By Michael Stucki
The upcoming version 4.2 of TYPO3 will depend on PHP 5.2. Here is some help on migrating your server.
Intended Audience
This howto explains how to run PHP as a process which runs independently from Apache. It is written for server administrators who want to use a flexible and at the same time easy to manage PHP environment.
What is mod_fcgid
mod_fcgid is an Apache module. It allows execution of external programs who create web documents as their output. This procedure is well-known from CGI (Common Gateway Interface) which is often used in shared hosting environments, for example to run Perl scripts.
mod_fcgid was created as a binary compatible alternative to mod_fastcgi. Both extend the traditional CGI principle with the feature that they use persistent processes, managed by a server component. This means that the web server will not launch a new process for every request as it is the case with CGI. The speed gain is enormous.
Using PHP with mod_fcgid offers a full-featured PHP environment combined with all the features that mod_fcgid provides. This solution has a lot of advantages over the traditional way of running PHP on a web server, while the only disadvantage seems to be that it is a little bit more difficult to be set up.
