The PHP development team would like to announce the immediate availability of PHP 4.4.9. It continues to improve the security and the stability of the 4.4 branch and all users are strongly encouraged to upgrade to it as soon as possible. This release wraps up all the outstanding patches for the PHP 4.4 series, and is therefore the last PHP 4.4 release.Security Enhancements and Fixes in PHP 4.4.9:Updated PCRE to version 7.7.Fixed overflow in memnstr().Fixed crash in imageloadfont when an invalid font is given.Fixed open_basedir handling issue in the curl extension.Fixed mbstring.func_overload set in .htaccess becomes global. For a full list of changes in PHP 4.4.9, see the ChangeLog.

The PHP development team is proud to announce the first alpha release of the upcoming minor version update of PHP. Windows binaries will be available starting with alpha2 (intermediate snapshots available at snaps.php.net). The new version PHP 5.3 is expected to improve stability and performance as well as add new language syntax and extensions. Several new features have already been documented in the official documentation, others are listed on the wiki in preparation of getting documented. Please also review the NEWS file.THIS IS A DEVELOPMENT PREVIEW - DO NOT USE IT IN PRODUCTION!The purpose of this alpha release is to encourage users to not only actively participate in identifying bugs, but also in ensuring that all new features or necessary backwards compatibility breaks are noted in the documentation. Please report any findings to the QA mailinglist or the bug tracker.There have been a great number of other additions and improvements, but here is a short overview of the most important changes:Namespaces (documentation maybe out dated)Late static binding and __callStaticLambda functions and closuresAddition of the intl, phar (phar is scheduled for some more work a head of alpha2), fileinfo and sqlite3 extensionsOptional cyclic garbage collectionOptional support for the MySQLnd replacement driver for libmysqlWindows older than Windows 2000 (Windows 98, NT4, etc.) are not supported anymore (details)New syntax features like NOWDOC, limited GOTO, ternary short cut "?:"Several under the hood changes also require in depth testing with existing applications to ensure that any backwards compatibility breaks are minimized. This is especially important for users that require the undocumented Zend engine multibyte support.The current release plan states that there will be alpha/beta/RC releases in 2-3 week intervals with an expected stable release of PHP 5.3 between mid September and mid October of 2008.