Event-triggered control (ETC) is a control strategy that is especially suited for applications where communication resources are scarce. By updating and communicating sensor and actuator data only when needed for stability or performance purposes, ETC is capable of reducing the amount of communications, while still retaining a satisfactory closed-loop performance. In this paper, an ETC strategy is proposed by striking a balance between conventional periodic sampled-data control and ETC, leading to so-called periodic event-triggered control (PETC). In PETC, the event-triggering condition is verified periodically and at every sampling time it is decided whether or not to compute and to transmit new measurements and new control signals. The periodic character of the triggering conditions leads to various implementation benefits, including a minimum inter-event time of (at least) the sampling interval of the event-triggering condition. The PETC strategies developed in this paper apply to both static state-feedback and dynamical output-based controllers, as well as to both centralized and decentralized (periodic) event-triggering conditions. To analyze the stability and the L-2-gain properties of the resulting PETC systems, three different approaches will be presented based on 1) impulsive systems, 2) piecewise linear systems, and 3) perturbed linear systems. Moreover, the advantages and disadvantages of each of the three approaches will be discussed and the developed theory will be illustrated using a numerical example.