The WinCache Object Cache for WordPress is available at the following location:

http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/wincache-object-cache-backend/

Note: if you use the old version that you have downloaded from blog post about how to Make WordPress faster on IIS with WinCache 1.1, then it is highly recommended to upgrade to the version from wordpress.org.

The plugin is based on the code written by Mark Jaquith for his APC Object Cache WordPress plugin. Thanks to Andrew Nacin for pointing me to that plugin and suggesting to publish similar one for WinCache.

The new build of WinCache with the fix for this problem is available now at the following location:

https://sourceforge.net/projects/wincache/files/development/

The latest dev build at that location is a release candidate build. Several customers have already verified that this build fixes the problem and is running stable in their environments. Please try it out and let me know if it works or does not work for you. The things to try and to look for are:

1. Try to auto-upgrade any of the WordPress plugins;
2. After installing this build check the Windows Application event log from time to time looking for errors caused by module “php_wincache.dll”.

If you see any errors while using this build please let me know by leaving a comment here or in WinCache forum or by opening a bug in PECL bug database.

• User Cache API’s can be used by PHP scripts to store PHP objects and variables in shared memory. This way PHP scripts may improve the execution speed by storing processed data in the cache and then using it in subsequent requests instead of re-creating the data on every request.
• WinCache Session Handler can be used to configure PHP to store the session data in shared memory cache. Using shared memory instead of the default file session storage helps improve performance of PHP applications that store large amount of data in session objects. The content of the WinCache session cache is persisted on disk so that it is not lost during IIS worker process recycling.
• File Change Notifications – the entries in the opcode and file caches are now updated as soon as the corresponding PHP files are modified on a file system. This is very useful for PHP applications that store its configuration in PHP files – for example Joomla!. Now the configuration changes for those applications take effect right away instead of a 30 seconds delay (default cache refresh interval).
• Lock/Unlock API’s – these API’s can be used to obtain/release an exclusive lock on a key in the cache.

Install the Windows Cache Extension 1.1 for PHP – RTW

To install the WinCache Extension 1.1 for PHP 5.2 and PHP 5.3, use the download links at the extension’s home page at http://www.iis.net/expand/WinCacheForPhp.

The installation with Web Platform Installer is the easiest as it will automatically place the extension binary into proper location and will update the PHP configuration to enable the extension. Also, if you have the previous version of the extension installed, then Web PI will upgrade it. If you install any PHP application by using Web PI then the WinCache Extension 1.1 for PHP will be offered as an optional component.

If you install the extension manually, then follow the instructions at Installing/Configuring WinCache for PHP.

Getting the extension source code

The source code for the extension is available at http://pecl.php.net/package/WinCache/1.1.0stable. For the instructions on how to build the extension yourself refer to Building WinCache Extension.

Getting support

The WinCache extension is not supported by Microsoft Product Support Services. Instead it is supported as any other community PHP extension via the forums, mailing lists and the PECL bugs database. Use the following resources:

• To get help with installation, configuration and usage – WinCache documentation on php.net;
• To ask questions about the extension – WinCache forum on iis.net;
• To report a bug in the extension – PECL bug tracking system.

• File Change Notifications – the entries in the opcode and file caches are now updated as soon as the corresponding PHP files are modified on a file system. This is very useful for PHP applications that store its configuration in PHP files – for example Joomla!. Now the configuration changes for those applications take effect right away instead of a 30 seconds delay (default cache refresh interval);
• Persistent Session Handler – the content of the WinCache session cache is persisted on disk so that it is not lost during IIS worker process recycling.
• Lock/Unlock API’s – these API’s can be used to obtain/release an exclusive lock on a key in the cache.

The beta builds of the extension can be downloaded and installed from the extension home page at: http://www.iis.net/expand/wincacheforphp (look for the “WinCache 1.1 – Beta 2” section there). The source code can be obtained from http://pecl.php.net/package/WinCache/1.1.0beta2. The documentation for the extension can be found on PHP.NET WinCache documentation.

To learn how to change popular PHP applications to use WinCache 1.1 features refer to the following:

• Performance Improvement in Joomla using WINCACHE user cache
• Performance Improvement in Drupal using WINCACHE user cache
• Make WordPress faster on IIS with Wincache 1.1

This is the beta release and the WinCache team is looking for your feedback on new features and functionality. Use the WinCache Community Forum to ask questions about the extension, report bugs and problems and to suggest features and improvements.

