# How to install PHP extension for Microsoft SQL Server under Fedora

They said PHP was dead.  
PHP replied: `¯\_(ツ)_/¯`

Regardless of PHP's health status, I found myself needing to connect to a Microsoft SQL Server via a PHP application running under Fedora. Finding concise details about installing the necessary drivers and extensions was not easy, so here is a blog post detailing how I did it.

**NOTE:** these instructions worked for me using Fedora versions 41 and 42.

## Step 1 - Install Microsoft ODBC driver and required PHP packages

Issue the following commands:

```
curl https://packages.microsoft.com/config/rhel/9/prod.repo | sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/mssql-release.repo
sudo dnf update
sudo dnf install msodbcsql18 unixODBC-devel php-pear php-devel
```

## Step 2 - Install PECL packages

Issue the following commands:

```
sudo pecl install sqlsrv
sudo pecl install pdo_sqlsrv
```

## Step 3 - Enable the extensions

Issue the following commands:

```
sudo bash -c "echo 'extension=sqlsrv.so' > /etc/php.d/20-sqlsrv.ini"
sudo bash -c "echo 'extension=pdo_sqlsrv.so' > /etc/php.d/30-pdo_sqlsrv.ini"
```

## Step 4 - Restart httpd and PHP services

Issue the following commands:

```
sudo systemctl restart httpd
sudo systemctl restart php-fpm
```

## After Fedora release upgrade

Chances are that Fedora will introduce a new PHP version after a release upgrade. For example, when upgrading from Fedora 41 to 42, PHP was bumped from version 8.3 to 8.4. This will require you to uninstall and reinstall the PHP extensions. This can be achieved with the following commands:

```
sudo pecl uninstall sqlsrv
sudo pecl uninstall pdo_sqlsrv
```

```
sudo pecl install sqlsrv
sudo pecl install pdo_sqlsrv
```

```
sudo systemctl restart httpd
sudo systemctl restart php-fpm
```