PDF (adobe.com)

Choosing an application server

An application server is software that helps a web server process dynamic pages. When choosing an application server, you should consider several factors, including your budget, the server technology you want to use (ColdFusion, ASP, or PHP), and the type of web server.

Budget
Some vendors sell high‑end application servers that are expensive to buy and administer. Others vendors provide easier, more cost-effective solutions (an example is ColdFusion). Some application servers are built into web servers (such as Microsoft IIS) and others can be downloaded for free from the Internet (such as PHP).

Server technology
Application servers use different technologies. Dreamweaver supports three server technologies: ColdFusion, ASP, and PHP. The following table shows common application servers available for the server technologies supported by Dreamweaver:

Server technology

Application server

ColdFusion

Adobe ColdFusion 8

ASP

Microsoft IIS

PHP

PHP server

To learn more about ColdFusion, select ColdFusion Help from the Help menu.

To learn more about ASP, visit the Microsoft website at http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnanchor/html/activeservpages.asp.

To learn more about PHP, visit the PHP website at www.php.net/.