books i bought

bigray

I bought sam's teach yourself php in 24 hours, and php advanced for the worldwide web by larry ullman. These books good to learn php good?

dp777

a lot of my friends seem to dislike the teach yourself in 24 hours books. I, however, have found them as great introductions to the language where you can get all the basics (in some of the cases very basic) of a new language down before you move on to the really fun stuff. My favorite book for PHP has ben the beginning PHP4 i think its published by wrox (i could be wrong, its that series that has the bright red covers...) that has been a most excellent reference manual for myself.

bigray

Ain't php advanced for the worldwide web by larry ullman a good book?

LordShryku

Ya know, I think for the beginner, the Teach Yourself books are a good start. It get's you working with the code, instead of just saying "Here's how you do this". Once you have a grasp of how to code smaller things, and want to start moving on to bigger things, books might not help as much. At that point, most of your answers will come from php.net, and forums like this.

piersk

Originally posted by bigray
Ain't php advanced for the worldwide web by larry ullman a good book?

When I first learnt PHP (about 18 months ago), I bought the predecessor (sp?) to the above book and that really helped.

If you aren't a beginner, then I thoroughly recommend O'Reilly's PHP Cookbook. It's not really a tutorial book, just loads of useful snippets that can be used "as-is" or can be addapted for your own use. Also covers a lot of GTK and PEAR.

Oh, and I've moved this thread to the Echo Lounge cos I don't really think it's as valid in the Install forum...

drawmack

I learned php almost exclusively from the manual - but php was my 32 language.

I recommend the teach yourself x in y [hours|says] books. Another set of books that's good for beginners is the for dummies series. Though one short coming of all these books is that they generally do not have review exercises at the end of the chapters. If you're book doesn't have those get one that does.

stolzyboy

Originally posted by dp777
My favorite book for PHP has ben the beginning PHP4 i think its published by wrox (i could be wrong, its that series that has the bright red covers...) that has been a most excellent reference manual for myself.

Yep, that would be by Wrox, and yep, they are the ones with the bright red covers...

Heard their are coming out with a new php book... 🙂

n00854180t

The only problem that I have with books like these is, most of the time they try to teach you the principles of programming. Now for someone completely new to the concept, that is great, but it makes a hard read for someone who knows those things, but wants to get into a new language. I prefer some of the more advanced books that cater to more experienced readers. However, I have read some of the Teach Yourself x in y [hours | days] (Hey drawmack, it looks like we have a standard for abbreviating the Teach Yourself books 😛) books and they were pretty good. I also learned alot from this Russian site that has a lot of that sort of books online (in HTML mostly, some in PDF). I am not sure I should post it (is it okay mods?) as it is technically copyright infringement (although, it's on a Russian site so...).

LordShryku

You could PM it to me 😃

GilesGuthrie

I bought "PHP and MySQL Web Development", which is a SAMS publication. I really really like it. It starts off with a PHP crash course, which manages to teach programming fundamentals before going on to how PHP does stuff. Then it goes through MySQL, concentrating on how to get PHP and MySQL talking in your pages.

By the time you get half way through it, you start to feel really comfortable, and then it becomes a reference, along with PHP.net.

I've recommended it to a bunch of other people, and they all agree with me.

I've got "Teach Yourself Apache 2 in 24hrs". Don't think much of it as yet, but then I'm only in hour 3, and I haven't touched my server yet. And each "hour" only took me 30-40 minutes to read, lending credence to my cynical hypothesis that the "hour" designation was justa marketing gimmick.

BuzzLY

Originally posted by stolzyboy
Yep, that would be by Wrox, and yep, they are the ones with the bright red covers...

Heard they are coming out with a new php book... 🙂

Really, Stolzy? I thought Wrox was dead? What book are they coming out with?

stolzyboy

Originally posted by BuzzLY
Really, Stolzy? I thought Wrox was dead? What book are they coming out with?

I think it is something like

Beginning PHP, Apache, and MySQL Web Development

but I'm not sure...

n00854180t

Hey stolzyboy, can I post the link to that Russian technical site? I looked on there again it looks like at least some of the books are freely distributed.

stolzyboy

Are they selling anything at all?

I'll check, but don't do it for now!

BuzzLY

Sweet... I'll have to get me a copy or two. 😃

drawmack

/me is not a wrox fan, was put of by a c++ book by them that sucked. Some of the code wouldn't even compile with the compiler that came with the book - but that's just me.

stolzyboy

Originally posted by BuzzLY
Sweet... I'll have to get me a copy or two. 😃

I'll think I'll get around 5...

jstarkey

Originally posted by BuzzLY
Sweet... I'll have to get me a copy or two. 😃

Yeah, me too. In fact, based on the things I've heard about it, I was going to try and get an autographed copy 🙂

LordShryku

Originally posted by jstarkey
Yeah, me too. In fact, based on the things I've heard about it, I was going to try and get an autographed copy 🙂

To my best fan,

Signed: I. Wrox

stolzyboy

Originally posted by LordShryku
To my best fan,

Signed: I. Wrox

Buzz, jstarkey

Looks like somebody doesn't get our inside joke! 😃