Hello,

Just starting out with PHP for web sites I create. Not necessarily
database types of things - that will come later - but short scripts or
snippets to perform validation, or accepting a variable into form. That
sort of thing.

What is the best book to get?

Thanks in advance,
Harvey

On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 06:08:47 -0500, eclipsme wrote...
>
>Hello,
>
>Just starting out with PHP for web sites I create. Not necessarily
>database types of things - that will come later - but short scripts or
>snippets to perform validation, or accepting a variable into form. That
>sort of thing.
>
>What is the best book to get?
>
>Thanks in advance,
>Harvey


If you have the basics down, sometimes the "Cookbooks" that O'Reilly publishes
can be useful for finding working through an actual project than sample scripts.

Tom
--
NewsGuy Accounts Go Jumbo!
NewsGuy Express increased from 30 to 50 GB of download capacity
http://newsguy.com/overview.htm

I would call myself a novice, maybe a good novice programmer, and
probably not intermediate and definitely not expert. I bought "CORE
PHP Programming" by Atkinson and I found that it was basic enough
through the first few chapters to get me going, and served as an
excellent reference later.

Kevin wrote:
> I would call myself a novice, maybe a good novice programmer, and
> probably not intermediate and definitely not expert. I bought "CORE
> PHP Programming" by Atkinson and I found that it was basic enough
> through the first few chapters to get me going, and served as an
> excellent reference later.

Thanks. It has mixed reviews on Amazon - People seem to either hate it
or love it. I found it used for $5 so I grabbed it. How much can you
hate it for $5???

Thanks,
Harvey

On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 22:57:30 -0800 (PST), Kevin <kevin@westportwa.com>
wrote:

>I would call myself a novice, maybe a good novice programmer, and
>probably not intermediate and definitely not expert. I bought "CORE
>PHP Programming" by Atkinson and I found that it was basic enough
>through the first few chapters to get me going, and served as an
>excellent reference later.

How ironic (since I am trying to learn PHP and my last name is
Atkinson). I wonder if I'm related to this author.

I'll check and see if it is in our school library.




Fred Atkinson

"Fred Atkinson" <fatkinson@mishmash.com> wrote in message
news:4r75m3tpq3debfg48jf5im1b41ki237irp@4ax.com...
> On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 22:57:30 -0800 (PST), Kevin <kevin@westportwa.com>
> wrote:
>
>>I would call myself a novice, maybe a good novice programmer, and
>>probably not intermediate and definitely not expert. I bought "CORE
>>PHP Programming" by Atkinson and I found that it was basic enough
>>through the first few chapters to get me going, and served as an
>>excellent reference later.
>
> How ironic (since I am trying to learn PHP and my last name is
> Atkinson). I wonder if I'm related to this author.

soooooooooooo ironic! one of the atkinsons knows php and can read and write.
in fact, that one wrote a book about php.

who are you?

> I'll check and see if it is in our school library.

not sure how much luck you'll have there, fred. elementary school libraries
don't tend to have a broad selection of materials.

On Fri, 14 Dec 2007 09:33:58 -0600, "Steve" <no.one@example.com>
wrote:

>soooooooooooo ironic! one of the atkinsons knows php and can read and write.
>in fact, that one wrote a book about php.
>
>who are you?
>
>> I'll check and see if it is in our school library.
>
>not sure how much luck you'll have there, fred. elementary school libraries
>don't tend to have a broad selection of materials.

So, you're determined to further humiliate yourself on another
post.

I'll say this, you're a glutton for punishment.



Fred Atkinson

"Fred Atkinson" <fatkinson@mishmash.com> wrote in message
news:1s85m31hgnjt07h8t9mcmalrl3nc4fip3v@4ax.com...
> On Fri, 14 Dec 2007 09:33:58 -0600, "Steve" <no.one@example.com>
> wrote:
>
>>soooooooooooo ironic! one of the atkinsons knows php and can read and
>>write.
>>in fact, that one wrote a book about php.
>>
>>who are you?
>>
>>> I'll check and see if it is in our school library.
>>
>>not sure how much luck you'll have there, fred. elementary school
>>libraries
>>don't tend to have a broad selection of materials.
>
> So, you're determined to further humiliate yourself on another
> post.
>
> I'll say this, you're a glutton for punishment.

sorry, was there any ever served? perhaps you could post the message id so
that my memory will be refreshed. hmmmm?

What I'd suggest for a book may not always be the right choice,
whatever people suggest checkout that book or if that edition is not
available check out similar by the same publisher. It all depends on
your approachability.

As suggestions for you to check out further, a good stater tome is the
Visual Quickstart PHP book by Larry Ullman, Peachpit Press. It starts
out with the basics and covers a whole lot of ground, with
explanations and sample results along the way.

