LEARN PHP SCRIPT

LEARN PHP SCRIPT

If you’re reading this, chances are that you’ve Googled a lot to decide which language to learn and how. And without a doubt, you must have run into a ton of articles about how language X is so much better than PHP – and PHP is going to die through obscurity soon. Haters gonna hate! As the popular saying goes, haters gonna hate! PHP has been at the helm of the web as you know it and that’s for a very good reason. It’s a mature language, has excellent documentation and a massive number of learning resources along with a great variety of utilities built around it. And let’s not forget the sheer proliferation of hosts and frameworks PHP has spawned. Like Heroku like hosting? Don’t worry, there are a number of excellent options for PHP as well! You could just install PHP but it gets quite boring without a server and some sort of database to play around with. And as a beginner, it’s not really trivial work to get all of these installed and configure each to work with the others without issue. This is where you grab a package such as XAMPP. These life savers typically install Apache, your web server, along with mySQL, a database system along with PHP significantly cutting down on set up time. Bonus points if you’re the code monkey type and install everything by hand. Before I send you off to alternate sources for PHP enlightenment, let me first refer you to our very own series for absolute beginners from none other than your favorite editor, Jeffrey Way. In this series, over the course of 40+ screencasts, everything from installing PHP to variables, from functions to working with MySQL is covered. You won’t find a better introduction to the PHP language than this series, and, while it’s unfortunately not free, you can subscribe to Tuts+ Premium for a mere $19. It’s absolutely worth it! Khan Academy may sound like an odd choice since there are no PHP lessons in there but trust me, it’s a good choice. What you can’t find in pure PHP, you can find in the basic of programming. For example, if you’re new to the entire programming hoopla, this is a great place to start. Another great place to start is Lynda. Here at Envato we have immense respect for those teaching there — the content is usually top notch and cover their topics well. And they cover a vast range of topics as well. If you need a specific lesson, this is where you should begin. The videos should give you an very good springboard, but, hopefully, hungry for more knowledge. The below books should give you a more elaborate introduction and lots of varied topics for you to devour. If you feel bored reading the initial portions, good, just skip ahead to the portions where your head hurts. Author: David Powers “So why another PHP book? Well, not everyone who uses PHP is a programmer. PHP is the most common dynamic web language used by designers, if their web sites require dynamic functionality, and there are hordes of novice users who want to set up dynamic web sites.” Author: Jason Lengstorf “PHP for Absolute Beginners starts at the very beginning stages of web programming, showing even the most inexperienced web developer, through examples, how to build a basic content management system. The book dives directly into writing web applications with accompanying explanation rather than explaining elements of the language and then showing examples.” Author: Adam Trachtenberg “PHP Cookbook has a wealth of solutions for problems that you’ll face regularly. With topics that range from beginner questions to advanced web programming techniques, this guide contains practical examples — or “recipes” — for anyone who uses this scripting language to generate dynamic web content.” Assignment #1: Disregard the Naysayers Assignment #2: Install PHP through [X]AMP Assignment #3: Learn the Fundamentals Assignment #4: Sign up with Khan Academy and Lynda Assignment #5: Read a Few, Good Books PHP Solutions: Dynamic Web Design Made Easy PHP for Absolute Beginners PHP Cookbook