Practical Uses of PHP It almost goes without saying that you will want your business website to be compelling, interactive, and secure. All of these characteristics will make your website more effective at bringing in and keeping customers. But how to go about it in a way that is stable, cost-effective, and easy to manage? One popular solution is to use the server-side scripting language PHP to help you solve those problems.
What is PHP?Created in 1995, PHP originally stood for "Personal Home Page", however it is now generally understood to mean "PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor". It was originally designed to create dynamic or more interactive web pages. It is a widely-used, open-source, general-purpose scripting language. PHP is a "high-level" language, meaning that it's generally more human-friendly (and easier to learn) than other programming languages such as C, ASP or ASP.net.
PHP was originally designed for use in Web site development, but rapidly grew to become a much more robust language. PHP's primary use is as an "embedded" scripting language, which means that the actual PHP code is embedded in HTML code. When used in this way, PHP enables your web server to process web pages before they're displayed in the user's web browser.
Benefits of PHP PHP is popular because it can be embedded directly into HTML coding.
- PHP can be used on all major operating systems and is supported on most web servers.
- PHP's main focus is development for the web, so it has a quick development time and can solve scenarios much quicker than some of the other web design languages.
- The latest version of PHP is a very stable and mature language used for web programming much like Java and Microsoft C#.
- It is open source so it is free!
- Database: It is very easy to write simple scripts which allow your Web site to interact with a database.
- Cross-Platform: Both the PHP engine and the PHP code can be used on almost any platform, making it extremely versatile.
- Development Tools: You only need a text editor to work on PHP; you do not need any development environment or compilers.
What can you do with PHP?PHP generally runs on a web server, taking PHP code as its input and creating Web pages as output, however you can also use it for command-line scripting and client-side GUI applications.
PHP is an extremely versatile language which enables you to create high-end, stable Web sites with plenty of bells and whistles. Here are just a few of the things you can do with PHP:Make HTML Web Forms Store Information in Databases Remember Web site visitors (cookies and sessions) Work with Arrays Work with Files (File Management and downloads) Parsing and Generating XML (also useful for large quantities of products on e-commerce) Check which browser your visitor is using How does PHP Work?As its name ("PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor") suggests, PHP derives its power by "preprocessing" hypertext on the server side. This generally means that when the PHP script (saved as a .php file) runs on your web server, it performs the programmed actions, and returns HTML code that will then be sent back to your customer's web browser.
The PHP script itself is not included in the HTML that is sent to the browser, so the PHP code is invisible and secure to the user.For example, let's consider the following simple PHP statement. (This example is merely to show the basic syntax of PHP in action. Any detailed discussion of PHP code is beyond the scope of this article.)In this statement, is the closing tag, and echo is a PHP instruction that tells PHP to output the text that follows it as plain HTML code. The PHP software processes the PHP statement and outputs the following:Hello World This is a regular HTML statement that is delivered to the user’s browser. The PHP statement itself is not delivered to the browser, so the user never sees any PHP statements.
Using PHP to Improve Your Website.PHP has many capabilities features designed specifically for use in Web sites, including the following:
1. Securing Your Website.
PHP can be used to secure your website (or certain areas of your website) so that your customer must enter a valid username and password. This can be used to reward preferred customers and to build an exclusive "membership" component of your business.
2. Working with Web Forms.
PHP can display an HTML form and process the information that the user types in. This can be an excellent way to learn more about your customers by asking them to provide profile information, and to collect information about their specific interests.
3. Communicate with Your Databases.
PHP is particularly adept at interacting with your databases, and storing information from the user or retrieving information that is displayed to the user. PHP handles connecting to the database and communicating with it, so it's not necessary to know all of the technical details for connecting to or exchanging messages with the database. You tell PHP the name of the database and where it is, and PHP handles the details. All major databases are currently supported by PHP.
4. Customer Loyalty Functions.
You can also use PHP to create a number of different functionalities on your website that will further help you to build customer loyalty, including interactive polls, a guestbook, and a message board.
The popularity of PHP continues to grow rapidly because it has many advantages over other technical solutions. PHP is fast (because it's embedded in the HTML code, the time to process and load a Web page is relatively short), PHP is free (it is open-source software), and PHP is versatile (is runs on a wide variety of operating systems, including Windows, Mac OS, Linux, and most Unix variants).
