newbie questions

Anon

ok, i been trying read some of this php stuff. i can kinda get some of this stuff, but....
what does it mean when you do $whatever
is like a telling some thing in your script if this=$whatever then $whatever you want to do with it? ok i am confused 🙂

and how the heck do you know when to use a ( or { or [

what i am seeing in some of this scripts that people write differ from each other to accomplish the same tasks.

I guess i have a lot of questions....so i better ask this.

where is a good starting point for php?? like a book or web? i try to read the manuals but it seems to be for people that already have somewhat of a clue. 🙂

Anon

Yeah the manuals are only really any good once you have grasped it. Your best bet is via a book....theres quite a few out now!

"$" just tells php that we are using a variable.....either one that we have declared or from a form, cookie, etc..
like:

$hello = "hello";
echo($hello);

//this would print hello,

If you had a form with a text input called "greeting" and someone typed in "hello" in it.....and you then in php went echo($greeting);
this would also print hello....cos' you are asking php to print whatever value was assigned to the input called "greeting".

"{" and "}" are used to surround or group functions (i am not a programmer so I don't know the correct terminology)
like;

if this happens
{
do this
}

otherwise
{
do that
}

the script does whatever is in between the correct "{ }".
If you didn't use them then the script would do everything until it hit the end of the script.

HTH
Scott d~

Anon

well i guess i if browsed this kick !@# website i would find some of my anwsers?

Anon

wow, i was just going back to my topic and i already had scott d post with minutes. and one of your scripts you posted for someone on database....<?php

if($submit)
{
$dbhost = "localhost";
$dbuser = "root";
$dbpass = "";
$dbname = "dbase name";

$db = mysql_connect($dbhost,$dbuser,$dbpass);
mysql_select_db("$dbname",$db);

mysql_query("SELECT * FROM $dbtable WHERE firstname LIKE '%$keyword%'");

{
//get columns
$name = $row[0];
$address = $row[1];
//blah blah

print ("<table><tr>\n<td>$name</td>\n");
print ("<td>$adress</td>\n</tr>\n");
//blah blah blah
print ("</table>");
}

}

else
{
print ("<form action='$PHP_SELF' method='post'>");
print ("<input type='text' name='keyword'><br>");
print ("<input type='submit' name='submit' value='Submit'>");
print ("</form>");
}
?>

you had a variable $row i got confused cause i am not sure what $row is refer to, or going to be refered to? i can understand like $dbhost you are going to use it for the database connection. and i guess i don't understand $row [0]

you know what is cool, is the time you guys give to awnser some this stupid questions. ok i sound like i am kissing someones butt 🙂
Thanks though

Anon

You can retreive data in two ways either using fetch_row or fetch_array...

if you use fetch_row like below then $row[0] is the first row of data in your database....mysql starts counting at 0.

$result=mysql_query(SELECT * blah blah);
while($row = mysql_fetch_row($result))
{
//get columns
$name = $row[0];
$address = $row[1];
these must be in the correct order otherwise you might have someones name as their address.
}

if you use fetch_array then you would simply within your script call you variable by its name like this:

$result=mysql_query(SELECT * blah blah);

while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result))
{
print("$row[name] $row[address], etc.");
}

enjoy!

scott d~

Anon

$row is in reference to the columns of the database. Scott has gathered the column headers into an array. He then refers to them as parts of the array. This is an easy way of refering to them if you don't know the exact names.

Hope that helped. I am still a beginner so my explaination may too simple.

Anon

scott d wrote:

"$" just tells php that we are using a variable.....
Yep. Also look into variable scoping and dynamic (or variable) variables - powerful functionality...

"{" and "}" are used to surround or group functions (i >am not a programmer so I don't know the correct >terminology)
Braces are used to delineate compound statements. A compound statement is simply a grouping of simple statements to accomplish a complicated task, usually after a conditional test, like Scott's example below.

if this happens
{
do this
}

You might also want to look up the tertiary operator (?🙂 and the alternate syntax for control statements.

All in all, I agree that the manuals aren't very useful until you have a good grasp of programming concepts. Try "Core PHP Programming" by Leon Atkinson - that's a good PHP book for beginners.