What is the significance of the error message "Deprecated: mysql_pconnect()" in PHP?

The error message "Deprecated: mysql_pconnect()" in PHP indicates that the mysql_pconnect() function is no longer recommended for use as it has been deprecated in newer versions of PHP. To solve this issue, you should switch to using mysqli or PDO for database connections in PHP.

// Connect to MySQL using mysqli
$mysqli = new mysqli('localhost', 'username', 'password', 'database');

// Check connection
if ($mysqli->connect_error) {
    die("Connection failed: " . $mysqli->connect_error);
}