PHP Performance on Windows – slides

There were a number of question at the end of the webcast that we did not get to answer due to lack of time. This blog post provides answers to those questions.

Q: Why is php_mssql.dll removed from php 5.3.2?
A: The reason why it was removed was because of an incompatible driver. The last SDK supported by Microsoft was not compatible anymore with VC6. Anyway, php_mssql.dll is not recommended to be used with SQL Server because there is a SQL Driver for PHP that is officially supported by Microsoft. You can get more information about the driver at Working with Microsoft SQL Server driver (php_sqlsrv.dll) for PHP on Windows.

Q: How can we have .htaccess file features work on IIS? Is there an alternative?
A: There are several options. If you just want Apache mod_rewrite rules to work on IIS, then you can import them from a .htaccess file. If you want complete support for all .htaccess features then you can try Helicon Ape from HeliconTech. Regarding PHP specific features in .htaccess file – for PHP 5.2 you could use htscanner PECL extension. In PHP 5.3 there is a new feature for per directory PHP configuration and .user.ini files.

Q: Do you have any numbers to compare iis performance with other web servers(apache, nginx, lighttpd)?
A: No, we do not have any numbers that can be shared. It’s difficult to come up with an objective test that compares web server technologies – there are too many variables and interpretations of the results and even if Microsoft ever produced such numbers they would probably cause a lot of controversy over the objectivity of those tests.

Q: Do you plan to implement wincache library for Zend Framework(Zend_Cache)?
A: WinCache team does not have plans for that, but there is already a PHP developer who is working on implementing this: http://github.com/juokaz/wincache.

Q: We have discussed here sugar CRM. Is Microsoft planning to do enhancement in sugar CRM functionality?
A: Microsoft works well with Sugar CRM development team and Sugar CRM add enhancements to their future versions to support new features from Microsoft, such as WinCache user and session cache for example. Microsoft, however does not contribute any code and does not work directly on any enhancements to Sugar CRM.

Q: Is Microsoft planning to develop any dll which can make PHP code to Intermediate language?
A: Assuming that the question is about .NET intermediate language – no, there are no plans for this.

Q: Would there be any tool in Microsoft development tool kit for PHP?
A: There are several projects in Microsoft that provide development tools and instructions for enabling interoperability between PHP and other Microsoft technologies. You can find more details about those projects here: http://www.interoperabilitybridges.com/.

Q: Is WinCache shared data accessible for CLI? Script A launches Script B, C and D … ?
A: Yes, you can access the shared data from CLI as long as you set wincache.enablecli = 1 in php.ini and all the CLI processes have the same parent process.

Q: Are the statistics results of WinCache the same in 5.2.13 as in 5.3?
A: If the question is about wincache.php statistics script then yes – the data presented by that script is the same regardless of the PHP version.

Q: Are there any security concerns with having wincache store session data in shared memory?
A: If you use different IIS application pools for different web sites (which is the recommended configuration), then WinCache ensures that those web sites can not access each other’s cache data. All caches, not just the session cache are not shared across IIS application pools.

Q: Is it safe to write to the user cache assuming data disappears from the system after the cache times out? Is the content of the user cache in wincache 1.1 written to disk at all?
A: Normally the data in the user cache is deleted from the cache after the time to live interval, but the deletion happens on the main request processing thread. This means that if there are no requests to process, the entries in the cache may stay longer than the TTL. WinCache does not write user cache content to disk, but if memory pagefile is enabled on the server, then it may happen that the memory content will be stored by OS in a pagefile. If a maching (not just a process) crashes when user cache content is in the pagefile, then the content may be present on disk.

Q: Is the sqlsrv driver going to be compatible with PDO?
A: SQL Driver for PHP 2.0 will include PDO support.

Q: Is there any documentation on securely configuring php/FastCGI in a shared application pool environment on IIS6 so that websites?
A: Check the article about setting up PHP on IIS6 and look for the section called “Impersonation and file system access”. If this is not what you are looking for – let me know.

Q: When are we going to see PHP 5.3 in the WPI?
A: Web PI team is planning to add support for PHP 5.3 in near future. Most probably it will be possible to select which version of PHP to install from Web PI. This is because there are some PHP applications in Web PI that will never support PHP 5.3.

Thanks to all who has attended the webcast and asked interesting questions!