Category: Product Updates

We are glad to announce that PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) is now available for testing on all SiteGround servers – way ahead of its scheduled official release date on November 21, 2024. Once again, we are among the first companies to provide PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) for testing on our hosting platform. Thanks to our unique PHP server setup, we are able to offer the latest PHP versions for our clients to test safely on their websites hosted with us. 

Discover more about the new features that the latest PHP version brings to the table in the next section.

What’s new in PHP 8.4 (Beta 3)

This latest version introduces some very important new features that will improve the PHP development experience even further. Let’s dive into some of the biggest changes that PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) offers:

Property hooks

One of the new features in PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) includes the ability to define property hooks which will eliminate the need for a lot of boilerplate code. This is one of the biggest changes in PHP history. Property hooks will help remove a lot of getters and setters by allowing each property to define its own get and set hooks. What’s more, an exciting addition is that in PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) property hooks can be defined in interfaces.

We can take this pretty standard class for example:

<?php
declare(strict_types=1);

class Website
{
   private $domain;

   public function __construct(string $domain) {
       $this->domain = $domain;
   }

   public function getDomain(): string {
       return $this->domain;
   }

   public function setDomain(string $domain): void {
       if (strlen($domain) === 0) {
           throw new ValueError("Domain must be non-empty");
       }
       $this->domain = $domain;
   }
}

As of PHP8.4 (Beta 3) we can use Property Hooks to achieve the same result with the following syntax:

<?php
declare(strict_types=1);

class Website
{
   public string $domain {
       set {
           if (strlen($value) === 0) {
               throw new ValueError("Domain must be non-empty");
           }
           $this->domain = $value;
       }

       get => $this->domain;
   }

   public function __construct(string $domain) {
       $this->domain = $domain;
   }
}

new without additional parentheses

Another new feature that will save lots of boilerplate code is that you don’t have to wrap newly created objects within parentheses anymore in order to be able to chain methods on them. 

What’s more, it works not only for methods – you can also chain properties, static methods, constants – basically whatever you want. Bottom line is that the new feature will simplify the syntax and make the code more concise and readable.

Example:

The “class member access on instantiation” feature was introduced in PHP 5.4.0. Since then constants, properties and methods can be accessed on a newly created instance without an intermediate variable, but only if the new expression is wrapped in parentheses:

class Website
{
   ...

   public function getDomain(): string {
       return $this->domain;
   }
}

// Valid syntax
$myDomain = (new Website('siteground.com'))->getDomain();

// Invalid syntax until PHP8.4
$myDomain = new Website('siteground.com')->getDomain();

New Array functions

Another notable change in PHP is the introduction of several new Array functions. PHP 8.4 introduced several new array functions with callback function:

array_find()

A function that returns the value of the first array element that matched the condition. If none of the elements matched the condition, the function will return `null`.

array_find_key()

Returns the key of the first element for which the callback was true. If none of the elements matched the condition, the function returns `null`.

array_all()

Checks if the callback returns true for all of the array elements

array_any()

Checks the callback returns true for any of the elements of an array.

These new functions make it easier to search and manipulate arrays based on custom conditions which in terms will lead to cleaner and easier to read code.

How to test PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) on SiteGround servers

As a SiteGround client, you can easily test PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) on your website. Simply log in to your Site Tools > Devs > PHP Manager section and you’ll be able to replace the current PHP version used by your site with PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) with a single click.

Please keep in mind that PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) is mostly available for testing purposes and as usual, we strongly advise you not to use it at your production site before its scheduled official release date (November 21, 2024).

If you need to test PHP 8.4 (Beta 3) with your existing site, we recommend that you create a new site for testing and clone your production site into it to test different things. For this purpose, you can use our WordPress Staging tool. While testing, make sure that nothing fails and check your log files to see if any warnings or errors appear. Once you are done testing, you can simply delete that site.

Wrap-up

At SiteGround, we are constantly working to introduce the newest PHP technology ahead of the others. That’s why we are excited to provide our clients with the latest PHP version which brings to the table some big improvements that could significantly enhance the PHP development experience. Take your time to test the new version before the official release date and stay tuned for more updates from the PHP community.

We are happy to announce that we’ve successfully upgraded our servers to MySQL 8, and that roughly 3 million databases are now using it at full steam. More importantly, this massive transition required zero effort on the behalf of webmasters and site owners! Our unique approach to this task allowed us to provide customers with all the benefits of the newest MySQL version, and at the same time mitigate the high risk of updating such a vital underlying website technology.

While many web hosts would change their MySQL version and let customers deal with the consequences, that just doesn’t align with our values. We took it upon ourselves to bring the benefits of MySQL 8 to all our clients, and prepared extensively in order to make the adoption painless and risk-free for them. That meant testing and evaluating seemingly countless application configurations (Joomla, Drupal, WordPress and other CMSs, and all their extensions and themes that come in different setups) to foresee the tons of possible post-upgrade problems – and then eliminate them proactively and swiftly without any work or hassle for the clients. 

Let’s dive into how we made that happen.

The Challenge: MySQL8 upgrade is risky and creates heavy workload for the website owners and webmasters

Upgrading a website’s MySQL is always risky: these big version updates bring with them truly innovative features, but it also means that existing applications and web setups may not be compatible.  Because of that, it usually takes years until they get largely adopted. For example, the first version of MySQL 8 premiered in 2018 and a year after its release it only had a 17% global adoption rate. 

