Need Some Major Help

[KefkaIIV]

Okay, prepare for this.
You don't need to give me the code, just point me in the correct directions.

I am fairly new at PHP, so I barely know anything.

At wifitournament.com - I want to create a PHP script that, instead of having Nintendo tournaments online with the handheld DS on the forums, have this script. Before anyone gives me dumb questions, the program, (just as the forum did), will organize the tournaments. Not host them, of course.

I need people to register for this, and when they register, they will see a few options. One of these options would be their stats. An administrator can add the losses, wins, and anything else, medals, ect. - to the appropriate places from the tournaments. The next one would be current tournaments, and when they click on them, they can register and they will be automatically assigned to a random bracket. And, an admin panel.

Through this admin panel, the brackets can be updated, the profiles can be changed, ect.
Is this possible through PHP? And how much skill and experience are we looking at here? Will this take months? Can anyone help me, or point me in the direction to everything I need here?

- Registering system
- Profile
- Admin CP (Ability to edit brackets and user profiles)
- Tournament sign-ups
- Ect.

And everything else I said. Any help would be appreciated.

[onlyican]

it is possible in php
I think this is intermediat level work

Where to start
Most knowledge needs to be
Forms
MySQL
Sessions / Cookies

[KefkaIIV]

[quote author=onlyican link=topic=101737.msg402880#msg402880 date=1153776299]
it is possible in php
I think this is intermediat level work

Where to start
Most knowledge needs to be
Forms
MySQL
Sessions / Cookies

[/quote]

Okay! Thank you very much!  ;)

Now where should I start off? I don't know much, lol... :(
I should probably start off with the sessions first?

For when they register? How would I come about doing that?

[Joe Haley]

I would start off with learning the basic concepts of programing (if you alredy do not know them)

From there, learn basic PHP syntax. (the manual is verry helpfull, http://php.net )

From there, learn some advanced programing concepts (sessions, sql, ext)

From there, learn Object Orentation.

From there, learn as many basic functions as you can. (again, the manual)

From there, learn as much as you can about the advanced functions.

From there, program something big! =)

[mainewoods]

-start at the center, learn how to Create a Mysql table:
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/creating-tables.html
-learn a little more detail about Mysql  Data Types:
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/data-types.html
-next learn about the php mysql functions you need to use:
http://www.php.net/manual/en/ref.mysql.php
-in order to actually add the data records you'll need the sql INSERT syntax
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/insert.html
-to retrieve the records added you'll need the sql SELECT syntax:
http://dev.mysql.com/doc/refman/5.0/en/select.html

-only the beginning of what you need to know, hope you like to read!

-Note: in the mysql.com manual, it uses examples like this:
mysql> CREATE TABLE pet (name VARCHAR(20), owner VARCHAR(20),
species VARCHAR(20), sex CHAR(1), birth DATE, death DATE);
-the part that follows the 'mysql>' is the sql part that you'll want to use with the php mysql_query() function.

[trq]

I would agree with Joe Haley here.

Basicaly, you could start trying to build this thing tommorow, ask questions every step of the way and get it done. It will be riddled with bugs, performance issues, and generally be an absolute nightmare to try and build upon or improve on functionality.

Or, you could forget the project at hand for a short while, learn to program and eventually come up with a more secure, robust and bug minimalised application.

You dont have to spend months on it, but a good grasp of programming concepts before trying to write this thing would be a much better idea.

A good place to start would be to read [url=http://www.hudzilla.org/phpbook]Pratical PHP Programming[/url] from start to finish. For most people, this would probably be sufficient to get a start on.