Page 60 - Beginning PHP 5.3

Part I: Getting Up and Running with PHP
2. Look for the Loaded Configuration File entry toward the top of the testing.php page.
This is the path to the php.ini file that is used to configure your PHP engine.
3. Open this file in a text editor, such as Notepad (Windows), TextEdit (Mac), or Text Editor (Ubuntu).

You may need root (administrator) access to edit this file. If you don ’ t have administrator access, ask
your server administrator to set the time zone for you.

4. Search for the following line in the file:
;date.timezone =
If for some reason this line isn ’ t in your php.ini file, simply add it yourself.

5. Remove the semicolon from the start of the line, and add your server ’ s time zone after the
equals sign at the end of the line. You can find your time zone in the list at http://www.php
.net/timezones . For example, if your server resides in Los Angeles, you ’ d change the line to:

date.timezone = America/Los_Angeles
6. Save the file and quit your text editor.
7. Restart Apache using the method appropriate for your installation. For example, on Ubuntu use

the System Administration Services application as described earlier in the chapter; on

Windows choose Restart All Services from the WampServer icon menu; and on the Mac run the
/Applications/MAMP/MAMP application and click Stop Servers, followed by Start Servers.
8. To test if the setting worked, reload the testing.php script in your browser and look for the
date.timezone entry. It should now show the time zone that you set in Step 5, as should the
Default timezone entry further up the page. All done!
If you can ’ t (or don ’ t want to) edit your php.ini file, you have other ways to set your time zone:

❑ Create an .htaccess file in the document root folder of your Web site(s) and add a directive to
the file to set your time zone:

php_value date.timezone America/Los_Angeles

❑ Alternatively, toward the start of each PHP script that you create, add a line similar to this:

date_default_timezone_set( “America/Los_Angeles” );

You can find out more about configuring PHP, including the php.ini file and .htaccess files, in
Appendix B.
Other Ways to Run PHP
This chapter has concentrated on the easiest way to get PHP up and running on your computer. You ’ ve
looked at installing the Apache, PHP, and MySQL packages on Ubuntu, installing a complete Apache/
PHP/MySQL setup on Windows using WampServer, and doing the same on the Mac using MAMP.
You can run PHP in a few other ways. The following sections take a quick look at them.

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