So you want to host and serve web pages from your own pc but spending your evenings configuring web and database servers isn't exactly your cup of tea? Xampp is for you!
While I thoroughly enjoy an evening of configuration, researching and testing, you may prefer to have your local development environment setup in less time than it would take to consume that caffeinated beverage you'd need to stay up and actually setup Apache webserver, MySQL Database Sever, PHP and Pearl. XAMPP is an easy to install Apache distribution containing MySQL, PHP and Perl. XAMPP is really very easy to install and to use - just download, extract and start. Xampp is available for Linux, windows, os x and solaris. It includes an array of utilities to assist with other net tasks such as file transfer and messaging. Best of all, Xampp is FREE.
The philosophy behind XAMPP is to build an easy to install distribution to get netizens into the world of Apache. It is put out by Apache Friends, an organization founded in 2002 to promote Apache, its ease and use, documentation and community.
To make it convenient for users XAMPP is configured with all features turned on. The default configuration is not good from a securtiy point of view and it's not secure enough for a production environment - please don't use XAMPP in such environment. XAMPP can be configured securely by simply running an included script
More information available at http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html
