I have been looking for a good introductory book on PHP for quite sometime now. "Spring into PHP' does give a good foundation on the subject for beginners. The basic concepts such as, operators, stings, emails, and functions are all there. Most of the other PHP books I have seen go right to more advanced concepts without introducing the basics needed to complete more advanced tasks. "Spring into PHP" is a good book if you need to learn PHP fast, but don't expect to learn the finer details of PHP. This book is probably just designed to give you a basic understanding of the PHP so you can go into a PHP file and have an idea what is going on. Even though the book illustrates the basic concepts of PHP very effectively, I wish there were more real-world examples. The chapter on communicating with a database is fine in teaching the concepts of adding, deleting, and inserting information into a database. However, the examples given for manipulating information in the database are given right in the code. In the real world you would enter the database information into text boxes. Overall, I wish some of the samples in this book stressed more interactivity.
Still, this is a great book for beginners who have little or no experience with PHP. It is certainly a better introductory learning tool than those huge PHP manuals that can have up to 1000 pages, which is great for professionals to reference, but not for beginners to reference. For this reason, I believe "Spring into PHP" would be an effective text book for an introductory php class.

I'm new to PHP, and chose this book because I had good results with "Spring Into: HTML & CSS". The chunks are clear and concise with lots of examples. I've learned a lot from this book, but keep having trouble with errors in the script. After going over (and over) the code, I started realizing that it was typos in the book coding itself-not user error! Being new to PHP, constant typos make the learning process more drawn out and frustrating! I'm ready to get a different book so I don't have to struggle through the typos (at half way into the book, I've found over a dozen). There are some good things to get out of this book; but is it worth the frustration?

I'm new to PHP, and chose this book because I had good results with "Spring Into: HTML & CSS". The chunks are clear and concise with lots of examples. I've learned a lot from this book, but keep having trouble with errors in the script. After going over (and over) the code, I started realizing that it was typos in the book coding itself-not user error! Being new to PHP, constant typos make the learning process more drawn out and frustrating! I'm ready to get a different book so I don't have to struggle through the typos (at half way into the book, I've found over a dozen). There are some good things to get out of this book; but is it worth the frustration?

This book is amazing. Its so easy as a training guide and resource. I used a 3M highlighter with Tabs and continue to use this book as a reference. This book goes through Baby steps to configuring things to get you launched into your own PHP applications.

I've read the PHP 4 Bible which I would rate a 2. This book 'Spring Into PHP' is honestly the best PHP book I've purchased. My other recommendation is SitePoints PHP & MySQL book, though I would still choose this book for beginner to novice over any.

This book is amazing. Its so easy as a training guide and resource. I used a 3M highlighter with Tabs and continue to use this book as a reference. This book goes through Baby steps to configuring things to get you launched into your own PHP applications.

I've read the PHP 4 Bible which I would rate a 2. This book 'Spring Into PHP' is honestly the best PHP book I've purchased. My other recommendation is SitePoints PHP & MySQL book, though I would still choose this book for beginner to novice over any.

I've been programming in c/c++ and java for 6 years now and recently at work was asked to give a facelift to our intranet site. Without this book I do not think I would have been able to complete all the requested task in such a short amount of time.

This is probably one of the most well written php books I've ever read. Steven Holzner did a perfect job bringing the nuts and bolts of PHP to the world in such a clear and concise manner. The books pace is perfect for a newbie into the PHP world and though technical is very easy to read and understand. Through this book I was able to give our intranet site an overhaul and add features to it in no time, leaving me plenty of time to focus on other projects.

If you need a quick jump start into PHP programming look no further.

I've been programming in c/c++ and java for 6 years now and recently at work was asked to give a facelift to our intranet site. Without this book I do not think I would have been able to complete all the requested task in such a short amount of time.

This is probably one of the most well written php books I've ever read. Steven Holzner did a perfect job bringing the nuts and bolts of PHP to the world in such a clear and concise manner. The books pace is perfect for a newbie into the PHP world and though technical is very easy to read and understand. Through this book I was able to give our intranet site an overhaul and add features to it in no time, leaving me plenty of time to focus on other projects.

If you need a quick jump start into PHP programming look no further.

This is a great book for someone who understands some programming languages and wants a quick overview of what php can do, and how to do it. There are a lot of different subjects covered, but none in great detail. So if you have ADD like myself, this is the book for you! In my opinion it's a great deal too.

This is a great book for someone who understands some programming languages and wants a quick overview of what php can do, and how to do it. There are a lot of different subjects covered, but none in great detail. So if you have ADD like myself, this is the book for you! In my opinion it's a great deal too.

This book is a great starter. The approach is just as clear as the text is. It gets you into the meat of things right away, yet you don't feel overwhelmed.

