This is a steps to write a php virus taken from Ben Dechrai talk at linux.conf.au here

The boom.php reads all php files and add <?php // FILE INFECTED ?> line to the begining of each file.

The boom.php reads itself and copy the virus code and inject it into all php files.

The boom.php reads itself and encrypt the encode itself using base64 then injects itselft into all php files.

In all cases the virus infects a file multiple times.

Same as step3, but this time it check first for the filename hash in the first line of a php file as a marker of an infected file. If not infected then it add the filename hash to the first line then do as in step3.