Learning PHP, MySQL, JavaScript, and CSS: A Step-by-Step Guide to Creating Dynamic Websites - Softcover

Nixon, Robin

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1449319262 ISBN 13: 9781449319267

Publisher: O'Reilly Media, 2012

Synopsis

If you're familiar with HTML, using the information in Learning PHP, MySQL, JavaScript and CSS, you will quickly learn how to build interactive, data-driven websites with the powerful combination of PHP, MySQL, JavaScript and CSS - the top technologies for creating modern sites. This hands-on guide explains each technology separately, shows you how to combine them, and introduces valuable web programming concepts such as objects, XHTML, cookies, and session management.

Carefully paced for non-programmers, this second edition of the top-selling guide to web development now also provides an extensive introduction to CSS, and benefits from reader questions and suggestions about the first edition, making the new edition even easier to follow and more information-packed than ever.

Plus, to ensure your have understood all the main points, you'll practice what you've learned with review questions at the end of each chapter, and there's even a sample social networking platform built with the elements introduced in this book.

Learning PHP, MySQL, JavaScript and CSS will enable you to:

• Understand PHP up to an intermediate level, including the basics of object-oriented programming
• Master MySQL, from database structure to complex queries
• Create web pages with PHP and MySQL by integrating forms and other HTML features
• Learn about JavaScript, from functions and event handling to accessing the Document Object Model
• Pick up the basics of CSS (and CSS3) and learn how to use it to create compelling and dynamic web pages.
• Find out how to manipulate CSS properties directly from JavaScript
• Make Ajax calls and turn your website into a highly interactive environment
• Upload and manipulate files and images, validate user input, and secure your applications
• Bring all these technologies together to create a  social networking site

About this title

Book Description

A Step-by-Step Guide to Creating Dynamic Websites

From the Author

Having developed for the Internet since the mid 1990s I have used a number of programming languages, beginning with Perl, which was the first tool I mastered. However I soon found that great though Perl was for developing with, at the time it didn't have the power I needed for ultra busy websites, and so the load averages of the servers I used was going through the roof.

So I rewrote all the processor-intensive code in C and was able to substantially slow down our server acquisition rate. But while C is powerful, it takes a lot of coding to replicate even basic Perl functions. So when PHP came along I was very pleasantly surprised to discover that even though it is interpreted (that is, re-compiled each time it is run), it placed far less of a strain on the servers than Perl, and also took up far less development time.

Since then I have used PHP in combination with MySQL for all my server side development. And with JavaScript gaining the XMLHttpRequest object, and hence the beginnings of Ajax, these technologies are now my mainstays for web development.

So when O'Reilly asked me to write the first edition of this book I jumped at the opportunity. In it I tried to take you from first steps, without assuming any prior knowledge other than basic HTML (and maybe some CSS), through each of the technologies in turn, and along the way point out the shortcuts and pitfalls I have discovered, to give you the headstart I didn't have. Thankfully the book was extremely well received, and has remained at the top of the web development book charts for over two years.

But now it's time for the second edition and I have done my best to pay the same attention to detail in updating it from the first edition, and also incorporating ideas and suggestions from many of the thousands of readers, as well as adding a whole new section on CSS - which means the book now covers all four of the most popular web development technologies (PHP, MySQL, JavaScript and CSS).

So I hope you'll find the book even more of a one-stop resource, and that you also find it easy to read and understand (and enjoyable too). And, as ever, I welcome any comments or questions you may have via the book's website at lpmj.net, and always do my best to provide assistance if you need it.

Edition details

• Publisher: O'Reilly Media
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1449319262
• ISBN 13: 9781449319267
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 556