Also whatever you read, before you do some serious work (you can fudge
on it a little until then because you need to know PHP before you can
understand how to protect it) you need to read some of the great texts
on PHP security on the net, PHP is a very flexible and versatile
language and if you don't take into consideration bad guys taking
advantage of that versatility it could lead to a lot of problems. As
a start check out the top 7 PHP security blunders is a good reference,
once you understand what they are talking about -
http://www.sitepoint.com/article/php-security-blunders

Larry

larry@portcommodore.com wrote:
> What I'd suggest for a book may not always be the right choice,
> whatever people suggest checkout that book or if that edition is not
> available check out similar by the same publisher. It all depends on
> your approachability.
>
> As suggestions for you to check out further, a good stater tome is the
> Visual Quickstart PHP book by Larry Ullman, Peachpit Press. It starts
> out with the basics and covers a whole lot of ground, with
> explanations and sample results along the way.
>
> Also whatever you read, before you do some serious work (you can fudge
> on it a little until then because you need to know PHP before you can
> understand how to protect it) you need to read some of the great texts
> on PHP security on the net, PHP is a very flexible and versatile
> language and if you don't take into consideration bad guys taking
> advantage of that versatility it could lead to a lot of problems. As
> a start check out the top 7 PHP security blunders is a good reference,
> once you understand what they are talking about -
> http://www.sitepoint.com/article/php-security-blunders
>
> Larry
Thanks for the link. I think I already did the first Blunder!

Harvey

Steve wrote:
> "Fred Atkinson" <fatkinson@mishmash.com> wrote in message
> news:1s85m31hgnjt07h8t9mcmalrl3nc4fip3v@4ax.com...
>> On Fri, 14 Dec 2007 09:33:58 -0600, "Steve" <no.one@example.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>>> soooooooooooo ironic! one of the atkinsons knows php and can read and
>>> write.
>>> in fact, that one wrote a book about php.
>>>
>>> who are you?
>>>
>>>> I'll check and see if it is in our school library.
>>> not sure how much luck you'll have there, fred. elementary school
>>> libraries
>>> don't tend to have a broad selection of materials.
>> So, you're determined to further humiliate yourself on another
>> post.
>>
>> I'll say this, you're a glutton for punishment.
>
> sorry, was there any ever served? perhaps you could post the message id so
> that my memory will be refreshed. hmmmm?
>
>
Wow, guys. Didn't know I'd create such a brawl.

Try ignoring each other. Makes everything easier.

JMHO
Harvey

"eclipsme" <eclipsme@nowhere.com> wrote in message
news:zaA8j.15043$k27.5201@bignews2.bellsouth.net.. .
> Steve wrote:
>> "Fred Atkinson" <fatkinson@mishmash.com> wrote in message
>> news:1s85m31hgnjt07h8t9mcmalrl3nc4fip3v@4ax.com...
>>> On Fri, 14 Dec 2007 09:33:58 -0600, "Steve" <no.one@example.com>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>> soooooooooooo ironic! one of the atkinsons knows php and can read and
>>>> write.
>>>> in fact, that one wrote a book about php.
>>>>
>>>> who are you?
>>>>
>>>>> I'll check and see if it is in our school library.
>>>> not sure how much luck you'll have there, fred. elementary school
>>>> libraries
>>>> don't tend to have a broad selection of materials.
>>> So, you're determined to further humiliate yourself on another
>>> post.
>>>
>>> I'll say this, you're a glutton for punishment.
>>
>> sorry, was there any ever served? perhaps you could post the message id
>> so that my memory will be refreshed. hmmmm?
> Wow, guys. Didn't know I'd create such a brawl.
>
> Try ignoring each other. Makes everything easier.

lol harvey. cheers man.

On Fri, 14 Dec 2007 07:36:47 -0500, eclipsme wrote...
>
>Kevin wrote:
>> I would call myself a novice, maybe a good novice programmer, and
>> probably not intermediate and definitely not expert. I bought "CORE
>> PHP Programming" by Atkinson and I found that it was basic enough
>> through the first few chapters to get me going, and served as an
>> excellent reference later.
>
>Thanks. It has mixed reviews on Amazon - People seem to either hate it
>or love it. I found it used for $5 so I grabbed it. How much can you
>hate it for $5???
>
>Thanks,
>Harvey

I try to avoid the "Learn Programming Language X in 15 days" type books, but
it's always good to start with the fundamentals. Once you have a good
foundation, then the cookbook style books are good for working through more
complex examples.

Tom
--
NewsGuy Accounts Go Jumbo!
NewsGuy Express increased from 30 to 50 GB of download capacity
http://newsguy.com/overview.htm

eclipsme wrote:
> Hello,
>
> Just starting out with PHP for web sites I create. Not necessarily
> database types of things - that will come later - but short scripts or
> snippets to perform validation, or accepting a variable into form. That
> sort of thing.
>
> What is the best book to get?
>
> Thanks in advance,
> Harvey

IMHO, there's only one PHP book that you'll ever need and that's the
O'Reilly book "programming PHP". It doesn't cover PHP5 but there's not
THAT much added by PHP5 that can't be learned online once you've
understood PHP4.