threads has never had a stable release, not sure why you would install it.

Feel free to report bugs with it at http://pecl.php.net/package/threads

Why offer it as an extension for the regular windows version then? How can people know which extensions are stable and which ones are not? Please explain it in the comment before people try to include it. I had a valid reason to want to try to include threads although I know that threads are hard to implement but I didn't expect this to be so unstable that it makes PHP crash each time it's started. Am I the first person to encounter this?

By the way wouldn't it be possible to let PHP tell in which module it crashes? I had to use binary elimination to find the module that crashed PHP. Each time I had to remove another 50% of the modules that I included until the set wasn't crashing anymore and then I had to add packages again. Each cycle involved changing the install (and why does the httpd.conf directory has to be filled in again each time, can't that be remembered?) And then I had to restart windows, so each cycle took about 15 minutes. with 2log16=4 cycles and some control cycles that is about 1.5 hours. And before I realized that the problem lay within one of the modules I already spent a couple of hours searching the WWW for possible causes and I fully deinstalled and reinstalled Apache and PHP. Please also consider that one has to look for all kinds of debris that earlier PHP and Apache installs may have left in all kinds of directories, like a php.ini in the windows directory etc.

BTW. Installing/upgrading Apache and PHP under Linux isn't a picknick either. It usually takes me most of a working day or even two days. I usually install a new Mandriva version every several years (a fully clean new install, not an upgrade, I learned that the hard way) and then try to upgrade Apache and PHP but that isn't easy as I stated before. First of all you have to install by recompiling both or the Apache include files are missing (and some of the library files). And then the fun begins, so was my installation for example missing a 'lex' or 'bison'. Luckily I still have my old PC standing by and could copy it's 'lex' but then the problem with all the libraries starts. Many libraries are interdependent of other libraries (of certain versions). Luckily I installed from DVD-ROM this time. In earlier times when installing from several CD-ROM's it was really very, very hard. Sometimes I even had to use a set of older CD-ROM's to find the correct libraries. Trying to find the correct libraries on the WWW also is a lot of work!

I think we should make PHP much more user friendly! Why not explain for every extension what it's good for: What does 'curl' or 'tiny' actually do, who should install it and how stable is it?

Please consider that the current default windows install doesn't even install the GD-interface which is already described in Rasmus Lerdorf's, PHP pocket guide of about 2000 (published by O'Reilly). A lot of other modules that you would expect are also not included in the standard install...