Yes, MySql is introduced towards the back and is hand-in-hand with PHP on almost every system that has one or the other. Your websites are bound to quickly become better looking, faster, and easier on resources. I wish I had gotten this book when I first started learning PHP. Great idea for new PHP developers and staff.

This book is a great starter. The approach is just as clear as the text is. It gets you into the meat of things right away, yet you don't feel overwhelmed.

Yes, MySql is introduced towards the back and is hand-in-hand with PHP on almost every system that has one or the other. Your websites are bound to quickly become better looking, faster, and easier on resources. I wish I had gotten this book when I first started learning PHP. Great idea for new PHP developers and staff.

"Spring Into PHP 5" is a primer on the latest version of the popular server-based scripting language, PHP. It is part of a new "Spring Into" series of books from Prentice Hall which intend to provide concise, fast-paced tutorials for new and developing technologies primarily for non-professionals and those professionals who need or want a quick and easy way to transition to new technology.

The author, Steven Holzner, is a prolific writer on technology, having penned 88 programming books as well as being a contributor to PC Magazine. His intent here is to make a technological topic like PHP scripting accessible, especially for novices who have little familiarity with web-related language other than HTML. He states an intent to produce "as good a book on PHP as can be". This is a good book but lacks depth and completeness and does not cover many practical uses of PHP. There is minimal discussion of security issues. There are other publications which would complement this book. The examples of PHP scripts are very simple and sometimes not practical.

The structure of the book is represented in nine chapters covering the basics of PHP for web designers. Each chapter is separately divided into "chunks" - bite-sized pieces of material - supported by examples and illustrated code snips. Each chunk is only about 1-2 pages long and is meant to be a self-contained "module", while building upon others in the book. Downloadable code examples are available at (...).

Holzner starts by briefly describing the why and how of PHP and quickly moves to installation issues. The following chapters cover the essentials of using PHP on a modest-sized website. The concepts of PHP are explained first - the terms, operations, syntax, components, and more.

Chapter 3 discusses strings and arrays. Chapter 4 covers functions. Chapter 5 and 6 show how to use PHP to control web pages, web forms and user interactivity. The usefulness of PHP for connecting to and using databases is noted.

Later chapters cover object-oriented programming, file handling, and working with databases. The final chapter skims a handful of useful aspects of PHP programming - using cookies and sessions, the ftp and mail features, and more.

Perhaps the most useful parts of the book are the two appendices. Appendix A is a listing of PHP's language elements. Appendix B is a comprehensive reference of PHP functions.

This is a rather light introduction to PHP, primarily for novices. There are useful tables of string and array functions and illustrations or examples on nearly every page. The illustrations and examples are produced in grayscale instead of full-color, but there is no need for full-color glossy production elements in a book of this type. The cost savings are reflected in the book's price - only $29.95 - less than others covering the same or similar material.

A good technical book should both lay all of the technical fundamentals, and then provide direction in how these fundamentals should be applied in the real world. This book does a great job, and I mean great, in giving a solid foundation in PHP and doing it very quickly (~300 pages).

Where it falls down is that the author doesn't provide tools for deciding which techniques to use where you have a choice. Particularly in the matter of database access. He presents the use of MySQL through the direct layer as well as through Pear::DB but doesn't provide any guidance in choosing one approach over the other.

That being said, for someone looking for an excellent introduction to PHP, as well as a fine ongoing reference work, you may have found your book here.

"Spring into PHP 5" is a good book for those new to programming. Readers need a very basic knowledge of HTML. Anything intermediate, like forms, is explained. Programmers (especially those who know Perl) can still learn PHP from this book since each section is clearly marked. They should just be prepared to skim a lot.

Books in this series consist of one to two page "chunks" grouped into chapters. Each chunk builds on previous ones, which provides for a nice flow. The chunks make it easy to understand what readers should get out of each section. Each chunk contains examples to apply these concepts. Many chunks also include screenshots of the input/output.

I found the book to be very clear. The appendices provide an excellent language reference. My only real complaint is that the book could use some best practices. Especially on when not to use a language features. All in all, the book is WYSIWYG. It lets you "spring into PHP" and get started very quickly.

An experienced programmer who does not know PHP 5 should be able to use this book to get up to speed within a few days. Holzner presents a concise and logical unfolding of PHP, and without taking 1000 pages to do so.

The first 4 chapters are about using the basic syntax. Much the same as several other languages like C or C++. The if-else and switch statements will look similar to what you're already used to, for example. There are the open and closing notations for a code block to get used to. But this is pretty simple.

The real point to the language is given in later chapters, on handling HTML in web pages and making forms and being able to validate these. Here, you really need prior acquaintance with web servers and HTML, to fully appreciate what Holzner explains about PHP.

He also gives more advanced usages. Where PHP can be written in an object oriented manner. A relatively recent thing in PHP. Also, he shows how to hook up PHP to a back end relational database. For the latter, he chooses MySQL. But Postgresql or any other RDB could probably also do just as well.