PHP Oracle Web Development: Data processing, Security, Caching, XML, Web Services, and Ajax: A practical guide to combining the power, performance, ... development time, and high performance of PHP [Paperback]

Yuli Vasiliev (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: July 30, 2007 | ISBN-10: 1847193633 | ISBN-13: 978-1847193636 | Edition: 1st Ed.

This practical book is built entirely around example code, covering the most popular and up-to-date topics on using PHP in conjunction with Oracle. The book explains in extensive detail how to build robust, efficient, and secure PHP/Oracle solutions. Although this book covers only the most popular and up-to-date topic areas on the use of PHP in conjunction with Oracle, the author does not make any assumption about the skill level of the reader. Packed with information in an easy-to-read format, the book is ideal for any PHP developer who deals with Oracle.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Yuli Vasiliev is a software developer, freelance author, and consultant currently specializing in open-source development, Oracle technologies, and service-oriented architecture (SOA). He has over 10 years of software development experience as well as several years of technical writing experience. He wrote a series of technical articles for Oracle Technology Network (OTN) and Oracle Magazine.

Product Details

• Paperback: 396 pages
• Publisher: Packt Publishing; 1st Ed. edition (July 30, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1847193633
• ISBN-13: 978-1847193636
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 7.5 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.5 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,857,156 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Clear and concise, October 2, 2007

By 

I. Laskey "ilaskey" (UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: PHP Oracle Web Development: Data processing, Security, Caching, XML, Web Services, and Ajax: A practical guide to combining the power, performance, ... development time, and high performance of PHP (Paperback)

PHP Oracle Web Development by Yuli Vasiliev, to quote the front, covers data processing, security, caching, XML, Web Services and Ajax. Quite a lot for a mere 360 or so pages.

The book starts off with notes on both PHP and Oracle and describes how to obtain them both and how to get everything up and running using the PHP OCI8 extensions from Oracle. Whilst Oracle is a market leader in the big database arena, many developers will be surprised to learn that the full and unrestricted product is freely downloadable for development purposes - you only need to buy a licence for a production system. Even then, a free cut down version is available if you don't need the full bells and whistles.

So, with everything up and running, the book launches in to the subject at hand. I was immedietely impressed with the author's clear and easily read prose. Every subject is presented with just the right balance of detail with lots of additional notes and background information to help fill in any gaps. The author's real world experience shines through with sections on locking issues and coding for reusability. The section on object-orienation was particularly welcome.

I also liked the fact that the book didn't just cover the core subject of using Oracle with PHP but also covered vital related material such as various security models and a sizeable section on caching techniques. The sections on XML, Web Services via SOAP and Ajax ensure all the current must-have skills are represented. Ajax was presented via an example application which featured all the aspects you'd need including both code and style sheets but I'd have liked a bit more general advice and description here.

The bulk of the book though is the coverage of the OCI8 extentions and here you can find out how to issue a wide variety of SQL statements including using stored procedures, making use of triggers and a good section on transaction handling that didn't just show how to use them but also had useful advice on structuring your code to make best use of them. I would have liked some notes on avoiding things like SQL Injection attacks but that apart, the security section had some interesting nuggets.

The section on object-orientation warrents close inspection if you want to really leverage the power of the tools available in this development environment. It didn't have much on the 'big picture' of how you'd structure applications this way but it does describe how it all works and how to extend existing objects as well as create your own.

I feel I can safely say that if you need to get to grips with PHP in an Oracle environment, you'll find everything you'll need here to get up and running very quickly. The pace, content and structure of the book are all excellent with my only reserve being the assumption that everything works as it is supposed to with not much in the way of troubleshooting advice. That apart, this is a fine book.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Clear and useful book, October 19, 2007

By 

Alexander Baranov - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: PHP Oracle Web Development: Data processing, Security, Caching, XML, Web Services, and Ajax: A practical guide to combining the power, performance, ... development time, and high performance of PHP (Paperback)

It's rather small, but gives a good overview of PHP, Oracle and AJAX, coupled together. There is only one project example Throughout the whole book, which is enhanced from various aspects. To be precise, they are:

Performance Optimization - views, stored subprograms, triggers, binding variables (Oracle);
caching mechanisms (PHP,Oracle) - intended to reduce amount of data transferred between database and web servers; AJAX - browser-side optimization,

Security - special database schemas coding/decoding algorithms usage(sha1, md5),
Virtual Private Database (VPD) - Oracle

Scalability/Complexity Control - object-oriented approach (PHP5 features, Oracle Object Types)

Unified Data - XML-processing data inside database/PHP server
using XML DB to implement web-service (SOAP, WSDL).

Many of these ideas are rather universal and can be applied to other database servers, web servers and script languages

I would like to emphasize that author is an expert in Oracle, he tries to move almost all business-logic to database server, use native Oracle features (some of them are implemented only in latest Oracle versions). There are also chapters devoted to general database principles (transaction features (ACID), views, stored subprograms, concurrency, views, triggers, stored subprograms) which can be very useful for novice developers.

4.0 out of 5 stars very good effort, but not five stars, April 26, 2010

By 

Andrew M. Pilsky "Oracle learner" (Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: PHP Oracle Web Development: Data processing, Security, Caching, XML, Web Services, and Ajax: A practical guide to combining the power, performance, ... development time, and high performance of PHP (Paperback)

It is a very good book. However, before buying it one must realise that it is simply not suitable for a beginner in Oracle/PHP as the author seems to imply in his introduction. One has to have some programming background and preferably even know the basics of both PHP language AND Oracle. In my opinion, the intended audience in this book are the people who come from IT backgrounds and can easily pick up pretty much anything IT related or at least, as i have said above, know the basics of both technologies. Given that, the author does a very good job at starting at this level and 'seamlessly' covering a lot of ground in very short amount of time. I personally loved it, because mostly this book is to the point, well explained and good examples are provided.
the reasons why i feel this book can only get 4 stars is because parts of it were not written very clearly. Especially the OO Oracle part where one might have to do lot of research on the web and reading over and over before actually understanding what the author meant. Also, in some parts there is a tendency by the author not to be very explanatory and one may have to read on a page or two and only then the concept will be explained whether directly or indirectly. Is it a good book? Yes it is. Is it worth the money? I believe it is. Could have been better had everything been presented gradually as opposed to just throwing some things at the readers? It could have been better.
Overall, a great book for people like myself who come from an IT background and/or know the basics+ or both Oracle and PHP and hate reading a lot of stuff on the Web just to get the idea how things come together.