For many use cases, this is not relevant to the end result. For many use cases where it is relevant, static site generators like Jekyll can actually imitate "d

For many use cases, this is not relevant to the end result. For many use cases where it is relevant, static site generators like Jekyll can actually imitate "dynamic content" from the perspective of the people running the site. The most important use cases for dynamic content these days are web applications, as distinct from "websites". On the other hand, web applications are also the most important use cases for better development ecosystems than are easily attained with PHP. In my experience and observations, the cases where PHP's easy provision of dynamic content capabilities make the most difference are websites (as distinct from "web applications") on shared hosting platforms or bootstrapped by existing content management systems like WordPress and Drupal (which are, in turn, often easily used because of either hosting platforms specifically for those CMSes or shared hosting providers). NOTE: I'm not sneering at "websites", as distinct from "web applications", as many people who draw such distinctions do. I'm just pointing out there is a distinction to be made between two different types of projects involving deployment of a codebase to a web server. Speaking only of the technology's proximate purpose: in one of these, the primary purpose of it is to make content accessible to the public; in the other, the primary purpose is to make functionality accessible to a userbase.