Web Database Applications with PHP, and MySQL

What You Need to Know

This book is about understanding and developing application logic that brings databases and the Web together. We introduce database systems over the course of the book, but our discussions don’t replace a book or class dedicated to relational database theory, or a book about a specific relational database system such as MySQL. Likewise, we assume you are already familiar with the Web. We introduce but don’t delve deeply into the three key web protocols, HTML, HTTP, and TCP/IP.

We also assume you can program in a third-generation programming language such as C, C++, Java, Perl, FORTRAN, or Visual Basic. Our introduction to the PHP web scripting language doesn’t assume you are familiar with web scripting or are an expert programmer, but we do assume you understand the basic HTML constructs and are familiar with the popular web browsers. If you can author an HTML document with a text editor that contains a <form> and a <table> element, you have sufficient HTML skills to use this book. It is the principles of structure in the markup process that are important, not the attractiveness or usability of the presentation in the web browser. We introduce advanced HTML concepts as required, but an HTML guide such as O’Reilly’s HTML and XHTML: The Definitive Guide, by Chuck Musciano and William Kennedy, is a useful resource for understanding and building web database applications. You may also find O’Reilly’s Programming PHP, by Rasmus Lerdorf and Kevin Tatroe useful as ...