I'm an absolute beginner!

[Solost]

No reference to the David Bowie song intended! :)

Greetings all ;)

This is my first post on this forum and almost certainly the first of many!

The bottom line is, I want to learn PHP and how to use it to build websites. For a while now I have been working with Dreamweaver and although a great tool I find it really difficult to get the results that I want. I would also like at a much later date to have a go at writing mods for things like SMF but I know I'm a while away from that :-\

I have looked into PHP and have read various articles and tutorials but they all seem to be aimed at users with at least a small amount of experience of which I have none!

I have downloaded a copy of PHP 5.0.2 (I think thats the V) and seen references to enabling IIS 6 and the likes. This is my first hurdle so to speak :P

What I have is a decent home PC running XP home. I believe that you cant enable IIS on XP Home ???

Anyway, I do have a hosting account that isnt doing much at the moment and I do know that my host does provide PHP hosting so where next for me?

I have the file downloaded with all the PHP content but no idea what to do with it :(

Anyone fancy taking me through this really slowly? :-[

Many thanks :)

[craygo]

Well what do you want to do? Put the files on your localhost or upload them to your hosting box?

If you are going to upload them just put them in the public_html folder and you should be able to go right to it.
if you would like to learn on your local box then you will have to download apache for your web server and you will be able to experiment and learn locally.

Ray

PS what is the file that you download??

[Solost]

Hi Ray, thanks for the reply.

The file I downloaded was PHP 5.2.0 from [url=http://www.php.net/downloads.php]This Location.[/url]

You ask me what I want to do?

The simple answer is, learn how to work with PHP. I'm really not exagerating when I say I dont have a clue where to begin. As it stands, I have the PHP folder which I have downloaded and dont know what to do with it.

I'm afraid I was a little nieve thinking that it was like HTML and just needed to learn the script but it appears thats only half of it.

[craygo]

Well if your hosting has php already then you do nothing.

It seems you want to learn and code on your own box so you will have to download apache first, get that working then since you have a windows box you can just keep the php files where they are and configure apache to use php.

Try here
http://www.phpfreaks.com/forums/index.php/topic,67271.0.html

You should be able to download one file which sets up everything for you

[Solost]

Lordy Lordy!!! ;D

Ok, I have downloaded Wamp5 and installed it on my PC and opened another can of worms it would seem ??? ;D

Now that it is installed, what next if you would be so kind :-[

If you can get me to the stage I can start to work with tutorials that would be great :)

TY

[craygo]

well next you might want to see if your web server is working and parsing php. If you open notepad or something like that copy and paste this
[code]<?php
phpinfo();
?>[/code]

Now save it as phpinfo.php to your web root folder and then browse to it with your favorite browser. http://localhost/phpinfo.php and you should see a screen with all kinds of php settings

Ray

[Solost]

I'll give it a go, wish me luck ;D

Thanks again for the help. :)

No doubt i'll be back for more ::)

[Solost]

So far so good. managed all of the above and found myself at a screen on my box giving me details of enviroment, apache handler, Bcmath and lots more.

Whats the next step towards PHP nirvana? ;D

[trq]

Id'e suggest reading [url=http://hudzilla.org/phpwiki/index.php?title=Main_Page]this[/url] from start to finnish doing the examples as you go.

Have fun!

[Solost]

[quote author=thorpe link=topic=120878.msg496367#msg496367 date=1167857165]
Id'e suggest reading [url=http://hudzilla.org/phpwiki/index.php?title=Main_Page]this[/url] from start to finnish
[/quote]

But I'm 38, I'd expect to be dead and buried before I got to the end of that :o

[trq]

Well what do you suggest then? Have you any programming experience?

[Solost]

Ok, being serious. No, I have zilch in the way of programming experience. If I'm honest about it, I guess i'd like to learn to run and skip the learning to walk bit ::)

I did check out that link and it has soooo much stuff there. I could be reading for hours before I got to do anything on a practical note by which time most of the information that I read in the first place would have gone bye bye's :(

For example, theres stuff about the history of PHP, the future etc. That imo doesnt apply to what I want to do although some would say background knowledge would be helpfull.

What I would really like to do now I have Apache set up on my PC is to have a go at some tutorials and working examples. Make mistakes and learn from them without trawling through page after page of info. More hands on in other words. Sorry if this sounds like the lazy mans approach :-[

[trq]

Its not what I would call a lazy mans approuch and for some it works better. its just I see people here everyday that are trying to run before they can walk.

Can I point out some sections that I think would be benificial to read before trying to jump in?

The entire section on [url=http://hudzilla.org/phpwiki/index.php?title=Simple_variables_and_operators]Simple variables and operators[/url], this really is a must. [url=http://hudzilla.org/phpwiki/index.php?title=Playing_with_strings]Playing with strings[/url] and most of [url=http://hudzilla.org/phpwiki/index.php?title=Arrays]Arrays[/url].

Once youve read those, I think you'd probably want to have a decent look at the section on [url=http://hudzilla.org/phpwiki/index.php?title=HTML_forms]working with forms[/url], by then, you should be pretty sweet to start getting into some tutorials.

Im not sure what it is your looking to build, but a simple blog is always a good starting point and for that you would need to use a database, so the section on [url=http://hudzilla.org/phpwiki/index.php?title=Databases]databases[/url] would also be an idea. And yes, databases use another language called SQL which you will also need to learn the basics of.

Honestly, with a little bit of reading to start with you will learn much quicker, examples will make more sense, and you wont learn so many bad habbits.

Good luck.

[Solost]

Thanks for that, that is a great help :)

Tbh, I have taken the plunge and started reading through. I would be lying if I told you I havent skipped a couple of sections though ;D

I will persevere with the reading and if I get stuck I know where to come ;)

As for what I want to do. Short term, learn a little about PHP and how to use it to create basic web stuff. Like you said, a Blog for example. Long term, full blown web sites.

Not such a tall order after all is it ;D

Thanks again:)