I think if you have been using the internet you have surely come across the term php? If not it is a programming language commonly used in the web design industry. It has contributed in many of the dynamic website that you have seen on the internet.The term PHP stand to Hypertext Preprocessor (I know I was asking myself the same question, where does the first P came from ). Php is different from HTML and JavaScript as it is a server-side scripting language. This simply means that all the process is done on your web server rather than on the client’s browser. Php is an open source and therefore can be downloaded for free. It can also be interfaced with a database (MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, Informix, Sybase, Solid, Generic ODBC, etc.) in order to extend it possibilities.

This tutorial is made for anyone who want to learn php in the easiest way.

This part of this tutorial will deal with the installation of the environment for developing php applications and the usual “hello world”. We will do the installation under a windows machine. Here are the components that we will need:

1. An Apache server
2. A PHP script processor
3. A Mysql Database

Don’t be scared from now, there is 2 way of doing this installation: The easiest way and the hardest way. For this time we will do the easiest one. Fortunately for us there are some packages that are already available and ready to be downloaded and installed. Some has many options and some have limited ones. For this tutorial I would use the easiest available on the market, and of course it is free.
Go to the easyphp page and download the current version.

http://www.easyphp.org/

I’m using EasyPHP 1.8 for this tutorial (7.70 MB)

Install EasyPHP by double clicking on the icon.

When the installation is complete, you should see an icon in your tray as well as the easyphp window. If both status are green this means that it is ok.

You just need to minimize it and it would stay in the tray.

As from now you have successfully set you environment for php. Just open your web browser and type http://localhost on the address bar. If you get the easyphp logo showing it means that you are ok

Now the important part comes in action. Point to the folder where you have installed your easyphp and open the www folderFor me it is found at E:\Program Files\EasyPHP1-8\www

Did you notice the index.php file that is showing in your folder? Everything that you put in this folder will be shown on your browser. To start with our first script, right clicks on a blank space on the folder and create a new text document and then open it. Start by adding those 2 lines

<?php

?>

Those two tags tell the php processor where to start and where to stop processing.

In between you just add what is needed to be processed.

For the hello world, we need to tell the php processor to send the text “Hello World”.

The function used to do this in php is echo.

So we put echo “Hello World”;
The final php script become

<?php

echo “Hello World”;

?>

Then save your file and rename it as hello.php and point you browser to http://localhost/hello.php and voila.

You should now have the usual hello world that every php learner have once experienced.

Basically the idea is to make the script perform some task and then output the required text.

For the web design use of php, we make it output some html formated text to be displayed on your browser. If you already know html this would be much easy for you to learn php.

Hope you have enjoy yourself with this easy php tutorial and don’t forget if you want to learn php, the best way is to practice, practice and practice.

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