Building Responsive Web Applications with AJAX and PHP is the most practical and efficient resource a reader can get to enter the exciting world of AJAX. This book will teach you how to create faster, lighter, better web applications by using the AJAX ingredients technologies to their full potential. Assuming a basic knowledge of PHP, XML, JavaScript and MySQL, this book will help you understand how the heart of AJAX beats and how the constituent technologies work together. After teaching the foundations, the book will walk you through eight real-world case studies covering tasks you’ll be likely to need for your own applications: - AJAX enabled form-validation page - Online chat room - Customized type-ahead text entry solution, that helps users find the help page for the PHP functions - A simple cards game that supports multiple simultaneous sessions - Whiteboard where online users can draw online - Database-enabled, editable and customizable data grid - RSS aggregator application - Use the script.aculo.us JavaScript toolkit to build a drag&drop enabled sortable list The appendixes guide you through installing your working environment, using powerful tools that enable debugging, improving, and profiling your code, working with XSLT and XPath, and working with existing AJAX frameworks.

AJAX and PHP: Building Responsive Web Applications is the most practical and efficient resource a reader can get to enter the exciting world of AJAX. This book will teach you how to create faster, lighter, better web applications by using the AJAX ingredients technologies to their full potential. Assuming a basic knowledge of PHP, XML, JavaScript and MySQL, this book will help you understand how the heart of AJAX beats and how the constituent technologies work together. This book is written web developers with a basic knowledge of PHP, XML, JavaScript and MySQL. After teaching the foundations, the book will walk you through numerous real-world case studies covering tasks you’ll be likely to need for your own applications: * Server-enabled form-validation page * Online chat collaboration tool * Customized type-ahead text entry solution * Real-time charting using SVG * Database-enabled, editable and customizable data grid * RSS aggregator application * A server-managed sortable list with drag&drop support using the script.aculo.us JavaScript toolkit

The appendices guide you through installing your working environment, using powerful tools that enable debugging, improving, and profiling your code, working with XSLT and XPath.

Chapter 1: AJAX and The Future Of Web Applications is an initial incursion into the world of AJAX and the vast possibilities it opens up for web developers and companies, to offer a better experience to their users. In this chapter you’ll also build your first AJAX-enabled web page, which will give you a first look of the component technologies.

Chapter 2: Client-Side Techniques with Smarter JavaScript will guide you through the technologies you’ll use to build AJAX web clients, using JavaScript, DOM, the XMLHttpRequest object, and XML. While not being a complete tutorial for these technologies, you’ll be taken to the right track of using them together to build a solid foundation for your future applications.

Chapter 3: Server-Side Techniques with PHP and MySQL completes the theory foundation by presenting how to create smart servers to interact with your AJAX client. You’ll learn various techniques for implementing common tasks, including handling security and error handling problems.

Chapter 4: AJAX Form Validation guides you through creating a responsive, modern form with real-time validation based on server data.

Chapter 5: AJAX Chat presents a simple online chat that works exclusively using AJAX code, without Java applets, Flash code, or other specialized library, as most chat applications work these days.

Chapter 6: AJAX Suggest and Autocomplete builds a Google-suggest like feature, that helps you find PHP functions, and forward you to the official help page for the chosen function.

Chapter 7: SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) is a text-based graphics language that can be used to draw shapes and text. (SVG is supported natively by Firefox 1.5, and requires a SVG plugin with other browsers). In this case study you learn how to implement a realtime charting solution with AJAX and SVG.

Chapter 8: AJAX Grid teaches you how to build powerful updatable data grid. You’ll learn how to parse XML documents using XSLT to generate the looks of your grid.

Chapter 9: AJAX RSS Reader uses the SimpleXML PHP library, XML and XSLT, to build a simple RSS aggregator.

Chapter 10: AJAX Drag and Drop is a demonstration of using the script.aculo.us framework to build a simple list of elements with drag&drop functionality.

Appendix A: Configuring Your Working Environment teaches you how to install and configure the required software: Apache, PHP, MySQL, phpMyAdmin.

not worth the price
This book does offer good insights into php and ajax. It however tends to not teach as much as redirect. It points to a lot of free resources on the web to explain things it should have had as it’s own chapter.

