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Today is 8/8/8, which is interesting for a few reasons, one of which is that it marks the end of PHP 4. What does this mean? It means yesterday’s release of 4.4.9 is the final release of PHP 4. More information can be gleaned from the mailing list archives, beginning with Derick’s request to drop support:

I am trying to gauge what people feel about dropping support for PHP 4 at the end of this year.

Derick caveated his suggestion with the idea of continuing to publish new releases that address security vulnerabilities. Rasmus didn’t see the point:

I don’t really understand what dropping support means if we will still release security fixes. That’s the mode we have been in for at least a year, so what would change at the end of the year?

He suggested a stronger stance:

I’d be more in favour of a statement that put a final death date on it which means no new releases of any sort. We could still say security-fixes only by the end of the year and then death by 08/08/08 or something like that.

So, here we are. PHP 4 is dead. Long live PHP.

Read More at Chris Shiflett: End of Life for PHP 4