PEAR

Overview

• PHP Extension and Application Repository
• Provides standard, structured, maintained packages of code for common tasks.
• PEAR's Integrated Templates allow scripts to be separated from HTML.
• PEAR's DB layer allows PHP code to be independent of the database server.
• The source code for each package is available.
• PEAR website

Some PEAR Packages

• Working with HTML and HTTP
• Manipulating and validating user data
• Sending, receiving and processing e-mail
• Credit card payment processing
• Using web services such as SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol)
• Encryption
• Reading and writing files, including compressed archives
• Graphing and image processing
• Using XML

PEAR Instructions (WampServer)

• Invoke a DOS window.
• Go to the directory where php is installed. On my machine this was C:\wamp\bin\php\php5.2.5.
• At the command prompt, type go-pear.bat and take all of the defaults.
• Type pear to list the various PEAR commands.
• Type pear list to list the packages that are currently installed.
• Type pear list-upgrades to see what upgrades are available. I received the message that PEAR 1.6.1 (stable) was installed locally, but that PEAR 1.7.1 (stable) was available remotely.
• To update PEAR 1.6.1 to PEAR 1.7.1, I issued the command pear upgrade pear.
• Then when I typed the command pear list-upgrades, I received the message No upgrades available.