PHP books

This book takes you beyond the PHP basics to the enterprise development practices used by professional programmers. Updated for PHP 5.3 with new sections on closures, namespaces, and continuous integration, this edition will teach you about object features such as abstract classes, reflection, interfaces, and error handling. You’ll also discover object tools to help you learn more about your classes, objects, and methods.

Then you’ll move into design patterns and the principles that make patterns powerful. You’ll learn both classic design patterns and enterprise and database patterns with easy-to-follow examples.

Finally, you’ll discover how to put it all into practice to help turn great code into successful projects. You’ll learn how to manage multiple developers with Subversion, and how to build and install using Phing and PEAR. You’ll also learn strategies for automated testing and building, including continuous integration.

Taken together, these three elements—object fundamentals, design principles, and best practices—will help you develop elegant and rock-solid systems.

• Learn to work with object fundamentals: writing classes and methods, instantiating objects, and creating powerful class hierarchies using inheritance.
• Master advanced object-oriented features, including static methods and properties.
• Learn how to manage error conditions with exceptions, and create abstract classes and interfaces.
• Understand and use design principles to deploy objects and classes effectively in your projects.
• Learn about design patterns, their purpose and structure, and the underlying principles that govern them.
• Discover a set of powerful patterns that you can deploy in your own projects.
• Learn about the tools and practices that can guarantee a successful project including unit testing; version control; build, installation, and package management; and continuous integration.

This book is suitable for anyone with at least a basic knowledge of PHP who wants to use its object-oriented features in their projects.

Those who already know their interfaces from their abstracts may well still find it hard to use these features in their projects. These users will benefit from the book’s emphasis on design. They will learn how to choose and combine the participants of a system, how to read design patterns, and how to use them in their code.

Finally, this book is for PHP coders who want to learn about the practices and tools (version control, testing, continuous integration, etc.) that can make projects safe, elegant, and stable.

1. PHP: Design and Management
2. PHP and Objects
3. Object Basics
4. Advanced Features
5. Object Tools
6. Objects and Design
7. What Are Design Patterns? Why Use Them?
8. Some Pattern Principles
9. Generating Objects
10. Patterns for Flexible Object Programming
11. Performing and Representing Tasks
12. Enterprise Patterns
13. Database Patterns
14. Good (and Bad) Practice
15. An Introduction to PEAR and Pyrus
16. Generating Documentation with phpDocumentor
17. Version Control with Subversion
18. Testing with PHPUnit
19. Automated Build with Phing
20. Continuous Integration
21. Objects, Patterns, Practice

Beginning PHP and MySQL: From Novice to Professional, Fourth Edition is a major update of W. Jason Gilmore's authoritative book on PHP and MySQL. The fourth edition includes complete coverage of PHP 5.3 features, including namespacing, an update of AMP stack installation and configuration, updates to Zend Framework, coverage of MySQL Workbench, and much more.

You'll not only receive extensive introductions to the core features of PHP, MySQL, and related tools, but you'll also learn how to effectively integrate them in order to build robust data-driven applications. Gilmore has seven years of experience working with these technologies, and he has packed this book with practical examples and insight into the real-world challenges faced by developers. Accordingly, you will repeatedly return to this book as both a valuable instructional tool and reference guide.

• How to install and configure Apache, PHP 5.3, and MySQL
• PHP and object-oriented programming basics
• New PHP 5.3 features and how to use them
• How to move beyond basic PHP, including using the Zend Framework
• How to use MySQL to securely store your website's data
• How to use MySQL Workbench to manage your database

Developers who want to harness PHP and MySQL to create powerful web applications

1. Introducing PHP
2. Configuring Your Environment
3. PHP Basics
4. Functions
5. Arrays
6. Object-Oriented PHP
7. Advanced OOP Features
8. Error and Exception Handling
9. Strings and Regular Expressions
10. Working with the File and Operating System
11. PEAR
12. Date and Time
13. Forms
14. Authenticating Your Users
15. Handling File Uploads
16. Networking
17. PHP and LDAP
18. Session Handlers
19. Templating with Smarty
20. Web Services
21. Secure PHP Programming
22. Integrating jQuery and PHP
23. Building Web Sites for the World
24. MVC and the Zend Framework
25. Introducing MySQL
26. Installing and Configuring MySQL
27. The Many MySQL Clients
28. MySQL Storage Engines and Datatypes
29. Securing MySQL
30. Using PHP with MySQL
31. Introducing PDO
32. Stored Routines
33. MySQL Triggers
34. MySQL Views
35. Practical Database Queries
36. Indexes and Searching
37. Transactions
38. Importing and Exporting Data

