Best way to learn PHP basics

[Tom S]

Can anyone suggest the best way to go about learning some basic PHP coding?

I have recently begun work on a website and trying to take the easy option, being a newbie to website design, I purchased a template which is coded in PHP.

I am trying to customise my template to make it more original, using Dreamweaver as an editing tool. I can handle some of the very basic changes through trial and error etc but I would really like to gain some basic knowledge of PHP which would help me in this sort of task.

Any reccomendations of where to start?

Thanks.

[shachi]

http://goodphptutorials.com/category/basic-and-beginner

Here are some books:

http://www.computer-books.us/php.php

[jr_yeo]

bookmarked it tnx

<edit>
@tom s here's another http://www.php-mysql-tutorial.com/

[blm126]

I recommend this http://www.w3schools.com/php/php_intro.asp

[jr_yeo]

bookmarked it

[superjadex12]

Gotta put my two sense in here.
A great site that I use frequently is :

http://devzone.zend.com/node/view/id/627

It used to be a lot nicer (visually) but they changed it , I don't know why.
But I highly recomend this because the writer teaches in a very friendly and simple manner. I would just that over any text-book style any day!

[zeropsi]

set up your own LAMP box on your local machine, download some open source php scripts, and then play around with them, seeing what code does what.

getting your hands dirty is always the best way to learn.

[Twey]

Agreed.

You do need a basic knowledge of the language before doing that, though. Another good way to learn is by teaching other people. Lurking on these forums, or IRC (#html, #css, ##javascript, ##php on Freenode), and answering people's questions has improved my knowledge no end

[superjadex12]

set up your own LAMP box on your local machine, download some open source php scripts, and then play around with them, seeing what code does what.

OR you can take the easy way :

http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html

Xampp! My best friend. To install, just download and run the exe. Loads just like any program. It has full LAMP capapilities ie. runs apache php, mysql with local phpmyadmin.

Funny thing is I have been using it to test php for 6 months or so and just barely figuered out how to run local mysql. Every since then- I can't stop coding!

Hope this helps as it really really really helped this novice . Proud to say I'm getting better!

[Twey]

I don't see the point, of the Linux distribution at any rate. Installing Apache, MySQL and PHP is a cinch.