Wanting another reason to upgrade to Moodle 3.0? Announced just before Christmas, Moodle 3.0.1 has been updated for compatibility with PHP 7.0.
What does this mean for Moodle users?
For starters, PHP 7 is up to twice as fast than PHP 5.6 and significantly reduces memory usage. This means that your Moodle site will perform faster and scale better. Coupled with Lambda Solution’ true cloud-based solution run on the Amazon cloud, your Moodle 3.0 site will be like night and day.
A cautionary note from Moodle developers urges you to investigate deeper into your installation of Moodle to check compatibility with PHP 7. This is due to the fact that language standards have changed for PHP 7 so code written for PHP 5 may not work in PHP 7. A few guidelines are follows:
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Your Moodle core and plugins may need to be modified so that code is compatible with both PHP 5 and 7
- Multiple minor changes in the engine may require action from developers (invalid class, interface and trait names, indirect variables and properties among others)
- Unlike PHP 5, engine errors in PHP 7 can be caught by using try { } catch (Throwable $e) { }
For more information on specifics for engine changes and knowledge on whether or not you’re ready to use PHP 7, see this page here. The biggest take away--test, test, test and test again. Engine changes could crash your Moodle site and/or result in a loss of certain functionalities.
PHP 7 Performance Improvements
A graphical view below indicates the hard facts on performance improvements with Moodle 3.0 and PHP 7:
20% Faster Login Times
59% Faster Course Page Load Times
42% Less Memory Used for Logins
38% Less Memory Used for Course Viewing
