“I've been hearing a lot about websites that are built using LAMP. I know it's an acronym, but what exactly does LAMP mean?”

Victor K. - Salt Lake City, UT

Hi Victor,

You're right that LAMP is an acronym. It refers to four different open source software products that are commonly used to create dynamic websites. Broken down, LAMP means:

L - Linux operating system.
A - Apache Web Server.
M - MySQL database server.
P - PHP programming language

Note that the "P" can also stand for Python or Perl scripting languages, but PHP is the most common usage.

Because these products are free, or open source, and also because they produces fast and reliable websites when used in combination with one another, it's not surprising that you're hearing LAMP a lot.

Thanks for the question!

-Molly