Rating: 
Summary: It worked for me!
Review: The presentation of the chapters does not follow a logical sequence. The explanation for a number of items is lacking, while explanation for the same items is often given several times. It is a mystery how anyone working through the examples would have rated the book highly. Pages 56-58 describe the sample database design. By the time the reader gets to Pages 266-273, the nature of the database changes. Table and column names are different, such as Color, and PetColor, just to mention one amongst several differences. The records for the database tables are not given. If one tries to produce the examples on Pages 274-277, one has to reverse engineer the examples. The records have to be typed manually to match the examples . CD files do not give a clue.The CD should have given the graphics files for the examples. Page 77 and Page 272 give examples for adding data to tables from a text file, but there is no comment on the location of those text files. One can spend a long time, before the correct answer is obtained, not from the book. This was my first book on PHP and MySQL, and I learned something. However, after contending with the shortcomings I decided to switch to another book.
Rating: 
Summary: PHP & MySQL for Dummies
Review: The presentation of the chapters does not follow a logical sequence. The explanation for a number of items is lacking, while explanation for the same items is often given several times. It is a mystery how anyone working through the examples would have rated the book highly. Pages 56-58 describe the sample database design. By the time the reader gets to Pages 266-273, the nature of the database changes. Table and column names are different, such as Color, and PetColor, just to mention one amongst several differences. The records for the database tables are not given. If one tries to produce the examples on Pages 274-277, one has to reverse engineer the examples. The records have to be typed manually to match the examples . CD files do not give a clue. The CD should have given the graphics files for the examples. Page 77 and Page 272 give examples for adding data to tables from a text file, but there is no comment on the location of those text files. One can spend a long time, before the correct answer is obtained, not from the book. This was my first book on PHP and MySQL, and I learned something. However, after contending with the shortcomings I decided to switch to another book.
Rating: 
Summary: Very Good!
Review: This book was perfect for me. It had exactly the amount of information that I needed to complete my project. The book provided all the details I needed and had warnings of things to watch out for. It was organized well,entertaining, and easy to understand. The examples were short and focussed so that they clearly illustrated the point of the example and were very easy to understand. This is exactly the right book for someone who knows someHTML, but doesn't know any programming, and wants to develop a web site that requires the use of a database.
Rating:
Summary: Now I'm Starting My Own Company
Review: This book was simple enough to understand that I've been able to create a database for my company with over 500 products in an easily viewable format. I saw a bigger, fatter book for PHP4 but they really lose you fast. Plus, I didn't have that much time to read. These dummies books are always my solution.
Rating:
Summary: Great book for beginners
Review: This is a great book for someone learning to use PHP and MySQL. It assumes the reader already knows basic HTML. The book is easy to read and understand. The topics it covers gives the reader a good grounding of the basics, enough to create a reasonably sophisticated web application. The stuff it leaves out is not essential to know, and can be left for when the reader steps up to more complicated applications. Information is well organised and easy to navigate. The two web application examples towards the back of the book are also excellent to learn from. They're very good at demonstrating techniques described in earlier chapters. One potential difficulty someone might have is with the explanation of relational database design. Someone without any past knowledge of relational databases might find the book's explanation a bit light. Designing relational databases isn't terribly complicated, but has its tricky bits. Another thing I liked about this book is how it helped me set up the appropriate software on my computer so it all worked cleanly together.
Rating:
Summary: It got me started!
Review: This is my first foray into PHP and MySQL. As an absolute beginner I spent a lot of time looking at different books and the concept didn't 'click' for me until I read this one. I tried a couple of simple scripts and they worked fine and now I'm ready to incorporate them into a site under construction. I highly recommend it for the beginner.
Rating:
Summary: It got me started!
Review: This is my first foray into PHP and MySQL. As an absolute beginner I spent a lot of time looking at different books and the concept didn't 'click' for me until I read this one. I tried a couple of simple scripts and they worked fine and now I'm ready to incorporate them into a site under construction. I highly recommend it for the beginner.
Rating: 
Summary: PHP & MYSQL for Dummies
Review: Well, after hearing so much about this book I decided to go out and buy it. I must say that this book taught me one thing. The opening and closing tags for using PHP. It is obvious to me that the authors of this book think they know how to teach a beginnner PHP but they are sadly mistaken. I must need PHP and MYSQL for morons then, because I still have no idea when to use what on PHP and MySQL. I have also gone on to but 2 more books on the subjects and still up to this day after 2 months of reading I am no further than where I started. I usually have to read a book once or twice before I grasp it, but not this one or any other for that matter. PHP is easy for those who know it and not for those who don't.
Rating:
Summary: Great for beginners
Review: When I bought this book I was looking to create dynamic web pages, and had begun using Perl/CGI. I happened to come across the PHP manual on the net, and was amazed. I did not know much about PHP, and had never used mySQL so I wanted an entry-level book, and was lucky enough to purchase this one.
The authors did a wonderful job introducing me to both PHP and mySQL. The book takes you through building a members only site, and an e-commerce site. Unlike many books I have read all code is well commented, and uses only topics already introduced and explained, so it is never hard to follow.
I recommend reading the PHP chapter before the mySQL chapter, even though it comes after, then going back to the database chapter. Anyway you read it though it is a perfect starting point for learning the two. After reading this you will probably want to read a more advanced book on PHP, and maybe one on mySQL, as many of he less common features of both are left out. But thanks to this book you will feel after 1 week like you could build your own amazon.com.
Rating:
Summary: Typo and missing modules
Review: When you buy a software manual, especially a beginners for "Dummies" book, with a CD that has source code with all sorts of typo errors, and an Apache windows host installation that has a missing critical php_so mod, so that you can't use the Apache installation, you're behind the eight ball from the very beginning. So, count on all sorts of frustrations just trying to get an installation working. Did these people ever hear of quality control or are they just trying to piss off someone trying to learn this stuff to no end. Because I opened the CD, I can't return this piece of crap. It now occupies spacer duty along with some old yellow pages under a monitor. It's not even useful as a toilet paper source.
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