PHP and MySQL Web Development, Second Edition (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Learning PHP is worth your time because you can do so much with it. Backed by a MySQL database server, the language makes an extraordinary engine for doing server-side scripting on Web sites. PHP and MySQL Web Development aims to unravel the wonderful possibilities of the two title technologies by walking the reader through tutorials, then presenting a series of moderately elaborate example projects. The PHP tutorial will impress anyone coming to the language from simple HTML work, and the MySQL tutorial is adequate for most applications (though it ignores the relational capabilities that appeared in version 4 with the InnoDB table type). If you like to study code (both listings and commentary), you'll appreciate the authors' solutions to common problems, like implementing shopping sites and managing restricted-access rules.

The programming approach of Luke Welling and Laura Thomson is procedural, neglecting the object-oriented capabilities of PHP almost entirely. It's a valid choice, as most PHP code is written in procedural style. As well, they've chosen to build their software around PHP 4.3, which doesn't have as much object-orientation capability of the new version 5 release. Some readers may lament the lack of up-to-date coverage, but others--perhaps serving sites from hosting services that run well-proven PHP 4.x--will appreciate that the authors took time to revise their PHP 4.3 code samples (which should, in most cases, be backward-compatible), rather than writing PHP 5 code for its own sake. --David Wall

Topics covered: How to program with PHP 4.3 (and its predecessors) and store data in a MySQL database. PHP coverage is extensive, covering all capabilities from basic form-handing to Web Services, while MySQL coverage is limited to the essentials of database setup and administration. Elaborate applications--such as a PDF generator and a content-management system--are written in a way that invites learning and adaptation.

Product Description

PHP and MySQL Web Development teaches the reader to develop dynamic, secure, commercial Web sites. Using the same accessible, popular teaching style of the first edition, this best-selling book has been updated to reflect the rapidly changing landscape of MySQL and PHP.

The book teaches the reader to integrate and implement these technologies by following real-world examples and working sample projects, and also covers related technologies needed to build a commercial Web site, such as SSL, shopping carts, and payment systems.

The second edition includes new coverage of how to work with XML in developing a PHP and MySQL site, and how to draw on the valuable resources of the PEAR repository of code and extensions.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 912 pages
• Publisher: Sams; 2 edition (February 12, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 067232525X
• ISBN-13: 978-0672325250
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 7.1 x 2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (62 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #319,579 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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  #74 in	Books > Computers & Internet > Databases > Specific Databases > MySQL & mSQL
  #99 in	Books > Computers & Internet > Web Development > Programming > PHP

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

133 of 135 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent book - poor publishing (1st & 2nd edition), May 8, 2003

By	apartment223 (TX United States) - See all my reviews

* Note: I refer here to both the first and second edition *

This is the book I purchased to get started on server-side scripting; it probably says "user-level intermediate-advanced" to avoid lawsuits; I had no prior knowledge of server-side programming, and no trouble understanding.

It is divided in four logical parts:
(1) PHP tutorial
(2) MySQL tutorial
(3) General discussion on server-side scripting & e-commerce (very interesting)
(4) Projects

This book does an excellent job at explaining PHP & MySQL to the beginner, and goes much beyond the frustrating "intermediate" level where similar books often stop. It assumes a working knowledge of HTML, which everyone interested in this book already has in all likelihood.

It is cleverly written, clear and concise. The authors share their extensive experience with the reader, notably in the third part where common pitfalls are discussed.

The index is well done, which makes this book an excellent desktop reference in addition to being a good tutorial.

The CD contains all the code for the examples, the complete book in searchable PDF, and other goodies like the Apache Server and PHP.

My recommendation: go to phpide.de and download PHPTriad to install & configure Apache/PHP/MySQL on your PC, or have someone knowledgeable do it manually for you to avoid headaches.

The only reason I can't give five stars to the first or second edition is the number of mistakes/typos in the code examples. The upload code doesn't work, PDF generation uses obsolete functions even in the second edition, etc.

Although most of the code supplied as example functions properly, it is annoying to know that a book written to teach you to program contains errors in the programming examples.

The second edition adds a chapter about XML and removes outdated URLs. Otherwise, it is the same book (including code typos).

Combined with the PHP & MySQL manuals available for download from their respective sites, allow a week or two of reading and you should have everything needed to start working.

All things considered, I strongly recommend this book.

PS: if your heart balances between ASP & PHP for server-side, consider that more servers are PHP-enabled, since it is cheaper (free).
If you want to stay in known terrain and use JScript, than go for ASP.

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best book on PHP/MySQL for beginners - intermed, March 18, 2003

By	Joshua Padnick (Scottsdale, AZ) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This book is simply great. I read the first edition about 10 months ago when I was a total beginner to PHP and MySQL (although I had taken a database course and knew some Java). This book basically got me up to speed on how to program in PHP. What's better, my database skills were packed with a lot of theory and not too much practical application and this book had a chapter that gave an excellent overview of general database concepts.

The first half of the book--basically teaching you PHP and MySQL--is great on its own. But then the 2nd half is excellent, too. They have tutorials on how to program the most common web applications: a shopping cart, a message board system, a content management system. I used this book as my primary referecne when developing my first versions of a content management system and e-commerce system and the results turned out quite well.

It's a shame that no one has reviewed the 2nd edition of this book because if you look at the Amazon.com entry for the first edition, you'll see it received over 100 reviews giving it 4.5 stars.

One word of caution about this book: they seem to forget to mention the concept of superglobals, but just look it up through Google and you'll easily get up to speed. Also, for advanced users, this book might be a decent reference but is probably a little too elementary. Maybe Professional PHP4 might be better for advanced users, although that book has some problems of its own.

26 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Thorough and practical, and improved, May 3, 2003

By A Customer

I looked at a lot of PHP books and selected Luke & Laura's (in its first edition) because it had a pretty comprehensive but fast-paced introduction to the language and then went on to show several practical applications. Some other books just duplicate the php.net function reference, or walk you through the tiresome details of a single project, but this book gets you working in the language and then gives the key elements of several practical projects that are typical for PHP programmers: shopping cart, content management, mailing list, discussion forum, etc.

The authors wrote that they aimed their book at readers who have some HTML and some programming experience, but not necessarily any web-programming experience. That put me in their target market, and I found the book an excellent fit.

I looked over the second edition today, and it is a significant improvement. The code is now current with PHP 4.3, and while the authors try to use techniques that don't require the latest PHP version, the code is more compatible now with the latest version (e.g. register_globals is not assumed to be set On). Other tweaks in the code listings, e.g. "if (isset($myvar))" instead of "if ($myvar)", show the code has been polished. The typeface is improved too; there seems to be more text on each page but it's actually more legible.

I looked up a practical problem today, how to log-in and keep session-state variables for database-authenticated users. Lots of articles on the web, and even some PHP books, offer home-grown solutions that could be translations of 1997 Perl code, but Luke & Laura give a simple and elegant method (in chap. 20) that exploits PHP's latest built-in capabilities and is easy for me to extend. They extend it, too, in their example apps later in the book.

PHP is popular because it's a cheap, easy, and full-featured language for web programming. This book has the thorough and practical approach that will have you quickly building commercially useful PHP applications.