In 2002, Yahoo! selected PHP for web site development and began to phase out its own proprietary server-side scripting language. Three years later, Michael Radwin reflects on how the switch to PHP offered both technical challenges and productivity increases.

The first part of the presentation offers a look inside Yahoo!'s decision-making process to adopt an open source scripting language. Radwin addresses why Yahoo! selected PHP over other languages, focusing on the performance and stability required to serve billions of page views a day.

In the second part, Radwin discusses Yahoo!'s PHP development methodology, which has enabled its engineers to rapidly implement features while still creating software that is maintainable over long periods of time.