Book recommendation

[Anon]

Recently started with PHP as part of a course & have been very interested in the language can anyone recommend a book on the subject for someone from a non- programming background?
Thank you for any help.

J.A Dwyer

[pwill69]

I really enjoyed PHP fast & easy web development by Prima Tech author Julie C Meloni. The examples were clear and concise as well as being real world.

[[deleted]]

Forget books, read articles here and on devshed.
Try examples,. read the manual better than any book, and free.

[phigga]

Generally, I'd say that a book is your best bet, but here I'm gonna have to agree with vincent.

No PHP book I've ever purchased comes close to the examples here.... also, for function reference you can't go wrong with php.net (same docs as here, but with user contributed notes).

However...if you DESPERATELY need a book (ie. if you really have no background whatsoever in programming and feel that a book will help you) then "PHP programming" by New Riders Publishing is a great one. Too bad it isn't free, like everything i mentioned above.

[toma42]

I personally never buy books about languages.

I do, however, think books about how to program are very useful. I strongly recommend reading, hilighting, bookmarking, crossreferencing, and memorizing Code Complete if you plan on making a living by programming. It's an older book but the methods are as true today as they were when it was written.

[Anon]

Let me give my hearty agreement! Code Complete is wonderful, as are quite a number of the classics: Software Tools in Pascal and The Mythical Man-Month to name a couple of my favorites.

Another thing I'd agree with here is the assertion that the language is secondary to learning Programming--The Concept.