Should someone install Apache, MySQL etc. or use ready-made packets like XAMPP for PHP development?

Do you use a webserver development package (like XAMPP) or do you install apache, mysql, php per package for PHP / Perl / Python / etc. development? What is your practical experience?

I have experienced so far:

• [-] XAMPP may causes some problems (stability, performance, dependency with other packages) on Linux - Ubuntu
• [+] XAMPP allows you easily to package your whole web development environment and share it with your team members
• [~] No easy updates with XAMPP via apt-get update? But who really wants to stay his web-server development environment up-to-date?

(By the way, I'm using Ubuntu 13.04 64bit.)

Never use XAMP. It is third party software with all the possible security problems. I would always avoid third party software if there is a better version.

Use the native LAMP stack (so no need to install all the packages seperatly).

sudo apt-get install tasksel
sudo tasksel

and choose LAMP:

The setup is pre-configured for Ubuntu and asks for a admin password to set up MySQL.

It is the easiest setup there is. Plus you are going to get all the updates for each of the individual packages. And anyone on AskUbuntu will be able to help you since it is the standard/default version.

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Quicker method:

sudo apt-get install lamp-server^

The ^ makes it install the task.