PHP for the Novice Programmer

By: Albert Ritzhaupt

Motivation: This e-book was developed to serve as an instructional resource for students in my Introduction to the Internet course that I teach for the University of North Florida and to serve the aspiring Information Technology (IT) student as a resource to learn about and how to use PHP. My hope is that this resource will be invaluable to the IT community, and help learning what I consider to be one of the best server-side scripting languages.

About the Author: Albert Ritzhaupt is currently a doctoral student at the University of South Florida, and an adjunct instructor at the University of North Florida.

Target Audience: This e-book was developed for the aspiring Information Technology learner with little to programming experience. This e-book does assume that the learner has a strong understanding of the fundamentals of the Web, Hyper-Text Markup Language (HTML) experience, and basic experience with the concept of a database.

Content Description: This e-book contains basic PHP programming information ranging from control structures to sessions. The online book includes: Introduction; Sequence; Selection; Repetition; Functions; Arrays; File I/O; and MySQL.

Approach: The e-book is organized so that the learner can easily skip sections and go to chapters that directly relate to their current skill set. The content found within the chapters briefly describes and summarizes material and provides solid see-and-do examples for the learner to follow along. Each chapter includes one or more practice exercises, an online assessment, and an activity.  The chapters include interactive examples.

Software Requirements: The online book assumes that learners have access to a PHP 4.0 enabled server that is properly configured.  Additionally, the learner needs access to a text editor or an IDE that is suitable for PHP development.