I also spends way to many pages showing duplicate code. For example in the 2nd chapter it spends significant time creating a function called createXmlHttpRequestObject. This function is about 1/2 a printed page. then in every later chapter this same function is printed at least twice per chapter. This isn’t the only example and in ends up that you have 10-15 pages of code for each section most of which is duplicate from previous sections. You could easily cut 50-100 pages from the book by removing the duplication.

The book also doesn’t spend any time on security. Specifically it doesn’t show how to create a secure login or to validate that the javascript on the client is authorized to get the data that it is requesting. Everything is free and open with only basic validation that data is in the correct form.

That being said it does provide a broad range of ways to use ajax. I would happily spend $10 on it again. Unfortunately i spent over double that :(

Ideal book for those who currently have some PHP, XML, JavaScript and MySQL already under their belt.
AJAX and PHP: Building Responsive Web Applications is the ideal book for those who currently have some PHP, XML, JavaScript and MySQL already under their belt. Little time is spent on the basics of these technologies other than a brief history of the Web and predictions for future Web applications making this book a great segue for those looking to take their basic skills to the next level. The code is well documented and commented so if you are the type of person who prefers to jump right in and work with code, then this book is for you.

The biggest strength of this book is that is provides practical code examples that teaches the reader how to combine and use these technologies together. Some of the most handy examples are server-enabled form validation, an online chat tool and an RSS feed reader. Even if you only need to know one of these items, though there are plenty more, it’s well worth it to pick up this book. No only will you be able to create these applications yourself, but you’ll learn best practices and understand the why and how of each program as well. Additionally, the book’s companion website is quite good and allows you to download all of the code. This can be especially helpful if you find yourself getting stuck somewhere and want to do a side-by-side comparison of the your code and the book code. There are even five free additional PDF chapters for download including an updated version of Chapter 5 - AJAX Chat - which uses JSON instead of XML.

However, if you’re the type of person that is looking for a very concise, step-by-step book, you may find yourself frustrated. Just as its strengths are in letting you jump right into the code, if you’re not at the stage where you’re comfortable with any of the included technologies, you’ll quickly find yourself overwhelmed with a lack of direction and an abundance of code. Additionally, while the use of bold type clearly indicates emphasis on specific code lines, if anything could improve this book, just for readability’s sake, it would color-indicated code.

In conclusion, if you’ve already gotten your feet wet with PHP, XML, JavaScript and MySQL then AJAX and PHP: Building Responsive Web Applications will help you get to the next level with real-world code examples and projects. You’ll not just "copy code" but gain an understanding as to the "why and how" of creating AJAX Web applications.

Packt Publishing Nails Another One!
The good folks at Packt Publishing have really nailed it with this title. This is one of the best books I have read on the topic of PHP and AJAX. They really broke down what the point and objectives of using AJAX with PHP are and then explained how to do things in a way that makes plenty of sense.

This book has no lack of code to copy, luckily most of the code can be found on the companion site hosted by Packt Publishing. I must say that as of my experience all the code was in working order, which was a pleasant change from some other coding books I have read recently.

The XMLHttpRequest code in AJAX and PHP is quite impressive including try/catch formula for catching exceptions and failures in the code and handling them properly, again a very welcome change to some of the coding books or recent. I was particularly impressed with the structure of the code regarding the handling of responses as well as all the explanations of the code used in each example, never did the authors leave you wondering what any piece of code did, or why it do so.

The book is a short 260 pages, and just full of useful information. A great follow up to this book would be anything DHTML as that is where most of the AJAX examples want to seem to lead a reader. Having a knowledge of DHTML is not important however a firm understanding of PHP and JavaScript would really benefit a reader choosing AJAX and PHP.

Grea book for beginners and intermediates.
AJAX and PHP: Building Responsive Web Applications

This is a great book for beginners as well as intermediate users of AJAX.

I have about 5 years of experience with PHP and 7 with Javascript and I had none with AJAX. I read a few tutorials online about AJAX and after reading some of this book, I love it.

This book is a great start with AJAX, especially if you are a PHP programmer like myself.

If you are looking to start building with PHP and AJAX, I recommend this book.

Not best practices, not cross browser, not teaching
The book would be ok as a reference or code examples with brief explanations. However, the code practices used, when compared to other current books left me very disappointed.

