The title may have sounded a little vague, but I did not know how to articulate the question.
I want to create a webpage that will contain links to other webpages. But, I want to make it a little modular and want to write all of the functions in one page and access it from the php script(webpage) that contains the part about displaying contents.
In short, I want to create a php page exclusively for displaying contents, and another for running the background functions.
Also, I have a LAMP architecture, and I just have the index.html page to begin with. How do I make it redirect to a php page?
First of all you should start exploring HTML, then Javascript, then PHP, then AJAX.
Take one by one, using books, using other script sources, usign stackoverflow.com to get answers.
I learned all those steps in that order just by reading other peaople sources, exploring and testing then on my own.
Basic HTML is pretty simple if you know how is works.
Learn what can you do with javascript, of course, if you need it.
Your best friend for php is php.net as it will always answer most of the questions
These days javascript frameworks like jQuery simply tells you step by step how to do what you need.
Assuming your LAMP stack is correctly configured, you just need to rename your index.html to index.php.
Then start reading the manual! (I know that sounds unhelpful, but that's where I started and it's the best way for me to learn).
http://www.php.net/manual/en/index.php
Simply rename your index.html to index.php and it should work.
tizag.com (excellent beginner tutorials)
php.net – Contains the PHP manual, user-contributed examples and other
documentation related to PHP.
phpfreaks.com (tutorials)
I ran two PHP workshops in 091 labs and made very trimmed down example apps. Slides and code here: http://091labs.com/wiki/?id=introduction_to_php
Edit: There's an error in the slides for week 1 there, the zend_extension line on setting up xdebug should have a .dll after php_xdebug
I see you already have a project in mind. Programming is best learned with a project rather than focusing on learning by reading alone, so stick with that.
What you described is essentially the Model-View-Controller paradigm used by most web application frameworks. MVC is designed to separate business logic from presentation.
I can't really give you a more specific answer since your question is very vague, but the simplest, most stripped-down way to accomplish MVC is to have two php files, one accessible from the outside, which then includes another file in a protected directory.
So for example you can have a functions.php file and then in your index.php file
require_once('lib/functions.php');
//call functions defined in functions.php
Aside from that, I think you just need to read up a bit and experiment on your own.
If you are starting PHP from scratch and you have LAMP up and running I would advise making a MySQL table with a bunch of strings that represent links to other pages.
I would then attempt to write an index.php page that can access this table and loop through the table displaying the links.
This is probably the easiest non trivial example of using PHP. Remember your page will need to be called index.php not index.html. Place the file in the same folder as your index.html for now.
Good luck!
I would suggest checking out lynda.com It's worth the money and it is a very good introduction to PHP/MySql
Related
I previously had someone build a website for me. It was 90% finished but then ill health got in the way.
I have all the files and I am now asking people to "put the website back together for me". The general consensus is that it's very messy and not clear what was done and some of the protocols are now out of date etc. And it would just be better to start from scratch. I have heard this from multiple people.
So now when I am asking a new guy to build it from scratch, he is asking me for the HTML files. I couldn't see any, so I contacted the previous developer and he said:
There are no HTML files, it all runs through the index.php file and
extracts pages, data etc. from the database.
I told this to the new developer, but he is saying:
But website is not possible without HTML. Ask him provide index HTML.
Pure HTML without php code.
I'm confused, because I saw the website up and running, so it seems it is possible without HTML?
I'm trying to figure out where the misunderstanding is happening.
Thanks.
What your previous developer is saying is that your site was dynamic and all requests were flowing through your index.php file, which in turn does some backend logic to produce HTML data for the browser to interpret. If you ask your previous developer to zip up the root of your old site, your new developer should be able to take it from there.
Can a website exist without HTML?
Without a .html file? Yes. Using only .php, .css and .js is possible.
Without using Hyper Text Mark-up Language? No. There ar no other mark-up language for browsers, afaik. So we're stuck with this.
Old dev used PHP for efficiency. Contents are in your database and fetched using php to show up in browser.
New dev probably only knows HTML and has no clue about php. Or, probably doesn't want to bother reading through the php codes to reverse engineer how your site works.
