Subtitles of the Movie

If we take a look at a text editor that we're going to be using, we can see that the text is stored in the main window, and if we want to preview what the PHP script will look like when it's run through the Web Server Software, then we have to leave our text editor and go to a browser to check that out. However if we use a product like PHP coder and we open up the same file here as we can see, because this is a PHP specific product our code has been colored with what kind of script we've entered, and we're also able to use this preview window to test our script. So the integrated development environment can be a good choice for some users. For the purposes of this title however, we're going to using the text editor and browser combination, because that's what everyone has and so it's a good basic standard to work with. I'm now going to quickly run through the knowledge that I expect you to have before you start learning PHP in this title. I'm going to expect you to be very familiar with HTML and if you're intending to use database with PHP, then I expect you to know the basic skills in that database so that you can apply what I teach you in these scripts, that I'm going to be using as examples to your own database and how that works. Very importance thing is that you know Structured Query Language. Now if you don't, if you haven't used a database before or you don't know it, then I should point out that the Virtual Training Company offers a number of titles on databases. I know there is one for Microsoft SQL Server which will teach you how to use Microsoft SQL Server and once I've I finished with this PHP title I'm going to start on a My SQL title. So if there is not My SQL title out when your reading this or viewing this rather then it will be out very soon. Finally you're going to complete your knowledge base with PHP through this title. And once you've done that you know everything you need to know to create dynamic websites. In terms of getting help with PHP outside of this title you should download a copy of the manual. So that, you can look up the different functions and commands of PHP syntax. And as you can see it gives a very short reference here that explains, comprehensively all the different functions but it can't go into very much depth. That's where an introduction guide to such as this title comes in and helps through your learning process as your getting to know PHP. You should also consider using the online version of the manual and this is available at www.php.net and the good thing about the online version of the manual is, that PHP users have added to the fairly brief set of instructions included within main body of the manual. And people are able to post at the bottom here with their views and little insights into the way to use different features of PHP. so the online version of the manual is constantly being updated and added to and contributed to, According to the whole spirit of Open Source Software. However I should also point out that the user contributed notes that I see in here contributed by expert user of PHP and are intended to explain points that are not well enough explained by the official PHP documentation. They are not intended for new users of PHP to post their questions. There are forums available for that kind of thing such as the www.excellcent.php.builder.com. and this is a big great place to go if you are stuck with a certain thing and you want some kind of advice as to where you can go from there. As you can see the forum is setup so that users can ask questions and other users can help them out with their problems. Once again however it's always best to first of all read the manual then to go to site such as PHP builder, and run a search for the question that you want answered and then finally, if you can't find an answer through doing those things then post your own question. That's about it for this movie and in our next movie we're going to have a look at the difference between scripting and viewing.