The Good:
- Good examples, all code is documented
- Different projects - code provided online
- The end results are good. (for Windows)

The Bad:
- Coding. They practice what I’d call "potluck programming". Basically you get 1 php page with inline calls to JavaScript, PHP, HTML and even some CSS properties. Maybe some programmers like this approach, but personally, I’ve been moving away from it, keeping your HTML alone, and inline JavaScript calls non-existent. The whole programming is basically obstrusive, taking over the file. Just bad programming practices. This is the biggest gripe I have with this book. Any current book should be teaching the more modern and less obstrusive ways of programming.
- MAC support. A lot of the applications simply do not work, or work with lots of quirks under Safari and OS X. I know the market share is just around 5%, but it makes some of the applications worthless for those people.
- There is not much in the way of teaching, I wanted to learn a bit more. The book has a lot of code, but the explanation section seems very lacking. (10 pages of code, followed by a "what just happened" section with less than 10 pages of code (there is less explanation than code, even though a lot of the code is repeated in that section.)

Overall, I was expecting a lot more from this book. I use both PHP and starting to use Ajax, and was hoping this would help, but I would not recommend this book to anybody. There are better books that talk about both Ajax and PHP without having PHP in the title. Professional Ajax is one example and presents the code in different files (though it ocassional reverts back to inline JS).

If you want a book of examples, but don’t care much about your coding style, you could very well enjoy the book. If you are striving to become a better programmer, and use unobstrusive practices, stay away from this book, as you will be thoroughly disappointed. Also stay away if you use a OS X for most of your work.

I would title the book: "Code for responsive web applications using AJAX and PHP".
You will not learn how to build those applications, but they will be kind enough to provide you with their code.

Practical Advice
Enjoyed this book. The authors clearly understand their subject and provide useful workable code that can be used as a basis for your own projects.

Great layout and easy to undertand for noobs and pros!
This is my second AJAX/PHP book and I must say this one is excellent. The author gives the reader not only great examples, but then reexamines the code to let the reader how and why each block is needed and what purpose it serves.

This is my first read from the publisher, Packt, but if the other books are laid out like this I’ll give them a go.

So should you buy it? I would say you definitely need a basic understanding of PHP and an Intermediate understanding of JavaScript to get through this book with a smile.

Highly recommended.

I wish there was more on the capabilities of PHP.
First off I’m fairly new to web programming (Javascript and PHP) but I didn’t find much to broaden my knowledge with this book. Ajax Javascript is covered extremely well elsewhere ("Pragmatic Ajax", "Ajax in Action" and "Ajax Design Patterns" for instance) and is PHP programming ("PHP and MySQL Web Development" and "Advanced PHP Programming").
The book is not complete enough to serve as an introduction to Javascript or PHP. It really doesn’t seem to cover the issues with distributed asynchronous programming either.
There is a huge need for a book that concentrates on building solid asynchronous servers with PHP. For instance how can state be carried from server call to server call (PHP session management?). What happens if multiple XML requests are sent while a PHP script is running? Can a single instance handle multiple requests without restarting from the beginning? How can a long running PHP program (yes you need to change the server time out) handle streams of data to and from Javascript?
My suggestions for the next edition are:
1) More on server side patterns (PHP) for AJAX
2) Session management
3) remote RPC techniques
4) JSON servers (techniques like phpolait?)
5) Talk through the code examples more.
I found the code in the book to be the hardest to read through and at the same time the most boring of any programming book I’ve ever read.

Mostly source code
I was hoping for a good explanatory book, but this is what I got:
listings - sometimes for 4 -5 -6 pages - of javascript /html. With no comments -just source code. Amazing.

Utterly useless. Sorry. I have tried again and again, but this book is quite bad even compared to an online tutorial from someone you have never heard about.

So keep your money.

Informative
This is a great book that discusses the frameworks and relations that PHP and AJAX use to provide dynamic applications. This book goes through the various methods to get the client side to talk with the server with out page refreshes and the tools that speed up the development process. This book has a lot of code examples of working projects that can be used in your own development projects.

well written
I have a number of years experience with php,dhtml,javascript and css and this book has some excellent examples that are well written and each builds on the last example with more and deeper details. I only wish there was more examples as the authors did such a great job with the ones presented. great job all!

