To that end Aesop consists of three main functions and goals:
Pre-compile and package HPHP - The idea here is simple. To get us up and running as quickly as possible I’ve packaged the HPHP binaries in the full download version of Aesop. This means we no longer have to worry about compiling HPHP, which saves time and possible headache. We needn’t use this version though, we can still download a minimal, Aesop only version complete with full source code.
Compile – Compiling HPHP applications from the command line means well, using a command line, setting environmental variables, and so on. Thus, we remove this burden and instead focus on making sure our code-base is acceptable to HPHP.
Aesop builds the file lists HPHP requires for code-compilation, sets environment variables, displays errors, and also manages the results of HPHP for the other main function of Aesop…
Manage Servers – Compiling code is only half the story. Once compiled HPHP has literally created a server-in-a-box for us. It’s a single executable that contains your source converted to C++, a web server, and the full PHP run-time. Aesop manages these executable for us in a nice list format, allowing us to start, stop and delete them at will. Of course setting their properties using GUI controls or a more advanced interface to a so-called HDF file is included as well.