I was recently assigned the task of designing a website that allows users to sign in, have profiles, and register for events. Furthermore, the site has to have an area for news postings and such. I know this has been done many times before, but I wanted to take this chance to do it myself so I can really understand how everything works. Anyways, I was curious to know if there were any good sites/books that would assist me in getting started. Also, is php/mysql the right pair for this or is there a better language pair that would work better for this.

Best Regards,
Rob Shields

PH and MySQL for Dummies by Janet Valade. Php and MySQL are perfect for this. Get that book and youll be up and running in no time!

PHP and mySQL are perfect for this! PHP is fast, and mySQL is free.

However, the thing that isn't fast is learning the **** two, and then learning how to integrate them (you may find you're eyes are a little bigger than your belly for the task you've taken on! )

A website I have recommended in the past, and always will is this article which explains PHP and mySQL intergration.

As for learning PHP, you will need to look at DevShed.com and the PHP Documentation to find out how all sorts of functions and stuff work.

That's all the advice I can give you really!

Yep php manual good resourcest for newbie

If you've got no previous programming experience you'll struggle to do it in a commercially acceptable time frame.

I have programmed in VB6/.Net and C++, so hopefully that will be enough to help me through this. Anyways, I also wanted to get options on PHP4/PHP5. What are the advantages/disadvantages to both and which one would you recommened for the site I described?

Best Regards,
Rob Shields

Rob,

I would just like to add Larry Ullman's book PHP and MySQL for the World Wide Web to the list. It was the first book that I bought on the subject and got me going straight away. There is also a companion website with everyone of the scripts so that you can see how things are done.

As for your question on PHP 4 or 5. PHP 5 just was just officially released about six months ago so most of the servers are still running some variation of PHP 4, so I would suggest learning PHP 4.

Good luck,

Kaiman

Website Design and Graphics - Glenwood Springs, CO

surely by the time you've learnt PHP4 properly, PHP5 will become more common?