For the light-headed reader.
I really did not find this book much use at all. After reading the first 2 chapters I suddenly realized I knew more then the guys who wrote it (and there are a few of them).
For someone who knows no Ajax or Javascript, I guess it is ok.

The major issue I had with this book is the repetition of code.

Sure, code reuses is great...in practice. But instead of saying, "Use the connection script we build in chapter X", the book rewrites the connection script, and it is like that throughout the book.

The book is approximately 260 pages long. If you take out all the re-occurrences of the code in the book, you would be left with about 100 pages.

Another bad point for this book was...why all the code? Why not a CD with the book with all the code on, and a reference to it in the book. That way they could focus more on the design and logic and leave all the code on CD.

I found this book ill planned and boring.

Sorry writers!

A great intro to popular web-based programming tools
A technical book is only useful if it appropriate for your current skills and knowledge. I am a system admin who has written a fair amount of C++ code and lots of Perl and other scripts. I now need to develop a simple web app from scratch, and this book was perfect for me. While I have many issues with the PHP language, the popularity of LAMP solutions makes PHP a necessary evil that will be around for some time.

This book is a great intro to AJAX as well as PHP, XML, CSS and the DOM. The book is laid out and progresses very well, assuming virtually no knowledge in the first three chapters and with many sidebar comments that answer anticipated questions. The code examples are explained well and give you some good, functional examples to play with and learn from.

They also do well by giving brief intros to important concepts such as DOM and CSS, but then provide links to good on-line resources rather than getting bogged down in these details. Why reinvent the wheel? If you start getting lost following the code that introduces one of these new concepts, just stop reading and peruse the sites they reference.

If you truly new to these concepts, I would recommend reading the first 3 chapters closely and not at your computer, except to refer to the websites they mention. Then go back and re-read them while creating and playing with the code they provide. This helped me a great deal.

make more money with this title
Good examples and techniques aside, there’s opportunities to turn your investment into cash in from projects in the real world. The later chapters contain great code examples for application pieces all web developers need in their arsenal; from javascript and security tips to interface how-to including a neat drag n’ drop sortable list app I enjoy using more (probably because I understand it better from the inside out) than the [...] drag n’ drop code I had been tinkering around with.

If you’re a total newbie to AJAX and PHP this book will get your feet wet and dunk you in. If you’re a PHP wiz with a good understanding of AJAX, this book will help "gel" it all together for you and add to your programming "street smarts".

Even the most impatient learners will appreciated each chapter section’s "Time for Action" samples which let you do stuff within the first 5 minutes of cracking the book open. (I jumped right to those sections then went back to read the other stuff if I felt I didn’t understand why something worked or didn’t work).

Excellent
I found this book to be an excellent introduction to AJAX for anybody with a good working knowledge of PHP, JavaScript and MySQL. Clear and concise with the example code well explained and presented.

Personally, I already had the background knowledge but had no experience of and very little knowledge of AJAX. I really needed a crash course in AJAX technologies. Two hours with this book changed that. I found it’s concise approach fantastic and it is a book I can see myself returning to again and again.

Overall, highly recommended, a great introduction to AJAX and a most enjoyable read.

Packs quite a punch!!
For under 300 pages of content, this books packs quite a punch. I’ve always liked books that are under 400 pages because we never get to finish reading those that are over 1300 pages (definitely not for learning a new language). I start out with a mid-size book like this one and once I grasp the basics, I dig into advanced topics with another hefty book. But this one had me covered with so much I don’t think I need an advanced book. Christian Darie proves it again - big books are heavy books, small books are great books. He and his co-author organized the content nicely and included lots of code examples that work. Real code! With links to some of the best stuff on these topics.

Pulp?
I was very disappointed to see that most of the book is made up of repeated source code examples. Parts of it is well written but it is very hard to get an overview and to me, it seems, this book was primarily made to make a bit of money while Ajax was still unknown and perplex. Although the authors give some fine examples of how to use the xml that Ajax is based on they don’t care to explain how to expand your own knowledge and understanding beyond the simple examples they provide.

If you are satisfied with copying the source code shown in the book then this might be the book for you, but if you want to learn Ajax properly you should probably buy another book.