Perhaps most importantly, PHP is a very well-established language. There are many user-run Internet communities that make very large amounts of information (and scripts) available. With so much experience behind it, using PHP for certain dynamic features can be a cost-effective and low-hassle way of increasing the stability of your website.
By Jeremy Gislason
Dec 11, 2007
What is PHP
Oct 25, 2007
Get easy for CMS Sever
Easy installation and deinstallation
To install XAMPP you only need to download and extract XAMPP, that's all. There are no changes to the Windows registry (not true if you use the Windows installer version of XAMPP) and it's not necessary to edit any configuration files. It couldn't be easier!
To check that XAMPP is working some sample programs are included, there is a small CD collection program (written in PHP using MySQL) and a small guest book software (written in Perl) and several other demonstration utilities.
If you decide that XAMPP isn't needed any more just delete the XAMPP directory and it's completely removed from your system.
However if you use the Windows installer version of XAMPP it's recommended to use the uninstall feature. As every installer the installer will make registry entries to remember the install.
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Oct 23, 2007
Different Types of CMS
There are a lot of different Content Management Systems available, and beside the main common feature of offering the division between layout and content, the modes of operation can be very different.
- Flatfile-CMS
- On a flatfile-based CMS, the content is (usually) saved in clear text files. Depending on the concept, layout elements can be saved in separate text files as well, dividing layout and content, and having the CMS put those two together on accessing the page (or any other defined action).
- Database-managed CMS
- With a database-managed CMS, all data is saved in a database and will be requested from there. Using such a system therefore requires a database (including the rights to modify it).
From a technical point of view, using a database has the advantage of a better scaling system on really huge amounts of data - provided that the database is properly accessible. On the other hand, a flatfile-based CMS can be much faster with a moderate amount of data, just because the database communication is not needed. This can be especially important in a shared-host environment (one server, multiple domains hosted), as server load and reduction thereof directly influences the website speed.
Portal systems
Portal systems still are very popular, and there are a large number of different systems (especially in the open source sector). The main advantage of those portals is often their main disadvantage: Using such a system, you can easily (and in a short time) build a complete portal that can be changed in look and feel using "themes" and "skins" (prepared layouts).
On the other hand, those "themes" and "skins" make portal systems quite inflexible when it comes to own enhancements, modifications and changes. Especially regarding the page design, a user has only very limited options. Additionally, nearly all portal systems need a database, and most are a bit on the slow side. Those who just want to set up a portal quickly might be well advised to use such a portal system, but if you have specific ideas or need special functionality, you might find portal systems lacking some flexibility.
source: http://docs.phpcms.de
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The Benefits of a CMS
A CMS makes it easier for people to create, edit and publish content on a website. Historically, website publishing has required significant technical skills (HTML, programming). A good CMS allows non-technical authors and editors to easily and quickly publish their content.
A CMS makes it easier for you to manage who creates, edits and publishes content. Because it establishes defined publishing processes, you can allocate specific publishing rights to various individuals.
By easing technical hurdles in the publication of content, a CMS can reduce the need for training, while facilitating more people to publish. At the same time, it reduces the daily stream of calls to the IT department for changes to the website.
A CMS reduces time-to-publish, allowing you to get content published faster. This is an important issue for the modern organization. The quicker you get key content published, the more value it creates.
A CMS allows for the design of a common and consistent information architecture (metadata, classification, navigation, search, layout and design). Inconsistent and poorly designed information architectures plague many websites.
A CMS will allow for the consistent management of metadata through content template structures. Of the many benefits this delivers is a significantly improved search process. Basically, if the appropriate metadata is captured on all documents, then people can find the right content a lot more quickly.
Security is an important issue, particularly for intranets. A CMS can facilitate better content security. It can control who is allowed to publish to the website, and who is allowed to see what content.
A CMS can allow you to more easily measure the success of your publishing efforts. You can track who is publishing what, how quickly content is getting published, whether the publication schedule is being adhered to, whether out-of-date content is being removed quickly enough, etc.
A CMS really comes into its own when you have a lot of authors and editors, based at multiple locations, publishing substantial quantities of content on an ongoing basis. Without a CMS, such an environment can become a nightmare to manage.
Without a CMS, what often happens is that there is a publishing free-for-all. The content quality is not properly monitored and becomes inconsistent. The navigation and layout changes from section to section, creating a frustrating experience for the reader.
