Build Your Own Database-Driven Website Using PHP & MySQL is a practical guide for first-time users of PHP & MySQL that teaches readers by creating a fully working Content Management System, Shopping Cart and other real-world applications. There has been a marked increase in the adoption of PHP, most notably in the beginning to intermediate levels. PHP now boasts over 30% of the server side scripting market (Source: php.weblogs.com).

The previous edition sold over 17,000 copies exclusively through Sitepoint.com alone. With the release of PHP 5, SitePoint have updated this bestseller to reflect best practice web development using PHP 5 and MySQL 4.

The 3rd Edition includes more code examples and also a new bonus chapter on structured PHP Programming which introduces techniques for organizing real world PHP applications to avoid code duplication and ensure code is manageable and maintainable. The chapter introduces features like include files, user-defined function libraries and constants, which are combined to produce a fully functional access control system suitable for use on any PHP Website.

Book is too old
This book is way out of date. There are more up to date versions available.

Great for biginners, but out of date for today.
True to Site Point’s method and style, this book makes it easy to jump into the basics of it’s subject. Easy to navigate and full of helpful tips and hints, all the matieral is easy to access.
However a word of warning for those who may wish to purchase this book- get a newer version! This version covers PHP4.0 which is being discontinued from use in November of 2007. Learning PHP4.0 will not be very helpful after November, so Look for the newer version of this book and you will be set.
I found this to be the newest version as of this posting: Build Your Own Database Driven Website Using PHP and MySQL
I was quite sad when I realized I had purchased, and then read through, the whole book and then found out that PHP4 will be discontinued. You need PHP5 or PHP6 to be effective and up to date.
Also, if you are not an absolute beginner at the subject, this book is probably not for you. You can find more advanced books on the subject that will help you in your php quest. I found the first couple of chapters to be a bore, and maybe even an insult, because they covered ’how to use windows’ how to open notepad, or how to do the equivalent in mac.

Excellent Book
I highly recomend this book. I think it best serves those who already know the syntax of PHP, but it is a excellent book. I recomend either "Learning PHP" (The O’Reilly book) or "PHP for the World Wide Web : Visual QuickStart Guide" for a beginner. Both of these books will help you learn the syntax and concepts of PHP, but then it is best to move on to a book that gives practical examples, and this book excells at giving practical examples.

A good book for getting started with php and databases.
By reading just the first 4 chapters I was able to create my own webpages using php and the mySQL database to store tables of data. It has some good example programs that you can follow.

Sitepoint PHP and MySQL
Sitepoint (both the books and the website) is an excellent resource for quick learning of the latest and greatest in web development technologies, and this book proves it. Very clearly written and easy reading; a practical, hands-on tutorial. Provides everything necessary to develop and serve up a top-notch website backed by a powerful database.

Very good introduction
Author Kevin Yank states up front that this book is intended for intermediate- to advanced-level Web designers. I think this is an appropriate designation, as a beginner would quickly become overwhelmed at the rate with which Yank introduces such heady topics as Relational Database Design (Chapter 5) and Regular Expressions (Chapter 7). It’s important to note that this book is an introduction to server-side technologies, not web site design; therefore, I recommend that the reader have experience with creating web sites and with client-side coding (HTML, JavaScript). Consider the pace: Chapters 1-3 of the book cover installation, your first MySQL database, and your first PHP page. Then by Chapter 6, the reader is coding a (admittedly rudimentary) content-management system!

Is this book for you? Consider that for the price, you get a basic introduction to a broad number of topics: 1) PHP installation, 2) MySQL installation, 3) relational database design, 4) using server-side programming to reduce client-side coding, 5) database administration, 6) writing effective SQL queries, 7) structured programming techniques, such as using includes, and 8) implementing cookies and sessions. If you are already comfortable with at least half of the topics in this list, then you are probably ready to graduate to a more in-depth book than this one. If much of this sounds new to you, then you will find Yank’s book an excellent introduction. Yank writes as if he was a friendly tour guide, at each step of the way walking you through what he has done and why he chose to do it that way. Because the style is so conversational, it’s easy to go back and re-read a chapter, which many readers might find themselves doing.

While the cover of the 3rd Edition (February 2005 update) goes at length to point out that the book covers PHP5, there is negligible content that goes beyond PHP4.x. None of the coding, and none of the author’s discussions on effective programming techniques, addresses OO programming at all, let alone how it’s implemented in PHP5. This is not necessarily a negative aspect of the book since, again, it’s essentially an introduction. Just don’t let the packaging fool you into thinking you’re getting more than you actually are.

For me, the primary value of a book like this is in the initial chapter, where it provides all of the necessary steps for installing PHP and MySQL in one place. While the online documentation for both technologies is excellent, I have found that it can be confusing to switch back and forth between the two sites to get your own set-up installed and configured. If you’re like me and must add Apache installation to the process, it only compounds the problem. Yank provides clear instructions for Windows and Linux users, with a nod to Mac X users, on installation and post-installation tasks.