Also, it had the worst typography I have ever experienced, the pages looked as if they were printed from a cheap ink-printer!

I feel sorry for writing such a harsh review but there are so many parts that are missing. It could have been a good book with a little more effort.

I would be very careful about buying any books from this publisher.

Quick introduction and reference to AJAX with PHP
This book highlights several different ways of using PHP and AJAX. It’s short, but includes examples of form validation, instant messenger, and the all important sortable table. All-in-all, a good book, but if you’re needing something more in-depth or more advanced, a longer (more pricey) book may be a better option.

A brilliant introduction
I bought this book because I realised that I needed to get to grips with Ajax technologies. As PHP is my weapon of choice this book seemed a perfect place to start.

The chapters are well laid out with different ajax ’applications’ well explained and coded. From basic form validation to Google Suggest, Ajax chat and Drag and drop I would recommend this book to anyone with a good grounding in PHP.

PHP implementation is aimed at PHP5 using MySQL through the mysqli extensions making this book valid for a long while yet.

It’s Much More than AJAX and PHP
I admit, when I first opened this book, I thought it would contain a dry discussion of how to use AJAX methods with PHP. But the book turned out to be so much more than advertised, I think its title must be wrong. It should have been called, "How to Use AJAX Methods with PHP, MySQL, DOM, CSS, SVG, XSL, XML, RSS, and JavaScript Frameworks." I certainly never expected to read it cover to cover, but that’s what I did.

In addition to integrating a wide range of modern web technologies, the book contains great examples of how to write building blocks for powerful web applications. These include form validation, chat, suggest, auto-complete, charting, grid, RSS, and drag-and-drop. Somewhere in the code for these functions are techniques for almost everything you might want to program into an application. What I really like about the book, however, is the ongoing explanation of how to write the code so it will be secure, and will perform correctly in every browser. Most books I have read don’t bother with such details, but this one even lays out a method to create user-friendly error reporting in production mode. It has a strong focus on writing code that might actually be used in a production environment.

My only quibble with the authors is that they seemed to be avoiding OOP in their JavaScript, though they used it with their PHP code throughout the book. They said OOP emulation techniques required a longer learning curve. However, the result of their decision is JavaScript files that run for seven or eight pages. I really think that OOP would have been less intimidating to a new programmer than page after page of unbroken code. I would recommend that the authors at least use eye-catching headers for the major functions in these files to help the reader understand the structure of the code. (Readers of the book as published might want to take a highlight pen to the function headings.)

As someone who is attempting to write my first significant web application, I think this book is wonderful. I expect to wear it out before I’m through looking up techniques. I already know that my application will need chat, validation, suggest, and data grid. This book practically hands me the code for these. But more than that, it provides me with a view of the basic methods to do many other things.

Much of the major content of this book is code. While the authors explain how the code works, the reader will still need to know the basics of HTML, CSS, SQL, and scripting languages, such as PHP and JavaScript. Another major advantage of this book, however, is that the authors give web links to many of the best tutorials on these topics. In fact, it would be possible to start with this book, and use the authors’ suggested links to look up almost every major web technology in order to learn it in the context of AJAX and PHP. All in all, that’s a lot of value for a book that has less than 300 pages!

AJAX and PHP by Example
This book teaches by example. The first few chapters introduce AJAX and what part PHP, Javascript and XML all play. Then the remainder of the book takes you through several example applications. The example apps are simple enough that you can easily follow. These applications include Form Validation, Chat, Suggest and Autocomplete, Charting with SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics), using grids, and Drag and Drop.

Each example begins by showing you the source code and how to actually implemented/deploy that application. There is also a supporting appendix for additional information about deploying the examples on a web server. Then each chapter follows by by explaining how the example worked.

If you would like to quickly begin using AJAX from PHP this book is a great start.

very average
’ajax and php’ is a very mediocre book with a lot of code in it, not especially good for learning, and not worth the price. if you want a really good ajax book, i recommend ’ajax in action’.

Very concise and non-labored reading
This book tends to jump right in and show you the important parts of the code you will need for your applications. It walks you through creating some of the more requested scripts and explains each step in just enough detail to give you a good grasp. That said, the book isn’t a major read at under 300 pages, which makes it light enough to get through in a weekend if needed. I highly recommend this book for those wanting to combine the power of AJAX with the speed and ease of PHP.

