Transcript PHP
Programming Language Presentation
PHP
CSCE 330
February 6, 2003
Group Members: Antwan B. Phan
George Hwang
Luat Vu
Contents
I.
What is PHP?
II. What does it do?
III. How does it work?
IV. Comparison of languages
V. Advantages and Disadvantages
VI. Samples of Code
VII.Conclusion
VIII.References & Resources
What is PHP?
PHP stands for Personal Home Pages
Hypertext Processor.
PHP is a server-side, cross-platform, HTML
embedded scripting language.
Was designed in 1995 by Rasmus Lerdorf
because it needs a free tools to program Web
pages.
What is PHP?
A fast, powerful and mature web-based
server-side programming language.
Allows the creation of dynamic web pages
for powerful web sites and web based
applications.
What does it do?
An Internet tool. It is usable for processing
large data on server-side and build an html
page that display the results.
Allows tight integration with a number of
database systems including including
Informix, Microsoft SQL Server, mSQL,
MySQL, ODBC, Oracle and Sybase
Used in conjunction with a relational database
system, like MySQL, large sets of data can be
handled with speed and flexibility.
How does it work?
A PHP scripts produces web pages, and may
be embedded inside html code.
Combines elements of functional and
imperative languages
Interpreter: take source code and directly
execute it.
Compiler: convert source code into
executable code that can be run at a later
time
How does it work?
Similar to C, but adds dynamic variables.
Serves as a "wrapper" for many standard C
libraries.
A server must be configured to execute the
interpreter on pages with .php extensions,
and send resulting html pages on the
network.
Comparison of Languages
PHP draws its strengths from a highly flexible
language derived from C/C++ and its
predecessor, PERL.
Perl syntax is very different from PHP, which
is more formal with its C influenced
procedure-based syntax.
In comparison with Perl, PHP gains some on
the readability side, but loses a lot on the
convenience side.
Advantages
PHP is a powerful language providing fast
development time.
There is a large amount of Open Source code
written in PHP meaning affordable and
speedy development of new applications.
Since it uses similar syntax and constructs,
knowledge of PHP can help you in learning
the C language.
Disadvantages
In order for a database to run correctly, the
PHP code must be changed to suit the
desired database.
A disadvantage is actually created by writers
of PHP scripts who inadvertently create a bug
through which hackers can exploit.
Cookies don't work.
Samples of Code
<html>
<head>
<title>Example</title>
</head>
<body>
Start Tag: <?php echo "Hi, I'm a PHP script!";
?> :End Tag
</html>
</body>
Samples of Code
Code to Open and Query a database in PHP
<?php
$sql = "SELECT * FROM queryitems";
//creates variable ($sql), sets equal to string
mysql_connect();
//connects to MySQL engine
$rs = mysql_db_query("Websitedb",$sql);
//creates record set which contains the results of the
//query
?>
Conclusion
PHP is a server-side scripting language that facilitates
the creation of dynamic Web pages by embedding
PHP-coded logic in HTML documents.
PHP can easily be self-taught and easily be
programmed for everyday use.
PHP combines many of the finest features of Perl, C,
and Java, and adds its own elements to the
concoction to give Web programmers great flexibility
and power in designing and implementing dynamic,
content-oriented Web pages.
References & Resources
http://www.scriptol.org/php.html
http://www.phphelp.com/article/1p1.ph
p
http://www.gnuworld.com/php
http://marty.anstey.ca/programming/