I don’t normally work with Web page development. I just don’t enjoy it as much as working with backend algorithms and systems. But I recently took a look at the XAMPP Web development environment and it was very nice.

The XAMPP system consists mainly of the Apache Web server, plus a database (either MySQL or the equivalent MariaDB), plus the PHP language to create dynamic Web pages.

Installing and working with Web server software can be a real nightmare, but I had only minor trouble installing XAMPP up and running. The main issue was that the machine I was using already had the IIS Web server up and running so I had to shut it down to allow Apache to use port 80.

I also had to disable UAC and fiddle with the Windows firewall program. If you’ve never done these things, you’re probably wondering what I mean, but if you’ve worked with Web servers before, then you know that configuration issues are always there and they’re very annoying.

So, after I got XAMPP installed, I started Apache, created a test Hello.html page, saved it at C:\xampp\htdocs and viewed it by entering http://localhost:80/Hello.html in my Internet Explorer browser. Bottom line: XAMPP isn’t easy but it’s much easier than other Web server systems.