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PHP
PHP is a server-side, cross-platform, HTML embedded scripting language that was developed in C and is
designed for working with relational database systems. If you are completely new to PHP and want to get some idea of how it works, have a look at the Introductory Tutorial at www.php.net. Once you get beyond that have a look at the example archive sites and some of the other resources available in their Projects section.
A PHP program is embedded directly in the HTML document. It must have a .phtml or .php3 or .php extension in order for the server to
look for PHP code in the document. Here is an example of how you embed the PHP:
<HTML>
<BODY>
<?
insert PHP code here
?>
</BODY>
</HTML>
Here is a sample PHP program shown accessing a MySQL database.
Note, you MUST have the <? at the begining and ?> at the end. PHP coding will not be displayed when someone views the source
code of your file through their browser if done correctly.
<?php
mysql_connect ("localhost" , "username" , "password");
$query = mysql_db_query("michael", "SELECT first_name from children");
$result = mysql_fetch_row($query);
$i = 0;
$check = 0;
while ($i if ($first == $result[0]){
$check = 1;
}
if ($check == 1) {
$i = mysql_num_rows ($query) + 1;
echo "You've already made a guess!!";
}
$result = mysql_fetch_row($query);
$i++;
}
if ($check == 0) {
mysql_db_query("michael","INSERT INTO children
(last_name, first_name, kids, sex)
VALUES
('$last', '$first', '$numb', '$gender')");
?>
To merely display the information in your database:
<P>These are the products I sell:</P>
<TABLE BORDER="1">
<?
mysql_connect(localhost, username, password);
$result = mysql(mydatabase, "select * from products");
$num = mysql_numrows($result);
$i = 0;
while($i < $num) {
echo "<TR>n";
echo "<TD>n";
echo mysql_result($result,$i,"prodid");
echo "</TD>n<TD>";
echo mysql_result($result,$i,"name");
echo "</TD>n<TD>";
echo mysql_result($result,$i,"price");
echo "</TD>n";
echo "</TR>n";
$i++;}
?>
</TABLE>
Thus having the loop in the php program create a table with the products listed. NOTE your username and password for the database are
not written in the file when it's displayed on the Internet so users viewing the source of your webpage will not see your password.
When using a CGI script to pull information from a form which has been submitted by a browser you must have the first line of the
script have this command on it (Much like perl scripts):
#!/usr/local/bin/php
For detailed information regarding PHP, you can go to their online manual: http://www.php.net/manual. PHP.net has many links to examples and scripts. There is also a mailing list to interact with other PHP users where you can ask questions and find useful scripts and bits of code. You will also find books available for learning
PHP.
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