PHP Introduction

Introduction to PHP
Introduction
PHP is a widely-used Open Source general-purpose scripting language that is especially suited for Web development and can be embedded into HTML. PHP stands for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor. It is a server-side scripting language, like ASP.

A simple example


<html>
   <head>
      <title>Example</title>
   </head>
    <body>
      <?php
        echo "Hi, I'm a PHP script!";
       ?>

    </body>
</html>

PHP scripts are executed on the server. PHP supports many databases (MySQL, Informix, Oracle, Sybase, Solid, PostgreSQL, Generic ODBC, etc.). PHP is free to download and use.

PHP file

PHP files may contain text, HTML tags and scripts. PHP files are returned to the browser as plain HTML. PHP files have a file extension of “.php”, “.php3″, or “.phtml” .

Why PHP?

PHP runs on different platforms (Windows, Linux, Unix, etc.). PHP is compatible with almost all servers used today (Apache, IIS, etc.). PHP is FREE to download from the official PHP resource: www.php.net. PHP is easy to learn and runs efficiently on the server side .

Mysql

MySQL is a database server. MySQL is ideal for both small and large applications. MySQL supports standard SQL. MySQL compiles on a number of platforms. MySQL is free to download and use.

PHP + MySQL

PHP combined with MySQL are cross-platform (means that you can develop in Windows and serve on a Unix platform)

Where to Start?

Install an Apache server on a Windows or Linux machine. Install PHP on a Windows or Linux machine. Install MySQL on a Windows or Linux machine .

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