Excellent
This book is ideal if you already know PHP, MySQL, JavaScript and have heard of AJAX but not had the opportunity to explore it further. If you want to try AJAX but have never come accross a scenario to use it, this book provides some excellent examples which can form the basis of great projects.

The theory behind all the technologies used is very clearly explained, without boring you with detail about obvious things. Right from the first chapter you start learning by examples. The examples can be easily adapted to many web projects and they cover stuff that is both useful and fun.

I have found this book very enjoyable - the best I’ve bought in a while.

Just what I needed
Ajax and PHP came at exactly the right time in my self-inflicted education as I am just now gaining functional literacy in OOP, Client/Server. PHP, CSS et. al..

There are a lot of things to like about this book, starting with its organization. It starts off by documenting what you need to know to best use of this book. And supplies the URL/Hyperlinks to get those literacies if you don’t have them. (Thank you!)

It achieves a nice balance of choosing what needs to go into an appendix.

It dispenses with the common irritating practice of showing code "excerpts" in favor of showing the entire script and follows each script example with a "What just happened" section that is as clear and concise as you will find anywhere.

If you only buy one AJAX book, make it this one.

Building AJAX and PHP skills with Packt: Recommended
The book is good, the topic is right, and pretty much everyone is thrilling to learn how to benefit from AJAX -- even if this means you’re going to use a lot of JavaScript, which you thought it was not necessary, since you know PHP, a powerful language, right?

To be frank, I was contemplating this book quite a lot before daring to open it for real. I can’t really explain why, but I was intimidated by the idea: not by its size (274 pages is a common size), not by the technology itself (I’m coding PHP pretty often, and JS is no more than... JS), so maybe it was just because I’m too conservative. I’m prone to use PHP pages the "go-to-the-server-and-come-back-with-another-one-please" way.

And this book really tries to learn you the basics of AJAX, through practical examples, that is. Quite impressive, given that most of us are usually grabbing new ideas & technologies from on-line articles, not from books entirely dedicated to a subject.

Packt (pronounced "packed") has made every effort to support this book, even up to a point where you’re overwhelmed by their will to make it easier for you.

Here’s what the web offer is:
* A book’s "classical" page with the publisher
* A book’s mini-site with the publisher, featuring demos of the case studies developed in the book
* A book’s mini-site with one of the authors, hosting an Errata and Notes

Downloadables:
* Chapter 1: AJAX and the Future of Web Applications
* AJAX Chat Revised - Chapter 5: Ajax_Chat_and JSON, a revised version of Chapter 5, now using and presenting JSON instead of XML. The first printed edition is only featuring the original XML-based chapter.
* AJAX Whiteboard mini-book - a case study on how to implement efficient client-server communications when heavy realtime communication is needed.
* Appendix A - installing and configuring Apache, PHP, MySQL, and prepare the database used in the demos.
* Appendix B: tools that can make your AJAX and PHP programming/debugging life easier.
* Appendix C: - Advanced XML: XPath and XSLT.
* Code download: the code for the samples described in the book.

Let’s get to the point.

The first contact with AJAX was, for most people, the suggest & autocomplete feature of Google Suggest, somewhere at the end of 2004 or beginning of 2005. If you want to implement such a feature for yourself, the whole Chapter 6 is dedicated to this subject: you will be implementing suggestions from PHP functions, with direct redirection to the corresponding manual page.

Unless you don’t actually need any book on the matter, you should start with the beginning, to get a clear idea of what "Asynchronous JavaScript with XML" really is, and why is it needed to improve usability and to make a site more responsive, or to find out some drawbacks of using AJAX (bookmarking may become pointless).

The basic principles of AJAX are very much disclosed from the first chapter, where you’re presented with a simple (and useless) simple PHP AJAX application, described in detail.

There is to note that the book features the full sources of all the applications used in the instructional process. If you download the source code, the use of the printed one is somehow limited, unless you want to make notes on the book, for analysing how things are done.

To ease the understanding, the book holds a few flowcharts, in key places. Otherwise, a rather important number of screenshots are presented to help you follow the topic even if you’re not in the front of your computer.

