PHP is a scripting language designed to fill the gap between SSI (Server Side Includes) and Perl, intended largely for the web environment. PHP has gained quite a following in recent times, and it is one of the forerunners in the Open Source software movement. Its popularity derives from its C-like syntax, and its simplicity. PHP is currently divided into two major versions: PHP 4 and PHP 5, although PHP 4 is deprecated and is no longer developed or supplied with critical bug fixes. PHP 6 is currently under development.

If you've ever been to a website that needs you to login, you've probably encountered a server-side scripting language. Due to its market saturation, this means you've probably come across PHP. PHP was designed by Rasmus Lerdorf to display his resume online and to collect data from his visitors.

Basically, PHP allows a static webpage to become dynamic. "PHP" is an acronym that stands for "PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor". The word "Preprocessor" means that PHP makes changes before the HTML page is created. This enables developers to create powerful applications which can publish a blog, remotely control hardware, or run a powerful website such as Wikipedia or Wikibooks. Of course, to accomplish something such as this, you need a database application such as MySQL.

Before you embark on the wonderful journey of Server Side Processing, it is recommended that you have some basic understanding of the HyperText Markup Language. PHP is also being used to build GUI-driven applications; PHP-GTK is used to build graphical user interfaces.

Setup and Installation

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Learning the Language

The Basics

This section is about things that are important for any type of PHP development. Useful for a PHP programmer of any level.

Control structures

Databases

Integration Methods (HTML Forms, etc.)  (14 Jan 2006)

Advanced PHP

Advanced PHP includes high level programming and PHP techniques designed to make PHP even more useful and powerful.

Data Structures

Data Structures

Object Oriented Programming (OOP)

Templating

Libraries

PHP PEAR

Frameworks

Security

See also the in the Sessions chapter.

Command-Line Interface (CLI)

Appendices

Contributors