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"Upgrading to PHP 5": Making it Faster and Easier to Develop Web Applications

August 5, 2004

Sebastopol, CA--In the new Upgrading to PHP 5 (O'Reilly, US $29.95), author Adam Trachtenberg guides readers from the world of PHP 4 to PHP 5 as he covers "what's completely new, what's received an overhaul, and what's just slightly different enough to slip you up." Upgrading to PHP 5 is not the definitive guide to the entire PHP language (look to O'Reilly's Programming PHP for that); rather, this book zeroes in on PHP 5's new and improved features--and covers these features definitively.

Trachtenberg shows seasoned PHP programmers the latest and greatest features of PHP 5 as he eases their migration from PHP 4 to PHP 5. He discusses what's new, how it's new, and, perhaps most importantly, why it's new. "This book explains the logic behind the changes," he says, "and shows how you can take advantage of them to the benefit of your code."

Detailed, side-by-side comparisons of PHP 4 and PHP 5 solutions ("the PHP 5 way is frequently shorter, more elegant, and provides you with greater flexibility," says Trachtenberg) help readers see how the updates and new features affect their work as well as determine the exact changes they need to make to existing code. Readers will also learn about more advanced features and gain valuable hands-on experience using the short code samples that are included throughout the book. The final chapter is a complete example program that pulls together all the previously introduced material into a single complete application.

A focused and accessible guide to PHP 5, this book covers topics such as:

  • The new set of robust object-oriented programming features
  • An improved MySQL extension, supporting MySQL 4.1, prepared statements, and bound parameters
  • Completely rewritten support for XML: DOM, XSLT, SAX, and SimpleXML
  • Easy web services with SOAP
  • SQLite, an embedded database library bundled with PHP 5
  • Cleaner error handling with exceptions
  • Other new language features, such as iterators, streams, and more
  • For veteran PHP programmers who are ready to get started with PHP 5, Upgrading to PHP 5 goes straight to the heart of all that's new in the latest release. By the time they've finished this book, they'll know PHP 5 in practice as well as in theory--and they'll be readily using it to more quickly and easily develop more powerful and flexible web applications.

    Additional Resources:

    Upgrading to PHP 5
    Adam Trachtenberg
    ISBN 0-596-00636-5, 304 pages, $29.95 US, $43.95 CA
    order@oreilly.com
    1-800-998-9938; 1-707-827-7000

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