PHP 5: Your visual blueprint for creating open source,...

Features

• Cover Type: Paperback with 320 pages
• Published by: Visual May 27, 2005
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 0764583328
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-0764583322
• Book Dimensions: 8.9 x 7.8 x 0.5 inches
• Weighs: 1.6 pounds

Product Description
* Now revised to cover features found in PHP4 and PHP5, this new edition shows Web developers step by step how to create dynamic, data-driven Web applications
* Two-color screen shots accompanied by concise callouts demonstrate how to tackle more than 100 key PHP tasks, including using cookies to monitor the activity of Web site visitors, retrieving information from MySQL or other databases, creating images and Web pages on the fly, and processing XML documents
* Shows how to use PHP with Apache Web server, process data forms, access data files, troubleshoot PHP scripts, and migrate scripts to PHP5
* A companion Web site features a fully searchable e-version of the book, plus all code that appears in the text-ready to plug into users' Web pages

Back Cover Copy
PHP 5

Welcome to the only guidebook series that takes a visual approach to professional-level computer topics. Open the book and you'll discover step-by-step screen shots that demonstrate over 150 key PHP 5 techniques, including:

• Setting file and folder permissions
• Using interfaces
• Writing object-oriented code
• Processing data in forms
• Using cookies to manage visitors
• Working with databases using MySQLi and SQLite
• Migrating scripts to PHP 5
• Parsing XML files using DOM
• Transforming XML with XSLT
• Troubleshooting PHP scripts

"Like a lot of other people, I understand things best when I see them visually. Your books really make learning easy and life more fun."
-John T. Frey (Cadillac, MI)

Reader Reviews
Programming books tend to fall into two categories, learn by example and reference books. If you are new to programming, it's generally easier to start learning by example suspending your knowledge of everything a language can do in favor of examining a few simple scripts to learn the basics. Once you have written a number of small scripts, a good reference book can guide you in writing more complex and functional applications. On the spectrum of how-to vs. reference, "PHP 5: Your visual blueprint for creating open source, server-side content" falls on the near-side of reference yet is organized in a practical solution based fashion. One of about six PHP books on my bookshelf (and perhaps only second to the php.net website), I find myself referring to this book more than any other reference. It is an excellent reference for things like recalling the syntax of a loop structure to the application of a loop in processing multiple form elements. Beyond being a solution-based reference, two things I really like about this book is the consistent two-page layout for each concept - a short description followed by code - and code shown in an actual editor window. (I'm not sure what it is about seeing screenshots of code but it seems to sink in better than code formatted in plain text on a page. Hence the Visual approach.) If you are new to web programming and are looking to buy your first PHP book then you may be better served with a learning through sample projects approach like "Build Your Own Database Driven Website Using PHP & MySQL" by Kevin Yank. In reviewing this book, expert programmers might scoff and say RTFM. For the rest of us somewhere along the PHP and programming learning curve, I believe this book serves as a friendly and practical reference.