This Adobe-approved, project-based guide from one of the world's most popular web design authors, David Powers, will teach readers how to progress from designing static websites to building dynamic websites in Adobe Dreamweaver CS5. Using step-by-step instructions with projects that build on the knowledge acquired in each lesson, readers will learn about the new PHP features in Dreamweaver CS5, including the ability to work in Live View with WordPress, as well as extended support for PHP code hints, syntax checking, and dynamically related files. Readers will learn how to upload images and send email with attachments using the Zend Framework. In contrast to existing books on the Zend Framework, this book will show web designers and developers with little or no programming experience how to use selected modules to integrate dynamic features into existing sites. There is a strong emphasis on following security best practices. Readers will also learn progressive enhancement techniques for updating pages seamlessly with PHP and Ajax.

Here's what Web designers need to know to create dynamic, database-driven Web sites

To be on the cutting edge, Web sites need to serve up HTML, CSS, and products specific to the needs of different customers using different browsers. An effective e-commerce site gathers information about users and provides information they need to get the desired result.

PHP scripting language with a MySQL back-end database offers an effective way to design sites that meet these requirements. This full updated 4th Edition of PHP & MySQL For Dummies gets you quickly up to speed, even if your experience is limited.

• Explains the easy way to install and set up PHP and MySQL using XAMPP, so it works the same on Linux, Mac, and Windows
• Shows you how to secure files on a Web host and how to write secure code
• Packed with useful and understandable code examples for Web site creators who are not professional programmers
• Fully updated to ensure your code will be compliant based on PHP 5.3 and MySQL 5.1.31
• Provides clear, accurate code examples

PHP & MySQL For Dummies, 4th Edition provides what you need to know to create sites that get results.

Note: CD-ROM/DVD and other supplementary materials are not included as part of eBook file.

This book covers the basics of PHP and MySQL along with introductions to advanced topics including object-oriented programming and how to build Web sites that incorporate authentication and security. After you complete this course, you will be able to use PHP and MySQL to build professional quality, database-driven Web sites.

It hasn't taken Web developers long to discover that when it comes to creating dynamic, database-driven Web sites, MySQL and PHP provide a winning open source combination. Add this book to the mix, and there's no limit to the powerful, interactive Web sites that developers can create. With step-by-step instructions, complete scripts, and expert tips to guide readers, veteran author and database designer Larry Ullman gets right down to business: After grounding readers with separate discussions of first the scripting language (PHP) and then the database program (MySQL), he goes on to cover security, sessions and cookies, and using additional Web tools, with several sections devoted to creating sample applications. This guide is indispensable for intermediate- to advanced level Web designers who want to replace their static sites with something dynamic. In this edition, the bulk of the new material covers the latest versions of both technologies: PHP 6 (due out in 2008) and MySQL 5 (available now). The book's publication date is likely to beat the official release of PHP 6, making it one of the first books available on the subject.

With the surge of popularity of PHP 5, object-oriented programming is now an important consideration for PHP developers. This version-neutral book is a gentle introduction to object-oriented programming (OOP) that won't overburden you with complex theory. It teaches you the essential basics of OOP that you'll need to know before moving onto a more advanced level, and includes a series of prepackaged scripts that you can incorporate into your existing sites with the minimum of effort.

It shows how object-oriented programming can be used to create reusable and portable code by walking you through a series of simple projects. The projects feature the sorts of things developers run up against every day, and include a validator for filtering user input, a simple Date class that avoids the need to remember all the esoteric format codes in PHP, and an XML generator.

• Teaches the fundamentals of OOP
• Simple projects show how OOP concepts work in the real world
• Prepackaged scripts can easily be added to your own projects

• PHP features, such as the Standard PHP Library (SPL), that are poorly documented or ignored by existing books
• How to develop classes of their own
• OOP in easy-to-understand language without getting bogged down in dense theory
• Solid foundations for developers wishing to delve more deeply into OOP
• How to leverage the strengths of OOP as a means for creating reusable code that can be used successfully within a procedural context
• How to code for both PHP 5 and 6

This book is aimed at intermediate-level PHP developers who want to take their skills to the next level by exploring object-oriented programming as a way of creating reusable code for a everyday website tasks. A typical reader would be someone who has read one of the author's previous titles, such as PHP Solutions, or one of the PHP books for Dreamweaver and feels ready to tackle something a little more challenging.

