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Learning to control the flow of data in php is a must. These if/else/elseif statements control what happens to data and what happens on the page. Here are some examples of these different types of statements-->

For these instructions, the variable $smart=true
<?php
if($smart=='true')
{
print 'Your really smart';
}
?>

That was just a short tidbit of php code that introduced the if statement, a variable, and the print statement. A variable is defined simply as

<?php
$variable= 'text';
?>

The print() function displays the text that comes after it onto the screen. So if I did print 'Hey'; the screen would output Hey. So, for the above flow of text, the logic would simply read, "If the variable smart is equal to true, then output You are really smart". The containers { and } contain what would happen if the instance is true.

The next kind of flow control is the elseif. If the first statement is not true, it would go to the next, and then finally finish-->

<?php
if($smart=='true')
{
print 'You are really smart!';
}
elseif($smart=='false')
{
print 'You are not as smart as I thought';
}
?>

The code above operates as this "If the variable smart is equal to true then print you are really smart. If that is not true, then if smart is equal to false then print you are not as smart as I thought".

The last tidbit of flow control is the else statement. The else statement would happen if all the instances before it have failed. Here is a tidbit of code-->

<?php
if($smart=='false')
{
print 'Your kinda dumb';
}
else
{
print 'I have no idea how smart you are';
?>

Obviously in this instance it would print I have no idea how smart you are becuase $smart does not equal false.

This message was edited by bobbonew on Aug 15 2003.



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The first big step in learning php and mysql is connecting to your first mysql database. But before you can connect, you must have a database to connect to! One of the best ways to administrate an online database is through phpmyadmin. I'm going to recommend using this throughout my tutorials as it is the easiest thing to use out there.

First, log into phpmyadmin and you will get this welcome screen. Type in a name that you want your database to be and click "create".


Now that you have your first database, you can now set your connection strings in a php file. Open up notepad or any text editor (except Word) and type the following into it:

code

<?php $conn = mysql_connect("localhost", "username", "password"); $db = mysql_select_db("database_name"); ?>

//Now the things you must obviously substitute in this code is your username, password, and database_name.

Great you now have the most basic code to connect to your database! Yeah its a great feeling isnt it? It took me about 2.5 hours to connect when I was learning so don't feel bad if you can't get everything to work correctly.

This message was edited by bobbonew on Aug 10 2003.



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Index
Php/mysql Websites
Connecting and creating your first database
PHP Templating System
Different PHP If/Elseif/Else Statements

Introduction
PHP is a scripting language that webmasters use to control content on their site from the server side. This means that when you go to view a php page, you would never see any php code, you see the code the server has processed and outputted to you.

Mysql is perhaps the best online database out there. A database is simple information stored in tables that can be outputted through the use of php. It can store alot of information such as user information, forum posts, news articles, and settings.

This entire site is based on php and mysql and hopefully at the end of these tutorials, you can design your own content management systema and user base. Plus i'm going to post a few php/mysql goodies for your own site.

Also, it would help to read the short tutorial by XsLashEr325 to install php on your computer and to learn the basics of php (which I will reinforce).

[color=#666666]This message was edited by bobbonew on Aug 15 2003.



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