Rating: 
Summary: With Few Printed Resources Available...
Review: ...we PHP developers often have to take what we can get. Given that situation, this book isn't bad. It's simplistic, true, but even so I've occasionally found it a handy reference. Still, there's no question that, to date, the best PHP reference work exists online. But if, like me, you sometimes still enjoy reading from a page which doesn't glow, this book might be worth the investment.
Rating: 
Summary: A great way to learn PHP if you're not a dummy nor a coder
Review: As a liberal arts major sucked into the vortex of maintaining webpages, I wanted to add functionality to my sites. After a some research and thinking, I finally settled on learning PHP as my entry into real "programming".Why? It's tag-based and easy to learn. It plays well HTML and databases. It's logical for someone without a programming background. It's open source and runs on almost all platforms. About the only thing that PHP doesn't do totally well is OO. So I picked PHP and scoured Amazon for PHP books. Of all the books in my PHP library, about 6 so far, this is the one read, used and referenced the most. It is well written, filled with great examples, and easy to follow. Yet, I also know that if there is something that I don't understand I can look it up and there has always been a lucid and detailed explanation. If you are thinking about jumping into the PHP pool, this is a great aid for you to help begin swimming right away.
Rating:
Summary: extensive professional PHP
Review: As big, extensive and detailed as this book may be, it only develops the strict necessary notions about the PHP language to allow for working on a professional basis. The "caching" topics, always important as a technique for enhancing site performances, might be more extensively developped and the book would gain in going a little deeper into templates buiders, like "Smarty" which it mentions, anyway. Thanks to the authors, I could in just one book, written with the genius of pedagogy that pertains to american authors, get all the necessary notions to understand complex structures involving Apache, Smarty, MySql and Php. Good Job !
Rating:
Summary: extensive professional PHP
Review: As big, extensive and detailed as this book may be, it only develops the strict necessary notions about the PHP language to allow for working on a professional basis. The "caching" topics, always important as a technique for enhancing site performances, might be more extensively developped and the book would gain in going a little deeper into templates buiders, like "Smarty" which it mentions, anyway. Thanks to the authors, I could in just one book, written with the genius of pedagogy that pertains to american authors, get all the necessary notions to understand complex structures involving Apache, Smarty, MySql and Php. Good Job !
Rating: 
Summary: Sorely Disappointed
Review: As someone who had been on the net and learned PHP and has also had some programming experience, I found this book to be sorely lacking. Without any programming experience, I know I would have been lost. The fundamental programming concepts were hardly explain at all and done in a poor manner. I bought this book because I heard it covers PHP 4 well (not an old PHP 3 book). The sections on sessions and cookies were pretty good, so in that sense, the book was good, but that is about the only good portion of this book. I also bought this book for help with databases, the most popular feature of PHP. However, this book hardly explains anything at all about what exactly is a database and other basic information about them. Regardless that this is a PHP 4 book, if it's going to touch on databases (MySQL mostly), a better introduction to them is necessary. PHP is a very easy language to pick up. As I've said already, this book is for someone who atleast has a basic introduction to PHP and basic programming. An important part oh PHP is the numerous native functions it comes with. PHP 4 Bible hardly covers any of them. Also, even though this is a beginniners book, a reference is usually provided in all computer books that I've seen. However, this books lacks that. Most books I've read have a standard goal, whether its a project to complete or something else. Although this is not always needed for an effective book, it's always nice to have, and this book would have been much more effective if it had a more difficult project that it delved into. The PHP 4 Bible is not a beginner's book due to its lack of an introduction to basic programming techniques and basic PHP fundamentals. This book is not an expert book and hardly touches on PHP concepts and code. This book is not a reference as it doesn't use or cover hardly any of the PHP's numerous functions. Perhaps it covers 3% (non-exagerating). In addition, it doesn't have a reference to look things up. In conclusion, I must say this book serves really only one purpose: it's a nice book to prop a door open. This book is a waste of money, and I don't reccomend buying it.
