Newby learning PHP

[Nick Mudge]

Hello,

What is the best way for a new person to learn PHP and still new to
programming to learn PHP. And also to learn how to use PHP with other
technologies to write really good database driven interactive Web sites?

Best answer wins a prize.

Nick

[Jerry Polyak]

"Nick Mudge" <ma******@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:jzFjc.44791$GR.6472041@attbi_s01...

Hello,

What is the best way for a new person to learn PHP and still new to
programming to learn PHP. And also to learn how to use PHP with other
technologies to write really good database driven interactive Web sites?

Best answer wins a prize.

Nick

By buying a book, reading it, learning from it and applying the lessons in
hands on exercises.

[David Heskett]

I would suggest this series of books:
PHP for the world wide web
PHP Advanced
PHP and MySQL
MySQL
http://dmcinsights.com/bk_pages/books.php?i=phpvqp
http://www.dmcinsights.com/index.php

and great resources:
www.php.net
www.mysql.com

Dave
mi*@heskett.com

"Jerry Polyak" <jerrypolyak@NOSPAM_yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:t9********************@adelphia.com...

"Nick Mudge" <ma******@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:jzFjc.44791$GR.6472041@attbi_s01...

Hello,

What is the best way for a new person to learn PHP and still new to
programming to learn PHP. And also to learn how to use PHP with other
technologies to write really good database driven interactive Web sites?

Best answer wins a prize.

Nick

By buying a book, reading it, learning from it and applying the lessons in
hands on exercises.

[Geoff Berrow]

I noticed that Message-ID: <jzFjc.44791$GR.6472041@attbi_s01> from Nick
Mudge contained the following:

What is the best way for a new person to learn PHP and still new to
programming to learn PHP. And also to learn how to use PHP with other
technologies to write really good database driven interactive Web sites?

Best answer wins a prize.

Firstly, you need a good working knowledge of html. You need to know
how to put together forms and form elements, tables and so on. Without
it you won't be able to make the PHP do anything. You can use an editor
like Dreamweaver to knock things up but be careful of using its
automated procedures. While you may be producing pages incorporating
scripts you will be lacking the understanding. For instance if you
wanted to bake a cake, you could just buy cake mix and add water and an
egg. Or you could combine individual ingredients, flour butter, sugar
etc. Or you could buy wheat, grind the flour, churn the butter... PHP
has a lot of ready written functions to help you write scripts, the
equivalent of prepared flour, butter, sugar

Secondly you need to be comfortable with basic programming constructs
and philosophies. You need to know the meaning of terms like variable,
array, function, loop and the all important if..else Do as many simple
web tutorials as you can to familiarise yourself with these terms and
ideas, but steer clear of the php.net tutorial for now. I think it
assumes a higher basic knowledge.

You will need to study databases and for more complex site this will
mean relational databases. This will involve getting your head around
normalisation which I won't pretend is easy. But it is vitally
important to get database structure right at the beginning. You will
need some knowledge of SQL, the language used to get results out of the
database.

Take it a bit at a time and do as many web tutorials as you can. File
snippets of code on your machine every time you do something new then
you can refer back to it when you need it rather than trying to remember
absolutely everything. Bookmark useful websites and usenet posts.
Apply what you have learned to small projects. Yes there are numerable
guest book scripts out there but you will learn far more by rolling your
own.

Good luck.
--
Geoff Berrow (put thecat out to email)
It's only Usenet, no one dies.
My opinions, not the committee's, mine.
Simple RFDs http://www.ckdog.co.uk/rfdmaker/

[Tim Van Wassenhove]

In article <jzFjc.44791$GR.6472041@attbi_s01>, Nick Mudge wrote:

Hello,

What is the best way for a new person to learn PHP and still new to
programming to learn PHP. And also to learn how to use PHP with other
technologies to write really good database driven interactive Web sites?

The first thing a new person would have to do is learning how to search
the web. And then search if he is the first person with this problem, or
that there are already answers given to this problem.

--
http://home.mysth.be/~timvw

[Jeremy Schoenhaar]

Am Wed, 28 Apr 2004 07:24:54 +0100 schrieb Geoff Berrow:

I noticed that Message-ID: <jzFjc.44791$GR.6472041@attbi_s01> from Nick
Mudge contained the following:

What is the best way for a new person to learn PHP and still new to
programming to learn PHP. And also to learn how to use PHP with other
technologies to write really good database driven interactive Web sites?

