I have been teaching myself php6/mysql5 for the past few months, having installed XAMPP on my home PC. Everything has been working great until I decide to upload some of my new projects onto the public web server. Then I come to the devasting conclusion that mysqli isn't supported by my web host! The public web server uses php version 5.2.6 and mysql 5.0.22. So, should I expect my web host to to change the settings so mysqli is supported (I'm not too sure how easy that is for them, but my initial phone call left me a bit concerned), or should I teach myself the older (more accepted?) mysql commands? I am not really sure how different the two options are.

I think that there is not much difference in the queries. Try changing the code when you call the functions to query the database

Thanks Weker, because I am only new at this whole thing I was extremely traumatised. But it turns out it was easy for my web host to make some changes to allow for the mysqli (it's just that the tech guy I initially spoke to hadn't heard of it before). It's good to know there isn't a great deal of difference between the two.