In this comprehensive guide to creating an e-commerce Web site using PHP and MySQL, renowned author Larry Ullman walks you through every step--designing the visual interface, creating the database, presenting content, generating an online catalog, managing the shopping cart, handling the order and the payment process, and fulfilling the order--always with security and best practices emphasized along the way. Even if you're an experienced Web developer, you're guaranteed to learn something new. The book uses two e-commerce site examples--one based on selling physical products that require shipping and delayed payment, and another that sells non-physical products to be purchased and delivered instantly--so you see the widest possible range of e-commerce scenarios. In 11 engaging, easy-to-follow chapters, Effortless E-Commerce with PHP and MySQL teaches you how to:
* Think of the customer first, in order to maximize sales
* Create a safe server environment and database
* Use secure transactions and prevent common vulnerabilities
* Incorporate different payment gateways
* Design scalable sites that are easy to maintain
* Build administrative interfaces
* Extend both examples to match the needs of your own sites

There are many reasons for serving up dynamic content from a web site: to offer an online shopping site, create customized information pages for users, or just manage a large volume of content through a database. Anyone with a modest knowledge of HTML and web site management can learn to create dynamic content through the PHP programming language and the MySQL database. This book gives you the background and tools to do the job safely and reliably.

Web Database Applications with PHP and MySQL, Second Edition thoroughly reflects the needs of real-world applications. It goes into detail on such practical issues as validating input (do you know what a proper credit card number looks like?), logging in users, and using templates to give your dynamic web pages a standard look.

But this book goes even further. It shows how JavaScript and PHP can be used in tandem to make a user's experience faster and more pleasant. It shows the correct way to handle errors in user input so that a site looks professional. It introduces the vast collection of powerful tools available in the PEAR repository and shows how to use some of the most popular tools.

Even while it serves as an introduction to new programmers, the book does not omit critical tasks that web sites require. For instance, every site that allows updates must handle the possibility of multiple users accessing data at the same time. This book explains how to solve the problem in detail with locking.

Through a sophisticated sample application--Hugh and Dave's Wine Store--all the important techniques of dynamic content are introduced. Good design is emphasized, such as dividing logic from presentation. The book introduces PHP 5 and MySQL 4.1 features, while providing techniques that can be used on older versions of the software that are still in widespread use.

This new edition has been redesigned around the rich offerings of PEAR. Several of these, including the Template package and the database-independent query API, are fully integrated into examples and thoroughly described in the text. Topics include:

• Installation and configuration of Apache, MySQL, and PHP on Unix®, Windows®, and Mac OS® X systems
• Introductions to PHP, SQL, and MySQL administration
• Session management, including the use of a custom database for improved efficiency
• User input validation, security, and authentication
• The PEAR repository, plus details on the use of PEAR DB and Template classes
• Production of PDF reports

Programming PHP, 2nd Edition, is the authoritative guide to PHP 5 and is filled with the unique knowledge of the creator of PHP (Rasmus Lerdorf) and other PHP experts. When it comes to creating websites, the PHP scripting language is truly a red-hot property. In fact, PHP is currently used on more than 19 million websites, surpassing Microsoft's ASP .NET technology in popularity. Programmers love its flexibility and speed; designers love its accessibility and convenience.

As the industry standard book on PHP, all of the essentials are covered in a clear and concise manner. Language syntax and programming techniques are coupled with numerous examples that illustrate both correct usage and common idioms. With style tips and practical programming advice, this book will help you become not just a PHP programmer, but a good PHP programmer. Programming PHP, Second Edition covers everything you need to know to create effective web applications with PHP. Contents include:

• Detailed information on the basics of the PHP language, including data types, variables, operators, and flow control statements
• Chapters outlining the basics of functions, strings, arrays, and objects
• Coverage of common PHP web application techniques, such as form processing and validation, session tracking, and cookies
• Material on interacting with relational databases, such as MySQL and Oracle, using the database-independent PEAR DB library and the new PDO Library
• Chapters that show you how to generate dynamic images, create PDF files, and parse XML files with PHP
• Advanced topics, such as creating secure scripts, error handling, performance tuning, and writing your own C language extensions to PHP
• A handy quick reference to all the core functions in PHP and all the standard extensions that ship with PHP

Praise for the first edition:

"If you are just getting into the dynamic Web development world or you are considering migrating from another dynamic web product to PHP, Programming PHP is the book of choice to get you up, running, and productive in a short time."

--Peter MacIntrye, eWeek

"I think this is a great book for programmers who want to start developing dynamic websites with PHP. It gives a detailed overview of PHP, lots of valuable tips, and a good sense of PHP's strengths."

--David Dooling, Slashdot.org