Rating: 
Summary: I found it mediocre
Review: At times this book looks as if it were written by consumate programmers that assume the reader has an extensive C++ background. At other times I felt it was irrelevant. Who would write the vapid little programs they use for examples? Like so many other manuals out there, the examples are not useful for the real world. A "Bible" should have a comprehensive introduction to the basics in the beginning. This book seems to blast past that in a hurry to get to databases and other subjects. Many times something new is presented and not clarified or clarified later. An example is the modulus ( % ), they place it in an example, and then two paragraphs later they tell you what it is for and not to worry - it's all in a later chapter. An awful lot of things are brought up this way. It makes for herky jerky reading. Nothing is linear. As a reference, it's not very good. An eample would be the modulus above. I think it and other math operators should all be introduced in one place. Introduce it as a basic concept and then you can use it later. They cover math operators and then later tell you there are more math operators. The appendices in the back are flimsy and useless. More meat would be nice. In chapter 3 getting started, nothing about the installation on my PC went according to the book. The directions for setting up Windows 2000 were outdated and I had to make some guesses. The latest version of PHP does not install anything like the book says. Ya, I found out after I bought this, that they had just released a new version of the book. Unfortunatly I bought this for a class I was taking. I am stuck with it. It surprises me that a book on a language that can be installed on so many platforms has so little in it about installation issues. The size of the book is much smaller than the JavaScript Bible. How can that be? It's a much richer language.
Rating:
Summary: I found it mediocre
Review: At times this book looks as if it were written by consumate programmers that assume the reader has an extensive C++ background. At other times I felt it was irrelevant. Who would write the vapid little programs they use for examples? Like so many other manuals out there, the examples are not useful for the real world. A "Bible" should have a comprehensive introduction to the basics in the beginning. This book seems to blast past that in a hurry to get to databases and other subjects. Many times something new is presented and not clarified or clarified later. An example is the modulus ( % ), they place it in an example, and then two paragraphs later they tell you what it is for and not to worry - it's all in a later chapter. An awful lot of things are brought up this way. It makes for herky jerky reading. Nothing is linear. As a reference, it's not very good. An eample would be the modulus above. I think it and other math operators should all be introduced in one place. Introduce it as a basic concept and then you can use it later. They cover math operators and then later tell you there are more math operators. The appendices in the back are flimsy and useless. More meat would be nice. In chapter 3 getting started, nothing about the installation on my PC went according to the book. The directions for setting up Windows 2000 were outdated and I had to make some guesses. The latest version of PHP does not install anything like the book says. Ya, I found out after I bought this, that they had just released a new version of the book. Unfortunatly I bought this for a class I was taking. I am stuck with it. It surprises me that a book on a language that can be installed on so many platforms has so little in it about installation issues. The size of the book is much smaller than the JavaScript Bible. How can that be? It's a much richer language.
Rating:
Summary: Ehh...
Review: Decent descriptions and examples of functions, etc. Kind of heavy on the abstract-math-formulas-as-examples-- if you like a book to use real-world examples to illustrate various implementations of a language/technology/etc., be forewarned: you really won't find anything of the kind until Part III (Advanced Techniques), and in the meantime, you'll be maddened by the dozens and dozens of scripts that result in nothing more than an integer or set of integers being printed onscreen... Works better if used alongside PHP Essentials (Julie C. Meloni), as the Bible is more of an intro guide to everything NOT database-related than is Essentials, which itself ONLY covers MySQL integration in any way that one could call "in-depth". As nascent a technology as PHP is, though, you have to give the authors credit, and just hope that someone else will come along and improve on their serviceable first attempt. Well-rounded for a first edition, just not quite on-par with most other titles in the IDG Bible Series.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent and Complete Reference Material
Review: For a beginner PHP developer, this book should be excellent for a start. Although it doesn't cover Oracle or MS SQL related function, it has short tutorial of SQL language; enough for building a dynamic database-driven web sites. I used to use Perl, this book made migrating to PHP simple. I like this book mostly because it explains function's behaviour clearly and list them by category (array functions, string functions, trigonometri function, etc.). It also has troubleshooting section for you to refer if you encounter problems running your script and doesn't understand what php said.
Rating:
Summary: Not the level of quality I'd expect from the "Bible" series
Review: I am an admirer of the "Bible" series of books, especially the Javascript Bible by Danny Goodman. This book is not of the same caliber. It covers lots of materal, but not in the depth seen in other Bible series books. It also lacks the excellent organization that I see in other Bible series books. That this comes without a CD of example code or a searchable PDF of the text is another dissapointment.
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