When does a CMS begin to make sense in comparison to using raw HTML or a package such as Microsoft FrontPage? Well, you need to be publishing at least 10 new documents a week. There should be a minimum of 5 authors/editors publishing this content. As the number of documents, authors and editors rise, a CMS begins to make more and more sense.
If this is you, you need a CMS. But be careful. Content management vendors are often obsessed with developing complex, convoluted and expensive technology. Be warned: a bad CMS can be worse than nothing at all. And there are a lot of bad ones out there.
Gerry McGovern
Oct 22, 2007
How to Choose a CMS ?
To answer this question, you must first ask yourself what it is that you hope to accomplish. There are way too many systems to use the hunt and peck approach to determine what would work and what wouldn't. Sure, OpensourceCMS can help you narrow down that choice, but ultimately it's up to you to decide if it will work or not. It's best to know up front what you want then look for a tool that fits that need or at least can be customized to fit it without much hassle.
Here are FIVE very specific things to consider:
1. First, determine what kind of site you are looking to have. Is it a portal? Is it a blog? Is it a static site for informational purposes? It is a project collaboration area? Is it one or a combination of all these things? This is the single most important step in deciding where to go next as it determines how large a playing field you'll have to deal with.
2. Next, decide what features and functions you would like to use on this site. Will it need to present static or dynamic information? Will there be a need for an event calendar? Will there be a need for an upload/download area? What about an image gallery? How about a poll or survey tool? Will you be needing a translation function? These are called "modules" or "plug-ins" and are typically add-ons to the core system (sometimes it is integrated as part of the base system) and can vary greatly from one system to the next. More established systems will have a lot of support which translates to a wide variety of modules and plug-ins, but on the other hand they may not have current support and modules may be incompatible with newer releases. Also it's important to note that just because a system supports a particular function, it's still important to see how it works and make sure that's what you expected. Different groups implement the same feature set in different ways and this is both a blessing and a curse. It helps to list all the things you need and use that as your shopping list to test against and experiment with. The key word here is experiment because that's the best way to understand how useful it may be.
3. Once you determine the base system and the modules to add it's time to decide on the presentation of your site. Most current systems utilize CSS (cascading style sheet) and templates that allow you to quickly update the look of your site. Sometimes this is referred to as the "skin" of the site. The same content shown with different "skins" can have quite a dramatic impact and appearance. One can be inviting, while another can be professional or silly. It's all up to your imagination. The good news is that even if you aren't creative or artistically challenged there are plenty of resources around to help you. These resources come in the form of templates and themes designed by more creative minds. You can download these and add them to your site and really give your site a complete makeover. Some of the better CMS even allows the registered user to pick and choose the "skin" or theme of your site. Sometimes this is referred to as "personalization." For example, you might be able to customize the "welcome" message when you login to the system to add your name as a greeting or change the color of the text or select the modules you would like to see when you login. All these features are handy and add an element of flexibility for both the user and you. Users will be pleasantly surprised by the ability to customize their "view" and you get credit for setting up an environment where users have more control without breaking or reprogramming the structure of your site.
4. Having the defined the site's presentation layer you're now off to focus on the meat of your system - the content (for the vegetarians in the house, your meat may be soy-based). As you may have read again and again that content is king. Well, it's true. Without content no matter how pretty a site looks, it's usefulness and utility will soon fade and no one will want to return for another visit. There's only so many times you will be interested in visiting a site that doesn't have the information that you're looking for. Information can come in many forms, it may be practical, it may be humor, it may be knowledge, it may be a cookie recipe, or it may even be how to build a better mousetrap. The point is that information helps to keep your audience coming back. It is like candy for little kids, that's got to be a knowledge payload or your site will suffer a slow, spiraling death. To avoid this is really simple, write interesting articles, tell a story, share your pictures, present your research, allow submission of content, and always keep the juices flowing by expanding your site with new ideas and thoughts. It also depends on what kind of system you have in place, if it's a blog provide daily commentaries, if it's a news site then aggregate news from other sources using news exchange mechanism like RSS, and if it's a forum create topics that encourage lively discussions. Nothing is more frustrating then visiting a site that doesn't have a point of view and/or some sort of benefit to the visitor. Everyone likes to discover or learn something new and when they find that at your site, they'll keep coming back again and again.
