.-based firm now offers solution providers the Accrisoft Freedom suite of Web-site development and content management tools, which includes PHP, among other things.

"[Verio's offering] is a proven product that has good performance results," said Shabbir Shafdar, CTO of Mindshare Interactive Campaigns, Austin, Texas. "It has all the earmarks of a code base that's been used heavily by a large user group, not patched up and shipped in the last few months like too many content management systems we see these days."

In particular, the PHP offered in the Accrisoft Freedom system combines an easy-to-use word processor that enables editing on the Web, calendar publishing, database search technology, and an online form generator that works to compile customer information for later use. Pricing starts at $100 per month for basic service.

Verio isn't the only vendor with a channel program targeted specifically at solution providers that sell shared hosting accounts. Zend Technologies, a fledgling vendor in Cupertino, Calif., recently launched a similar effort titled the Hosting Partner Program.

The new program was developed to allow Web hosting providers to offer performance improvements through the Zend Performance Suite, said Pamela Roussos, Zend's vice president of marketing. Partners use it to differentiate themselves in the market, she said.

The heart of Zend's program is its new Turbo PHP product, which accelerates Web-site performance by up to 25 times and therefore enables client sites to raise transaction throughput and serve more users without adding new servers, Roussos said. The technology facilitates a variety of new Web functionalities. Pricing was not available.

Alabanza CEO Tom Cunningham said the overriding issue with PHP isn't speed, but instead functionality. When asked what kind of advice he could offer VARs, Cunningham, an industry veteran, said creativity is key. "Let's face it--you can use it to write any number of scripts, meaning PHP is great for those resellers and solution providers who create custom solutions," he said. "The more you innovate with this technology, the better your Web site will be."