I noted some sites started pushing to PHP5 with the announcement last year that PHP4 would be EOL (end-of-life) in 2007. In truth I understand that there is no longer a compelling reason to remain with PHP4. The biggest obstacle was older software that did not support PHP5 (since version 5 is incompatible with version 4 in some respects). However there is no reason why most of that software cannot be updated, and if so I am pretty sure that some alternate version 5 compatible software exists.

The need for PHP4 has not changed much since Fedora Core 5 (FC5). Hence I have taken the time to update the SRC.RPM that I had originally distributed for FC5 to support Fedora Core 6 (FC6). Included are several security updates as well. FC5 users who used this file previously should update. The updated source RPM package is provided on the following guide: PHP4 on Fedora Core 6 Steps provided should work for FC6, FC5 as well as FC4.

I do not know how many people require PHP4 on Fedora Core 5. However since I find that I use it, I am providing PHP4 binary RPMs. Since I made the files available I did receive some complaints. Primarily a compile failure on x86_64 architecture and a compile failure on PPC architecture. I have no means to test PPC, however I have tested with x86_64 and had success. For x86_64 architecture, I have tested the src.

Apparently some developers still require PHP4 on their web servers. The previous method for doing so on Fedora Core 4 (FC4) was to use the FC3 RPM’s. (A formal procedure was provided by the guide: PHP4 on FC4.) Since the release of FC5, the dependancies and outdated linking from the FC3 RPM packages may be difficult to resolve. It is recommended to recompile the PHP4 SRC.RPM and link it to the running software provided in FC5.

EDIT (Dec 19, 2005): I have written a formal guide on PHP4 on FC4. As a followup to my previous post about PHP4 on FC4, I decided to abandon PHP5 altogether. I spent some time to try and get the PHP4 src.rpm from FC3 to compile correctly in FC4. As it turned out neither the GCC4 nor the GCC3.2 included in FC4 would compile everything properly. So I decided to try GCC3.