The decision about if and when to switch to a newer MySQL version requires the webmaster to weigh potential problems that might occur against the benefits it brings, and invest time and money in fixing post-upgrade problems. This creates a huge burden for website owners and webmasters.

That’s where web hosting companies might be of huge help – or not – depending on how they manage their servers and the level of service they provide to their customers. Among our competitors there are two popular approaches to such large-scale upgrades: either enable the new MySQL version on only the new servers you launch, and if current clients want the new version they need to relocate to the new servers; or put both the old and new MySQL’s on one server, which would increase the resource usage of the server and might ultimately deteriorate the performance of the sites hosted on it. 

Neither of these options is ideal though. In both cases, the burden of risk still falls on the website owner or webmaster, as they would need to do the work to make their sites compatible with the new MySQL. The likely outcome is that many would just not upgrade, thus missing out on performance, security and other benefits. What’s worse, many clients would continue using an older version of MySQL for so long that it would become vulnerable and unsupported by the official developers. This would put their websites at serious risk. Not a great plan. 

SiteGround’s unique approach: millions of databases automatically updated to MySQL8 without hassle for the clients

At SiteGround our philosophy is to ensure that all our customers can benefit from the latest technologies, and with the least possible hassle: no work, no risk, no extra investment, just take it out of the box and use it. When we offer a new software like MySQL 8 that comes with multiple benefits, we make sure all clients can safely and easily enjoy it. 

This is why our approach to this upgrade was different. We didn’t leave it to our clients to figure out how to upgrade to MySQL8; we did it for them and took on all the work to eliminate incompatibilities and resolve post-upgrade problems. That upgrade process included evaluating the level of risk, researching all possible incompatibilities and upgrade errors, automatically fixing problems, and manually verifying the results. As a result, millions of sites are now using MySQL 8 without any extra headaches.

Extensive research and multiple dry runs to reduce upgrade fail rate 

We began by extensively researching the incompatibilities of MySQL 5.7 (the previously used version of MySQL). The goal was to discover which issues could act as potential blockers to updating a database to MySQL 8. 

Next, we copied and isolated hundreds of servers and started dry-run upgrades. The objective was to identify problematic software and setups that break after the transition, find solutions for them in advance, and document all results carefully. We used all that data to minimize the upgrade fail rate and to automate the aftermath problem resolution.

Automated and quick fixes of broken sites

Building on the extensive research and testing, our engineers developed a smart system that essentially served as a skilled mechanic for your website. It would run a compatibility check with MySQL 8 based on your specific application configuration and database structure. If it detected incompatibilities, it would patch them on the spot.

As a result, after the upgrade this automatic system helped us to immediately remove errors and broken queries for thousands of websites, and it spared us tons of manual work, in addition to resolution wait time for the clients.

Manual fix of 7518 websites by our experts (free of charge for the clients)

The automated checks did a tremendous job, but we went even further. After a server was upgraded, our technicians would open pretty much all websites hosted on it to make sure they were fully functional. Of those, they identified 7518 websites with issues, which they then fixed manually after the migration in due time. 

804 sites provided with a time extension (at our expense)

All our automated and manual checks left us with an impressively low number of sites that remained incompatible with the new MySQL version — below 0.001% of all. For these clients we provided a custom server setup where they would be able to use MySQL 5.7 for two additional months allowing them enough time to address significant query incompatibilities and to get ready for the new version. We believe each of our users should be given the option to receive the best service, so at this time we’ve absorbed the cost of maintaining the old version on additional servers. 

Efficient server upgrade schedule paid off in fast problem resolution

One of the internal challenges during the process was to schedule the servers for upgrade so that we would have had enough people to not only address potential issues, but also complete the upgrade successfully in the shortest possible time frame. Based on our statistics from the dry runs, we could predict how many websites would have had issues per server, and therefore knew how many servers to schedule and how many technicians to staff so that we could address problems quickly. At some point, our process was so efficient that it allowed us to successfully upgrade as many as 180,000 websites in 24 hours! 

Timely and honest communication with customers

Those of you who’ve been customers for a while surely already know how much we value transparent and clear communication when it comes to events that impact your websites. This upgrade to MySQL8 was no exception. We notified each client at least seven days prior to the transition, informing them of the day and hours we would upgrade their websites (always non-business hours for their respective region). 

The Summary 

Our top priority in this upgrade process was that all sites would be fully functional as usual after the upgrade – no problems, just benefits from the newer MySQL. The outcome? We had a 99.99%+ success rate of the migration process! 

• With solid planning, preparation and precise execution, we successfully upgraded roughly 3 million databases and made them fully compatible with MySQL 8 without any work for our clients. 
• It took us only 63 migration days to achieve this for all websites hosted on our platform, totally free of charge, all while making sure that every single client website had been thoroughly taken care of. Well, let’s not forget the month or two we invested in preparation work,including research, dry runs, and automations.
• A special team of 34 people worked for a total of 1228 hours on the actual upgrade, completing the process with utmost efficiency and professionalism – it took them an average of seven minutes per server to switch and resolve issues. 

It was an enormous task on a staggering scale, especially considering the high bar we set for ourselves. But in the end all the hard work on our part paid off in absolutely no work for our clients. And that in itself, for us, is the end goal that justifies all the effort.