OK, you’re an intermediate PHP developer, but you know very few of JavaScript. Client-side scripting was not one of your major interests. How are you going to swallow the book?

Chapter 2 is set to make you feel more relaxed and comfortable. Not only it describes JavaScript and the Document Access Model (DOM) in a nutshell, but it also provides you with useful reference links (page 30).

As a general rule, you will find useful URLs in several places throughout the book, so be prepared to improve your skills even after having finished with it.

The next "hard nut" is the very heart of AJAX: the XMLHttpRequest object. You will learn of it in the same Chapter 2, and the table at page 47 lists its methods and properties.

But it wasn’t tough, so far. Most people already knew about DOM (at least if they have used CSS), and a bit of JS too. Some people never needed to use XML though, but, you know, the "X" in AJAX is from XML, even if there is no XML involved in the functioning of XMLHttpRequest, and you’re not bound to use XML if you don’t want to!

XML is a vast subject, and so are DTSs, schemas and namespaces, XSLT and Xpath, etc. Page 55 lists some starting points, and recommends Appendix C (not present in the first printed edition) for an introduction to XSLT and Xpath.

Fininshing the Chapter 2, which is very dense in information, will get you introduced to some basic handling of XML, but more important, to handling errors and throwing exceptions.

In the real world, you will need to do some serious data processing at the server level. This is what Chapter 3 is meant for, with some more examples too.

This time, you will also need to work with a database, MySQL in our case. Make sure you’ll properly setup the database, because you will need to create some tables in some future sample project too -- fortunately, the book is supportive, especially if you’re using phpMyAdmin.

As a general rule, once the access to the database is solved, everything should "just work". Each sample needing MySQL access has the credentials in a config.php file, so it’s better you just create the user "ajaxuser" with the password "practical", to avoid editing several files.

The only problem I encountered was an error message:
"Class ’mysqli’ not found"
which should be solved by adding
extension=mysqli.so
or
extension=php_mysqli.dll
to php.ini (and don’t forget to restart Apache).

One of the first usability gain of using AJAX is form validation within the same page, without pushing back and forth error pages and the like. This is the first thing I’ll implement in a web site in the process of "ajaxing" it -- and you will read Chapter 4 to get a good grip of one of the most useful usages of AJAX.

The rest of the book is very much a sequence of labs where you will learn more and more through practical exercises, with full code and explanations provided. You will do with AJAX:
* a web chat (Chapter 5).
* real-time charts with SVG (Chapter 7).
* grids with client-side XSLT (Chapter 8).
* a RSS reader (Chapter 9).
* drag and drop (Chapter 10).

What are my impressions with this book?

Once I went beyond the initial reluctance, I could see the book is actually not a bad one. The four Romanian authors did a good job, although some would have appreciated if a more playful style was used, instead of the rather academic one. For instance, PHP books by Julie C. Meloni can be swallowed easier due to the lighter style, more appropriated for people not willing to feel like in the front of a teacher.

Also, fragmenting the code with more comments shouldn’t hurt -- no, actually not "code comments", but textual descriptions of what is actually happening in there.

For a practical introduction into AJAX with PHP, I would rate the book with 4 stars out of 5, but not more, for style reasons mainly.

Add Ajax Client-side Features to PHP Driven Web Applications
This book assumes a working knowledge of PHP, XML, JavaScript and MySQL and that you have PHP, MySQL, phpMyAdmin and a server such as Apache installed on your computer. In this book the authors, Cristian Darie, Bogdan Brinzarea, Filip Chereches-Tosa and Mihai Bucica, teach their readers how to add Ajax client-side features to PHP driven web applications.

As you would expect, the authors begin by discussing what Ajax is, its history and which Ajax features you will be adding to the PHP applications discussed in the book. The authors take a modular approach when building these web applications.

The first programming task discussed in many computer books is client-side form validation and in this book the authors have done the same by showing how Ajax has changed the traditional form validation process. In the traditional process, the client-side validation occurs after the form has been submitted but before it reaches the server. The authors show you how to improve on this process by using Ajax to validate the user’s input as he types.

