PHP is rapidly gaining the popularity and many companies are switching their current language for this language. PHP is a server side scripting language. PHP executes the instructions on the server itself. Server is a computer where the web site is located. PHP is used to create dynamic pages and provides faster execution of the instructions.
Why PHP is sometimes called as embedded scripting language?
PHP is a high level language which is used to allow users to write and understand it in human readable form and also use an interpreter to interpret the code which user write for the computer.

PHP is used as an embedded scripting language for the web. PHP is embedded in HTML code. HTML tags are used to enclose the PHP language. HTML is used and PHP is code written in it in the same way as you write JavaScript in HTML.

What is difference between require_once(), require(), include()?
require() includes and evaluates a specific file, if the file is not found then it shows a Fatal Error.
require_once() includes only the file which is not being included before. It is used to be recommended for the files where you have lots of functions stored.
include() includes the file, even if the file is not found, but it gives a warning to the user to include().

PHP being an open source is there any support available to it?
PHP is an open source language, and it is been said that it has very less support online and offline. But, PHP is all together a different language that is being developed by group of programmers, who writes the code. There is lots of available support for PHP, which mostly comes from developers and PHP users.