PHP Tutorial :: Part 1 :: Intro to PHP

• How to create a php file
• name the file xxx.php (xxx being whatever you want)
• enclose any php coding on the page with <?php to start and ?> to end
• How to insert text or html in a part of the php file that is enclosed in the <?php and ?> tags
• echo "putwhateveryouwantinhere";
• for example:: 
• echo "<center>Here is some text and <img src='blah.jpg'> that was an image</center>";
• How to include another php file inside your php file
• you would want to do this if there is a bit of code you use over and over on different pages
• you will either use include or require - require will cause it to fail if it cant find it
• for example
• include "includes/header.php";
• require "includes/navigation.php";
• What is a php variable
• a php variable is a variable that you apply a value to and use in equations, allowing for dynamic websites
• a php variable is denoted by the $ sign in front of a word
• for example
• $age
• $name
• $username
• How to declare or assign a php variable
• you will use the equal
• for example
• $age = "23";
• $username = "cooldude23";
• How to pull information from a database
• first you have to connect to the database
• $dbh=mysql_connect ("localhost", "insertdatabaseusername", "insertpassword") or die ('I cannot connect to the database because: ' . mysql_error());
• mysql_select_db ("insertdatabasename");
• next you have to throw a query at the database
• $query = "SELECT * FROM tablename WHERE username='sally'";
  $result = mysql_query($query)
  or die ("Couldn't execute query.");
• next you have to format the way the query will show up, like in this example with a while loop
• while ($row = mysql_fetch_array($result))
  {
  extract($row);
• next you will want to print what you want from this loop
• echo "<h2>Rows :: $variablefromdb</h2><br><br>";
• finally you will want to close the while loop
• }
• that will print all of the variablefromdb values from that table when the username is sally