At that time the possibility of a non-blocking, socket-based PHP middleware was given by using an asynchronous event driven workflow or forked processes. In parallel, as of August 2012, a threading extension for PHP by Joe Watkins enabled true POSIX compatible multithreading. Controversially threads were used because they allow the programmer to account for hardware usage instead of relying on the used runtime environment and enable easier communication between parallel working batches.
