As new as a newbie an get. Please help!

Bebberman

Hi, I'm a newbie....

I'm as new as a newbie can get, and then some...

I self-taught myself to use basic HTML to build websites, because that's what I like to do and seem to be good at it. You can visit them here:

www.geocities.com/redkaven

www.geocities.com/xbox_dragons

I noticed for some time now that most websites that are more clean-cut and easy to navigate add web pages that ended in php...

How here I am...

I'm wanting to learn to build pages with php, but like I said "I'm really new to this" I don't know what alot of the abrevations stand for. I mainly just need help getting started I figure it out as I go along...

I'm pretty intelligent so please don't say I can't do it and it will too hard, or go to school, because I really can't aford it right now. Just take a look at my websites and you should be able to see I have potiental. I'm a locally known artist with various medias...

So please any help would be appreicated...

This is what I downloaded and where from:
PHP 4.2.3 (tar.bz2) from: http://www.php.net/downloads.php

I think I might have goofed on installing it. It asked: "which type of HTTP server would you wish to configure to run php."

I had several options like : Windows PWS 9x or Me, Windows PWS on NT station, Windows IIS 3 or lower, Windows IIS 4 or higher, Apache, Xitami, None(or other server) I will configure it manually.

Which was I supposed to choose? I choose none and to configure it mannually.

Anyways after that step I'm trying to figure out what to do next. I'm supposed to upload something to geocities right? A php.ini file? I dunno...

I'm currently gonna use geocities free web hosting service to get me by for now while I learn, but I intend to upgrade to my own and combine my websites... Geocties does support php, and php2 & php4, whatever that is...

I know it seems like I'm in left field, but you'd be surprised what I can do...

Just in case the question is asked, I run on win98, and I think IE4.0...

Thanks in advance,

-Bebberman

phlow

first of all:
i'm quite sure that geocities does NOT support PHP!

then another tip:
try phpdev4 (www.firepages.com.au/dev4.htm)! it contains a configurated server.

floR

You have downloaded the PHP parser, which you don't need if you're gonna let Geocities host your site. You only need it if you want to test your PHP pages on your own PC. And if you're gonna do that, you need a webserver.

If you want to test the PHP stuff locally before uploading (which I recommend highly), the easiest way to get you going is to download a complete Apache(webserver)/PHP package at www.easyphp.org

Please bear in mind, however, that PHP has virtually nothing to do with HTML. PHP is a server-side programming language which typically outputs client-side HTML.

Bebberman

Okies phlow I took your advice and downloaded the phpdev with the MySQL bundle.

I seem to be getting somewhere now and everything seems to be working properly...

I'll leave another update on my progress soon...

And by the way, geocities does support php, I looked into before even considering learning this stuff. I didn't start sonner on this because I was told free servers don't allow php.

-Bebberman

Bebberman

I'm at my first problem already, and please don'y laugh...

I can't even get the "hello world" script to work yet. Simiply because I donot know where to put the script. Do I open my notepad and put it on there and name it hello.php? If that's the case, then how do I get that file to my directory?

Thanks in advance,

-Bebberman

floR

I don't know about the product that phlow posted, but with easyphp you would do the following:

make a file in notepad with the script
save the file in the webserver's documentroot (for easyphp that's \programfiles\easyphp\www) as hello.php
start the webserver if it's not running
goto http://localhost/hello.php

Hello world!

Bebberman

Damn, maybe I should've took you advice...

-Bebberman

Bebberman

There was a www section, so I posted it there. It's seems to be in the right place because it shows up on the localhost.

But... You know there is always a but.

My notepad keeps saving the file as a text file. How do I manually name the type of file? Or should I select the option all files when I save it?

I know there's a way to configure my PC(win98) to show file extensions(file-types) and be able to manually name them. I've did it before, but can't how remeber how.

Anyone mind explaining to me how to do this again?

Thanks for your help, it's very highly appreciated...

-Bebberman

Bebberman

Got it figured out, disreguard my last question...

-Bebberman

epp_b

A really nice PHP manual CHM Edition is downloadable form php.net: http://www.php.net/distributions/manual/php_manual_en.chm

Very quick and easy to use.

jnuneznyc

Look for a Free PHP Editor for Windows. Maguma offers a cool one. http://www.maguma.com/home/index.php