Best answer wins a prize.

Firstly, you need a good working knowledge of html. You need to know
how to put together forms and form elements, tables and so on. Without
it you won't be able to make the PHP do anything. You can use an editor
like Dreamweaver to knock things up but be careful of using its
automated procedures. While you may be producing pages incorporating
scripts you will be lacking the understanding. For instance if you
wanted to bake a cake, you could just buy cake mix and add water and an
egg. Or you could combine individual ingredients, flour butter, sugar
etc. Or you could buy wheat, grind the flour, churn the butter... PHP
has a lot of ready written functions to help you write scripts, the
equivalent of prepared flour, butter, sugar

Secondly you need to be comfortable with basic programming constructs
and philosophies. You need to know the meaning of terms like variable,
array, function, loop and the all important if..else Do as many simple
web tutorials as you can to familiarise yourself with these terms and
ideas, but steer clear of the php.net tutorial for now. I think it
assumes a higher basic knowledge.

You will need to study databases and for more complex site this will
mean relational databases. This will involve getting your head around
normalisation which I won't pretend is easy. But it is vitally
important to get database structure right at the beginning. You will
need some knowledge of SQL, the language used to get results out of the
database.

Take it a bit at a time and do as many web tutorials as you can. File
snippets of code on your machine every time you do something new then
you can refer back to it when you need it rather than trying to remember
absolutely everything. Bookmark useful websites and usenet posts.
Apply what you have learned to small projects. Yes there are numerable
guest book scripts out there but you will learn far more by rolling your
own.

Good luck.

The only thing that I noticed that was missing is Don't forget to comment
your code. Get used to comment even small scripts. Even simple scripts
don't look so simple 6 months later.

Jeremy

[Terence]

Nick Mudge wrote:

Hello,

What is the best way for a new person to learn PHP and still new to
programming to learn PHP. And also to learn how to use PHP with other
technologies to write really good database driven interactive Web sites?

First, do the tutorials provided in the PHP manual (which can be
downloaded separately). They are excellent for newbies.

Go to zend.com and check out the tutorials.

Check out sites like phpbuilder.com -- there are lots of sites like
that. (use google to find em)

That's it. That's the BEST way to learn PHP. Roll up your sleeves and
get stuck into it. When you get stuck, ask questions when you have tried
to find answers in the PHP manual first. Don't be like some people who
want people on this forum to do their work for them -- those people will
never learn much because they are lazy. That's my advice.

Best answer wins a prize.

oh goodness. how could I resist.

[Jeffrey Silverman]

On Wed, 28 Apr 2004 22:34:21 +0200, Jeremy Schoenhaar wrote:

The only thing that I noticed that was missing is Don't forget to comment
your code. Get used to comment even small scripts. Even simple scripts
don't look so simple 6 months later.

Jeremy

Can I add here that one shouldn't OVER comment code, either.

I.e. there is a fine line between *not enough* and *too much* when it
comes to comments. In one's newbie phase, learn to comment EVERYTHING.
Eventually you will realize that it is not critical to comment everything.

Example of over-commented code? I have seen examples, posted to this
newsgroup (comp.lang.php) along the lines of:

<?php
// set $number_of_items_in_list to the number of items in the
// $list_of_things array.
$number_of_items_in_list = count($list_of_things);

// Get half of the number of items:
$half_the_items = $number_of_items_in_list / 2;

// Add one plus one:
$x = 1 + 1;

//etc...

?>

I am exaggerating a bit but I really have seen newbie code with nearly
this many comments. I mean, if you name your variables sensibly, that's
half of your commenting right there!

Allright, my $0.02. Later...

--
Jeffrey D. Silverman | jeffrey AT jhu DOT edu
Website | http://www.wse.jhu.edu/newtnotes/

[Terence]

Jerry Polyak wrote:

By buying a book, reading it, learning from it and applying the lessons in
hands on exercises.

I learnt with the first edition of "Core PHP Programming".
Excellent newbie material. I read it from cover to cover. Very easy to read.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg.../-/0130463469/

When you want to graduate to more complex PHP apps, check out "PHP and
PostgreSQL Advanced Web Programming"

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg.../-/0672323826/

Ignore the dodgey review by someone who managed to find an error in one
of the examples.