[mapserver-users] Fwd: MS4W version 4.0.0 pre-release 'alpha' available

[Andy Colson]

On 06/27/2016 01:41 PM, Jeff McKenna wrote:
> Forwarding to the MapServer community, to get feedback and testing with PHP 7.  Thanks.  -jeff
>
>
> -------- Forwarded Message --------
> Subject: Re: [MS4W-Users] version 4.0.0 pre-release 'alpha' available
> Date: Mon, 27 Jun 2016 12:42:11 -0300
> From: Jeff McKenna via MS4W-Users <ms4w-users at lists.ms4w.com>
> Reply-To: ms4w-users at lists.ms4w.com
> To: ms4w-users at lists.ms4w.com
> CC: Jeff McKenna <jmckenna at gatewaygeomatics.com>
>
> Hello everyone,
>
> Another alpha build (alpha3) is now available on the download server (http://www.ms4w.com/release/experimental/), which contains PHP 7.0.8 as well as its extensions.  Thank you to those who had filed tickets for specific PHP extensions (at http://ms4w.com/trac).  Note that most of the extensions are loaded by default in PHP, so the best way to check what extensions are included is through a phpinfo() call (there is a 'phpinfo.php' file already included in /ms4w/apache/htdocs/  Technical users might want to check the configure command used when I compiled this PHP, which is shown in the phpinfo() results (or here is a screenshot, see the 5th row in the table: http://pasteboard.co/1ZYfzJyX.png).  Don't be afraid to request additional extensions through the MS4W tracker: http://ms4w.com/trac - the time is now for feedback and requests.
>
> PHP 7 is of course a big improvement (and I've invested almost 2 months of my time to rebuild the entire MS4W stack for PHP 7, which requires the latest compiler).  You can check online for performance improvements of PHP 7, most estimate 3X speed improvements with this version (wow). An important note of course is that PHPMapScript is not yet included in the alpha, as it definitely requires additional development time and effort; so please please contact me directly if your organization can help fund this effort.
>
> Thank you for using MS4W.
>
> -jeff
>
> -------
>
> Please check the 'HISTORY.txt' file in the alpha, for a list of changes in your alpha build.
>
> To use these alpha builds, be sure to install the 'Microsoft Visual C++ 2015 Redistributable Update 2
> ' package first (vc_redist.x86.exe): https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=51682  An important note: because of this new compiler, old systems running Windows XP (and possible Windows Server 2003) can no longer be supported.  But of course if need be, I can provide custom builds with the old compiler for those organizations requiring that.
>
> I realize that so many organizations (many on this mailing list) rely heavily on MS4W, so please contact me directly to help support its development with funding.  It is very important.
>
> Below is a list of recent changes.  If you want the latest stable MS4W release, please download last month's MS4W 3.1.4 release (from http://ms4w.com/).
>
> *************************************
>
> 2016-06-27 Gateway Geomatics
>    * ms4w version 4.0.0-alpha3 created. Notable changes are:
>
>           - upgraded PHP to 7.0.8 with Visual Studio 2015 compiler (trac ticket 5)
>           - built additional PHP extensions with Visual Studio 2015 compiler:
>             pdo_mysql (trac ticket 52), pdo_oci, oci8, bzip2
>           - rebuilt all GDAL plugins and bindings
>           - moved CSharp, Java, Python bindings into folder /ms4w/gdalbindings/
>           - updated script /gdalbindings/python/test-cgi-mapscript.py for Python 3
>
>           *PHPMapScript will not work in this version, needs dev work + funding
>


Forgive my dumbness.  But.  Whats the point of PHP if PHPMapScript doesnt work?

Even if it did work, what's the point when 90% of the time spent is inside mapserver, of which 50% of that time is spent reading .shp/PostGIS/.tiff/etc.

I'm all for PHP 7, please don't misunderstand, but this:

> PHP 7 is of course a big improvement (and I've invested almost 2 months

Makes it sound like my gis hosting is going to be 3x faster.  But its not.  Right?

-Andy