Beginning PHP5

by David Mercer and Allan Kent

What is this book about?

Beginning PHP5 is a complete tutorial in PHP5's language features and functionality, beginning with the basics and building up to the design and construction of complex data-driven Web sites. Fully functioning applications are developed through the course of the book. Other features of the book include installation guide and troubleshooting tips, introduction to relational databases, practical working examples...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0764557831
• ISBN13: 9780764557835
• Release Date: July 2004
• Publisher: Wrox Press
• Length: 859 Pages
• Weight: 3.05 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.9" x 7.6" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Perfect book to start PHP

This book is very well organized with a lot of details and examples. It is not boring or hard to follow. Each chapter follow a clear path to take you there. I would strongly recommend it to all those people that are looking to learn PHP and they are not yet familiar with web base programming. It is not a requirement to already know HTML.

PHP5 a really really good review

When I first thought of the idea of reading a book that I would be able to choose I knew I wanted to learn something useful. I have wanted to get at least one language under my belt by the time I am 16. There are many languages out there such as Perl, PHP, Cold Fusion, ASP, Python, C++, C, and of course Assembly. Now I do not think anyone could learn Assembly right off the bat without learning easier languages first. I have a great interest in dynamic web sites and servers. Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP, and free time of course are a prefect match! I have always had to learn everything I know about computers from researching by myself, whether it is Google or in this case a book. PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor) is a language that revolves around web sites. With PHP developers are able to create a more dynamic web site then they normally would with regular HTML. An example would be a simple site with a user / login option / feature. What PHP does is although developers to code a script to handle such an option / feature. This book does a very theroe job of explaining the whole processor and background of PHP. It starts out explaining the apache side of things, showing how to set up a server on both platforms. Next it explains the syntax of PHP and has many examples. Then throughout the book it explains some functions and how they can be used. I epically liked the chapter on Dir / File manipulation. After it explains functions and examples it shows you how to use MySQL along with PHP. With is a must if you are going to be learning PHP. Also I like that it cover image manipulation. This is what I created using the knowledge I gained from this book. It is a site where users may create an account and then upload certain types of media (images, audio, and video). And has a nice GUI where they can manage it from.

Pretty useful book!!

I got a lot out of this title. Having known almost nothing about PHP to begin with, I am now able to do some pretty neat stuff... Thanks..

This book has been extremely useful

(...)PHP code can be used on a local machine as well as uploaded to your server and used in the real world. You may need to make modifications to the code to reflect the domain name, etc. of your particular server. With that out of the way, let me say that this book has been extremely useful to me (a beginner). Not only does it start with the fundamentals of PHP, including installation, it continues through many advanced areas of programming so that you do not need to rush out and buy another book to complete your project. It even covers some basic HTML integration for those that are new to that too. All in all, I have not seen any other book on PHP5 with the depth and ease-of-use of this one.