Introduction

What is PHP?

PHP stands for "PHP: HyperText Preprocessor". PHP is a server side scripting language for making logic driven websites. Ever wonder how they made that "contact us" form on their site, which sends out emails? Well, they used PHP. Or, how they made that image upload tool? Well, they used PHP. PHP written scripts can use databases to keep track of your customer's and visitors activities on your site, send out periodical newsletters to your subscribers, upload files or images and drive the content on your site dynamically. The possibilities are endless. Most of the social networking websites you visit are writing in PHP. Yep! PHP is that powerful. Learning The Basics of PHP will help you tremendously in your Webpage development.

How PHP Works?
PHP sits between your browser and the web server. When you type in the URL of a PHP website in your browser, your browser sends out a request to the web server. The web server then calls the PHP script on that page. The PHP module executes the script, which then sends out the result in the form of HTML back to your browser, which you see on the screen. Here is a basic php diagram which illustrate the process.

 

What are PHP benefits?
PHP is a free open source language. That means you don't have to pay thousands of dollars in licensing fee to acquire PHP. Best of all, it is easy to install. The most striking feature of it is that it is easy to learn. PHP is used by millions of people and developers around the world. There are thousands of websites on the internet which are written using PHP. One primary example is Yahoo! Bookmarks. PHP has an ever growing community. There are thousands of websites, forums and community websites dedicated on PHP. I built this site to share my PHP examples, recourses and code with you that you can use on your website easily. I will also show you how to build your own PHP website with all the bells and whistles from ground up. You will also learn the fundamentals of PHP and write your own PHP code. Basic PHP at the ground level up.

 

What I need in order to build PHP driven sites?
You need PHP Hosting. One of The Best Is HostGator

Link Direct to Order Page . Good news is, Hostgator is one of the best and most affordable php and mysql host on the web anywhere. There are tons of web hosting companies trying to compete for your business but most do not live up to what they should.

I recommend Hostgator Looking for Web Hosting With Quality Support? 24/7 Support Via Phone, Live Chat, and Email! The Live Chat Has Helped me many times and they stay with you until you are completely taken care of.

Summary-Do you want to know if PHP is easy to learn? It is very easy to learn especially when you take it a step at a time. Complicated things you may want to do on your website are made easier with the usage of PHP and it will allow you to do almost anything you can imagine. Implementing simple forms or logic on your site is very easy. Techniques of learning PHP is best shown with examples Several Benefits of using PHP are: PHP is one of the Best Open Source Languages that is completely free. You don't have to pay huge amounts of dollars in different licensing fees to utilize PHP. The most exceptional feature of it, is that it is easy to learn and best of all, it is very easy to install. . PHP is vastly used by millions of people and many developers around the earth. There are milllions of websites on the world wide web which are written using PHP. This even includes sites such as Yahoo! Bookmarks. What can PHP personally do for you? It can greatly increase the functionality of your websites. It will allow you to write scripts which will allow your visitors to interact with you through your website. If you are the owner of a small business website, you can use PHP to let your users send feed back to you in relation to your ad services, products, or even create forms which will allow your website visitors to send you emails Learn PHP you will find out what you have been missing in your webdesign and development.

Setting Up PHP/MySQL on your Computer
You can easily install PHP and MySQL on your home computer easily (see PHP installation page). This will allow you to write and test code on your computer and later deploy it to your PHP web hosting account.

Is PHP easy to learn?
If you have the will and the determination, then nothing is hard. Just Follow the tutorials on my page. I will walk to you through step by step, provide you with working examples, code and tutorails to help you learn PHP. My goal is to make the learning process fun and easy for you:). If you have any question or need help, you can email me.

Source - http://www.php-learn-it.com/introduction_to_php.html