Modern PHP Development in 2024

PHP is Not Dead!

PHP has evolved tremendously with PHP 8.x, bringing modern features like JIT compilation, attributes, union types, and more.

Modern PHP Features

1. Strong Typing

class User {
    public function __construct(
        public string $name,
        public int $age,
        public ?string $email = null
    ) {}
}

2. Attributes (Annotations)

#[Route('/api/users', methods: ['GET'])]
public function getUsers(): array {
    return User::all();
}

3. Match Expression

$result = match($status) {
    'pending' => 'Processing',
    'approved' => 'Completed',
    'rejected' => 'Cancelled',
    default => 'Unknown'
};

Modern PHP Frameworks

• Laravel: Full-featured framework with elegant syntax
• Symfony: Enterprise-grade framework
• Slim: Micro-framework for APIs

Tools and Ecosystem

• Composer for dependency management
• PHPStan/Psalm for static analysis
• PHP-CS-Fixer for code style
• PHPUnit for testing

Performance

PHP 8.x with JIT compiler offers significant performance improvements, making it competitive with other backend languages.

Conclusion

Modern PHP is a powerful, performant language suitable for building everything from small APIs to large-scale enterprise applications.