In what scenarios would it be more advantageous to use PHP's image functions or external libraries like libchart for graphic rendering instead of relying on Perl scripts?

When needing to render graphics in PHP, it may be more advantageous to use PHP's built-in image functions or external libraries like libchart instead of relying on Perl scripts for better compatibility and performance. PHP's image functions provide a straightforward way to manipulate and create images directly within the PHP environment, while external libraries like libchart offer more advanced charting capabilities without the need to switch between different scripting languages.

// Example of using PHP's image functions to create a simple image
$width = 200;
$height = 200;
$image = imagecreate($width, $height);
$bg_color = imagecolorallocate($image, 255, 255, 255);
$text_color = imagecolorallocate($image, 0, 0, 0);
imagestring($image, 4, 50, 50, "Hello, World!", $text_color);
header('Content-type: image/png');
imagepng($image);
imagedestroy($image);