5. Now that you've got this all down there's only one thing left to consider and that is on-going maintenance and renewal. When choosing a CMS think about how you'll be maintaining the system as it grows. What happens to the content when it grows old? Will it be archived and it be available online? Or will that even be necessary or desired? Will there be a way to restore the whole system to another area or even to a whole separate system if your server should crash? Different CMS handles these differently; some include an export function while others require a manual batch to be run periodically to capture the changes. While these aren't sexy topics to think about, it's necessary to plan for worst-case scenarios before it happens because at that point if you don't have already have a plan in place it's too late. Consider talking to other administrators and joining in discussions to get a better handle on this issue. There are a lot of considerations to keep in mind and that is beyond the scope of this article (stay tuned for future articles on the topic). Just keep these in mind and don't forget warned you to plan ahead.
All right, that should give a good overview of the whole lifecycle in choosing a CMS and gives a brief glimpse into some things for consideration. Here's a quick rundown one last time so that it'll help you nail it on the spot on what you need to go to get started. First, decide on the base system by focusing on what your needs are. This may be a portal, a blog, a news site, a project collaboration site, or a combination of all of the above. Second, decide what additional modules and plug-ins are needed to fulfill those needs and extras. The modules should compliment your site by providing little extras to make the user experience enjoyable and interesting. Third, setup the look and feel of your site by defining the theme of your site. Your presentation will help to make it easier for your audience to find information and to see it the way you intended. Fourth on the list is producing content to fill your site so that your user community will keep coming back for more. Content is what a good site keeps fresh and really can make or break a site for repeat visits. Think of content as the jelly in a donut, without the payoff it's like eating a plain cake and while that may suit some users, it will certainly alienate the veracious appetite of the user community who are always starving for information and eye candy. Finally, the last element is to plan for the future by considering how best to maintain the site so that you'll keep up with the growth that your site will have as word of mouth starts to spread about how great a job you're doing. It's important to think of disaster recover and also to plan for growth so that it doesn't become a bottleneck and result in a pain in the neck for both you and your user base. This is a lot to digest, but as you gain experience with the tools that are available, you'll soon discover that all these things are important and you'll gain confidence in picking the right solution for your needs.
source : opensurcecms.com
What is osCommerce
osCommerce is an Open Source based online shop e-commerce solution that is available for free under the GNU General Public License. It features a rich set of out-of-the-box online shopping cart functionality that allows store owners to setup, run, and maintain their online stores with minimum effort and with no costs, fees, or limitations involved.
osCommerce has attracted the largest community for an e-commerce solution that consists of over 155,500 store owners and developers worldwide with add-ons being contributed on a daily basis. To date there are over 4,300 add-ons available that have been created by the community to extend the features of an osCommerce online store.
osCommerce combines Open Source solutions to provide a free and open e-commerce platform, which includes the powerful PHP web scripting language and the fast MySQL database server. With no special requirements, osCommerce is able to run on any PHP 4.1+ enabled web server running on Linux, Solaris, BSD, Mac OS X, and Microsoft Windows environments.
With over 6 years of operation, osCommerce has built a showcase of over 12,700 online shops that have been voluntarily added to the live shops section, and powers many thousands of more online shops worldwide.
source: http://www.oscommerce.com/
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What is PHP-Nuke
PHP-Nuke is a CMS (Content Managment System) that integrates in its inside all the instruments that are used to create a site/portal of information (meant in broad sense). Give
n the immense number of present functions in the installation and in an even greater quantity of modules developed from third parties, the system is also adept to the management of:
· Intranet business,
· e-commerce systems,
· corporate portals ,
· public agencies,
· news agencies,
· online companies,
· information sites,
· e-learning systems
· and so on...
PHP-Nuke utilizes as hinge of its own structure the duo PHP+ MySQL, very often being accompanied by the Apache web server. Many modules have integrated many other languages, such as Javascript, Java, Flash and also even systems that serve, through the portal, sounds and films in streaming mode(Online Radio, TV Online, Images, Files...)
PHP-Nuke is developed with a particular eye to the suggestions of the W3C, in its origin, the code is in fact W3C compliant and one has validated both the code and the style sheets. It is then up to the user who intends to create a portal to adhere to these standards during the modification of the graphics or the intrinsic characteristics of the system.
The personalisation either of the graphical, or of the programming part has only a single limit, the fantasy and capability of the programer and web designer.The presence of many PHP-Nuke sites similar to each other is due mainly to the lack of time of those who created them or the fear that the phase of personalisation is too difficult on a technical level. In fact, it suffices to let oneself be inspired by the available themes, in order to realize how easy it is to sew a new dress to onIt is s portal.