Next you will build an Ajax chat application. The authors do not cover supporting processes such as chat rooms, chat user lists and login. They choose to concentrate on improving the message posting and receiving processes using Ajax to eliminate the need to reload the webpage when performing these tasks. Before Ajax and other XMLHTTP related programming, this was only possible using Java, Flash or other special programming.

Ajax was made popular due to Google Suggest. So it is only logical that the authors would show you how to build your own Ajax suggest and autocomplete application. The database used for the working example for this application is the PHP Function List at PHP.net. Next you learn how to build two real-time charting applications. The first is a graph drawn in real-time using SVG and the other is an Ajax grid using XSLT and XPath. Both of these applications update these charts without reloading the webpage.

The popularity of RSS syndication makes this next application my favorite. You will build a simple RSS reader (aggregator) using Ajax, PHP, XSLT and SimpleSML. Finally, the last lesson is based on an existing web application (script.aculo.us). You will learn how to use Ajax to add drag and drop support to this task management application. (To Do List)

The book has a supporting website which has working demos of the web applications featured in the book, sample chapters and a free case study eBook entitled AJAX Whiteboard. This is a simple Ajax web application that allows you to draw with your mouse.

The authors of this book blend their varying backgrounds for this project. Cristian Darie is a software engineer and technical author. Bogdan Brinzarea has a background in banking and security. Filip Chereches-Tosa is a web developer and Mihai Bucica works in the field of communication software.

Poor print quality
I was personally a little disappointed with some aspects of this book. While the content is good, and relatively well-written, the print quality and paper used is very poor indeed. There is so much show-through on some pages that it makes reading the code very difficult as you can see the code on the reverse page too.

As, like many developers, I run sites on servers running PHP 4, many of the examples don’t work as they’re PHP 5 specific. Not unsurprising I suppose, but it would still be beneficial to have stated this in the title.

Solid package bundled with great AJAX and PHP code
If you are a PHP programmer who is looking to start integrating AJAX in your upcoming projects, then this book will be a perfect start for you. The book focuses more on code rather than theory, and explains the pile of code in an easy manner.

The book starts with a great chapter explaining how web evolved and why the need for AJAX was created. It then explains what AJAX is and how it works - a difficult task to explain to the beginners, but the authors did it wonderfully. For the kick-starters, the chapter ends with a simple yet interesting hand-on example of a quick AJAX app, something that inspires many.

The next chapter goes into the basics of JavaScript, DOM, XMLHTTPRequest and related key points and explains each of them with good examples. This makes sure that you know what you’ll do and why you’ll do things in a specific way.

Before going into building core AJAX functionalities, the authors then introduces you to handling several PHP situations with AJAX (error handling, returning outputs, etc). Also, they show you how you can create the bridge between AJAX and MySQL.

After telling you everything you need to boost your own site with AJAX, they start to tell you how you can avail different AJAX functionalities in your site - Form Validation, Auto complete, Real-time Charting, Drag-n-drop, and so on. These are divided in the rest of the book in chapters. Each of them has a real-life working example that can make you think "Oh man!! I was looking for this to be in my site!!!" Although it’s more code than theory, you won’t loose the path as they start the chapters with a problem-solving manner and after showing the code, explain them step-by-step.

The book marvels at boosting you with both knowledge and practical application of AJAX to start with. But, it lacks in telling about the many great AJAX frameworks out there for PHP. The authors could have gone further to include a chapter mentioning the PHP-based open-source frameworks currently available (such as AJASON, XAJAX, TinyAJAX, AJAX Agent, etc). This could have helped the readers avoid writing all the basic request handling codes by hand (in both JavaScript and PHP). Also, there could have been a more detailed explanation on where the usage of AJAX is not appropriate.

Apart from this, the book was a sheer pleasure to follow and the choices of examples were very relevant to the current web trends and should help anyone who wants to implement AJAX real soon.

Excellent
This book is ideal if you already know PHP, MySQL, JavaScript and have heard of AJAX but not had the opportunity to explore it further. If you want to try AJAX but have never come accross a scenario to use it, this book provides some excellent examples which can form the basis of great projects.

The theory behind all the technologies used is very clearly explained, without boring you with detail about obvious things. Right from the first chapter you start learning by examples. The examples can be easily adapted to many web projects and they cover stuff that is both useful and fun.

I have found this book very enjoyable - the best I’ve bought in a while.