Mainly for this information, this book is an excellent way to get started with server-side technology, but it is not at all suitable for production purposes. As with any server or server-side technology, security is a major and much-debated topic of concern with PHP and MySQL. Yank does address some of the basic methods of protecting a MySQL server from attacks, including how to password-protect the root user account and how to grant only necessary access to new users. I’m sure many PHP programmers will argue with Yank’s recommendation that PHP’s "Magic Quotes" feature be left On, since turning it Off "exposes you to hackers attempting SQL injection attacks on your Website if you are not very careful to write scripts that protect themselves from such malicious behavior" (p. 24). Mind you, he is simply quoting the recommendation at php.net, since the On setting is recommended for beginners, but it points out why this book is not suitable for production-ready applications. Yank does provide abundant footnotes for the reader to find more detailed information, including the online documentation at www.php.net and www.mysql.com.

Yank very often invites the reader to consult the forums at [...] for further information and advice. Do not construe this as a mere marketing ploy. The SitePoint forums are indeed an excellent resource, with an active and often well-experienced audience.

All of the code listed in the book is available as a download from [...]. Simply provide your e-mail address, then you will be prompted with a question that you can answer only if you have the book in front of you.

Great place to start when diving into the topic
This book is for those who like step-by-step directions accompanied by explanations of how things work. I learned many things using this approach. This book is a stepping stone to creating dynamic Web sites.

Yank does a fine job covering a little of everything without overpowering the reader with too much. Anyone who has experimented with Perl, PHP, ASP.NET, MySQl, Access, some of them or all of them will like the book. Those who can write PHP and MySQL with little help need to find a more advanced book (don’t have suggestions, but I am sure others do).

I rarely ran into problems while following the examples. I’ve worked with other technical books and hit a brick wall at times requiring a call for help or serious research. While working with this book, I only got stuck once and immediately figured out the problem with a little research.

Yank uses visual aids and avoids jargon when explaining the process of laying out the database tables. A reviewer commented that Yank missed important concepts regarding databases. This book is not meant to go into such details. There are other books for that.

This book is well-rounded in covering all the necessary components of building a Web site using a database. While adding data, viewing tables, and querying the database, you’re learning tasks that will come in handy for future projects.

Not only do you get instructions for PHP and MySQL, but also advice on structuring code so that it’s used effectively.

If you’ve never installed Apache, PHP, or MySQL or can’t recall how to do it, the steps for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X are in the first chapter. Since the latest edition covers PHP 5, the author addresses the differences in PHP 4.3. When working on the first PHP script, there is no "Hello World!" for a change.

The early chapters provide a good overview of PHP and MySQL. By Chapter 4, the contents of the earlier chapters are integrated as the backend database connects to the Web page with PHP. The next chapters show how to use forms to manage, add, delete, edit, and search data. By midpoint, the reader has designed a database, organized it, created Web pages for the data, added administration pages, and administered the database. Yank also explains how to generate cookies and build a simple shopping cart.

The appendices include MySQL syntax, functions, column types, and PHP functions to use with MySQL. The book has an accompanying Web site that includes errata and four free sample chapters. Having edited a few tech books, I know how easy it is to miss things when you’re working on different computer set ups and application versions. Check the site especially since it has the code from the book. When running into problems, compare your code to the code from the site.

One chapter has a challenge along with the solution (a couple of pages later, so you’re not tempted to peek). Having a challenge like this in most chapters, I believe, would help cement the learning. Overall, it will make the purchaser happy.

The four free sample chapters give you a good idea of what the book is about and its style .

Highly recommended to beginners
Before I read this book I knew very little about PHP and MySQL. I had dabbled a little in ASP many years ago but foremost I’m a designer so coding isn’t always second nature to me. I started reading this book on the train to work and again on the way back; after 2 hours reading I had the confidence to try to build my own basic content management system!

At just over 250 pages the book is rather on the small side compared to a lot of the other books on the topic, but it really does contain all the essentials. It also encourages you to think for yourself and it really helped me understand how simple PHP and MySQL really is.

This book is very much aimed at the beginner who hasn’t dabbled before so I doubt it’s of much use to established PHPers, but to newcomers to the field I can’t recommend this book enough.

A great overview of of a complex process
This is a great book for someone getting started in serving up dynamic webpages. It provides an excellent introduction to PHP and MySQL (including installation) and how to make them work together. The power user will want to go on to other resources, but this one will get you over the startup hump.

This is a great beginners book
I bought this book and am very happy with it. I’ve bought a lot of books on PHP that really suck, not because the author didn’t know the subject, but because the author stunk as a teacher. This isn’t a reference book, it’s a how-to tutorial and it succeeds at what it set out to do. It teaches PHP and MySQL to newbies. I’ve used it and have loaned it out to others in my company and they love it. Read this one first and then, if you want to, move on to more in-depth books on PHP.

Introduction for beginners, has technical flaws
I’d like to recommend this book because there is a lot going for it. The text is readable. The illustrations and screenshots are well done. And the book presents a nice learning curve from beginner to reasonably high level concepts. But the book has some technical flaws that other beginning PHP books do not. An example is the authors use of SQL, a primary feature of this type of book, which is implemented using string concatenation. This type of SQL is not only inefficient, it’s also prone to SQL injection attacks which means that any code based on this book will have serious security issues.

There are some very good parts, however. The chapter that introduces relational databases is very well done.

I recommend O’Reilly’s Learning PHP 5 as an alternative to this book.