PHP or NO PHP?

hi,

some of my freinds say that Yahoo, Google and Orkut use php, but i do not see the .php extension in the address bar of my browser.

Also the source code of the page, too doesnt contain the the

"<? , or <?php" tags. is it possible to use php and not let ppl know that its php?

Yes, just set the PHP MIME type as a different extension.

Although if a site uses PHP, you will never see <? or ?> tags in the page source because PHP works that way. The code between those tags is processed and the tags' content isn't sent to the browser.

As for .php not appearing on the address bar, this is how you can avoid it. Assume that you have a site at http://domain.com/. You have a page http://domain.com/index.php, but if you want to access it, it's enough if you write only http://domain.com/ to the address bar. Also http://domain.com/?page=about will show the page http://domain.com/index.php?page=about without showing .php in the address bar.

There are also other techniques you can use for hiding PHP's existence, like modrewrite.

so why would someone want to hide that they are using php?

if u use gmail, the web address says :

http://gmail.google.com/gmail?_sgh=
does this show that gmail is using php???

yahoo uses php now most of the time. in the past, they used some perl, and mostly their own "Y script" (or something similar). their backend was mostly written in c/c++ (but now, most of it gets written in php).

orkut uses asp.

google uses python on all other servers (google.com, gmail, etc), with a c/c++ backend..

it doesnt seem that Yahoo uses php on its site. i mean there isnt a page with .php or recognizable characteristics of php?

what do u mean by backend was in c/c++??

also so if google is using python does this mean it is better than php

1) php pages don't need to end in .php

2) what are (other) "recognizable characteristics of php"?!?

3) truste me.. or don't, but then at least google it..

4) they even have (at least) one high-profile php guru working for yahoo (but i will not tell you the name.. google it)

5) if you don't know what backend means, than i can't explain it to you..

6) google using python means just that, that google uses it (and probably think it is better for them)

most of the world thinks php is better for them (for web stuff anyway)