WordPress® All-in-One For Dummies®
by Lisa Sabin-Wilson, Cory Miller, Kevin Palmer, Andrea Rennick, Michael Torbert
Trying Out a Little PHP
To test some PHP code, follow these steps to create a simple HTML Web page with an embedded PHP function:
- Open a new, blank file in your default text editor — Notepad (Windows) or TextMate (Mac) — type <html>, and then press Enter.
The <html> tag tells the Web browser that this is an HTML document and should be read as a Web page.
- Type <head> and then press Enter.
The <head> HTML tag contains elements that tell the Web browser about the document; this information is read by the browser but hidden from the Web page visitor.
- Type <title>This is a Simple PHP Page</title> and then press Enter.
The <title> HTML tag tells the browser to display the text between two tags as the title of the document in the browser title bar. (Note: All HTML tags need to be opened and then closed, just like PHP tags that we describe in the preceding section. In this case the <title> tag opens the command, and the </title> tag closes it and tells the Web browser that you're finished dealing with the title).
- Type </head> to close the <head> tag from Step 2 and then press Enter.
- Type <body> to define the body of the Web page and then press Enter.
Anything that appears after this tag displays in the Web browser window.
- Type <?php to tell the Web browser to start a PHP function and then press Enter.
See the preceding section on starting and stopping PHP functions.
- Type echo ‘<p>Testing my new PHP function</p>’; and then press Enter.
This is the function that you want PHP to execute ...