| If you’re reading this book, you probably already know what PHP is—one of the world’s most popular programming languages for Web application development. Widely available and backed by the support of a vociferous and enthusiastic user community, the language was in use on more than 20 million Web sites at the end of 2006…and that number is only expected to grow!
Personally, I’ve always believed the reason for PHP’s popularity to be fairly simple: It has the unique distinction of being the only open-source server-side scripting language that’s both easy to learn and extremely powerful to use. Unlike most modern server-side languages, PHP uses clear, simple syntax and delights in non-obfuscated code; this makes it easy to read and understand, and encourages rapid application development. And then of course, there’s cost and availability—PHP is available free of charge on the Internet, for a variety of platforms and architectures, including UNIX, Microsoft Windows, and Mac OS, as well as for most Web servers.
For these reasons, and many more, developers are flocking to PHP in droves. Their managers aren’t complaining either—using the PHP platform helps organizations benefit from the cost savings that accompany community-driven software, and simultaneously deliver high-quality products by using communitygenerated, well-tested PHP widgets to reduce development and deployment time.
Where does this book come in? Well, PHP has hundreds of built-in functions, classes, and extensions; filtering and analyzing these to identify the most appropriate strategy to deal a particular problem is often beyond developers new to the language, especially those working under tight project deadlines. With this book in hand, developers no longer need to worry about this; PHP Programming Solutions offers ready-made solutions to 250+ commonly encountered problems, making use of both native and external libraries to teach developers the most effective way to use PHP in their development projects. |