Suggestion: Get a different dev. A smarter one. You probably have to pay more, but it's more expensive to hire a less smarter dev.
I realize this question is similar to this one but there didn't seem to be a definitive answer there. Currently I'm using <?php include "banner.html"; ?> but in order for this to work I need to change the ext of ALL pages to .php instead of .html.
I don't think this is really best practice. I'd prefer to keep my basic webpages as html files and reserve php files for server-side logic - isn't that the way it's supposed to be??
The banner should be displayed at the top of each page by default as soon as the page loads, so from what I've read jquery.load() is not appropriate as that should typically be triggered by user input. This is not an ASP.NET project so master pages is not an option. Also heard about HTML templating but after googling it I walked away more confused than ever.
I don't think this is really best practice.
It's fine, especially for small sites.
I'd prefer to keep my basic webpages as html files and reserve php files for server-side logic - isn't that the way it's supposed to be??
Keeping business logic and view logic apart is a good idea, but you don't need to go so far as to ban .php extensions on files that don't include business logic.
You might want to investigate the MVC pattern and the approaches taken by frameworks such as CodeIgniter or CakePHP if you want to see how other people keep their logic and HTML separate.
Either go ahead and convert the files to .php (totally fine practice), or use file_get_contents rather than include to get the HTML content:
<?php echo file_get_contents('banner.html'); ?>
I was having a "discussion" with my manager today about the merits of using PHP includes and functions as a template to build websites more quickly and efficiently. He has been using Dreamweaver templates for years and sees it as really the best way to go. I would like to start using some different and more efficient methods for web creation, because we need to get through our projects faster. I would like to know in detail what would make Dreamweaver dwts better than using code to accomplish the same task, or vice versa.
His reasoning is:
When you change links on the dwt file, it changes links for every page made from that dwt.
Even if you move pages around in directories, it maintains links to images
Everyone in the company should do it one way, and this is the way he chose (there are two of us, with someone who's just started who needs to learn web design from the beginning, and he plans to teacher her the dwt method)
If you edit a site made with a dwt, you can't change anything in the template (it's grayed out), making it safer
If he's building sites with dwt, and I'm doing it with PHP includes, we can't edit each others' sites. It gets all over the place. When we have new employees in the future, it will get all crazy and people can't make changes to others' sites if they're out of the office.
I've been studying PHP these days, and am thrilled with how powerful it is for creating dynamic pages. The site in question which sparked this "discussion" is more or less static, so a dwt would work fine. However, I wanted to stretch my wings a bit, and the code was getting REALLY jumbled as the pages grew. So I chopped off the header, footer, and sidebar, and brought them in to all the pages with a php include, as well as dynamically assigned the title, meta data, and description for each page using variables echoed in the header.The reasons I like this better are:
It's cleaner. If every page contains all the data for the header and footer, as well as the extra tags Dreamweaver throws in there, then I have to sift through everything to find where I need to be.
It's safer. It's sort of like the above reason dwts are safe, except I do all my code editing in a text editor like Coda. So on occasion I have accidentally deleted a dwt-protected line of code because those rules only apply within dreamweaver. I can't chop off part of the header if I can't see it. Incidentally, this makes it easier to identify bugs.
It's modern. I look through source when I see great pages made by designers and design firms I admire. I've never seen dwt tags. I believe by using PHP to dynamically grab files and perform other tasks that keeps me from having to go through and change something on every page, life becomes easier, and keeps things streamlined and up-to-date with current web trends and standards.
It's simple. This should be at the top of the list. Like I said we have to train a new person in how to create for the web. Isn't it much better for her to learn a simple line of PHP and get an understanding for how the language works, rather than learn an entire piece of (not exactly user-friendly) software just for the purpose of keeping her work the exact same as everyone else's? On that note, I believe PHP is a powerful tool in a web designer's arsenal, and it would be a sin to prevent her from learning it for the sake of uniformity.
It's fast. Am I mistaken in my thought that a page build with header and footer includes loads faster than one big page with everything in it? Or does that just apply when the body is loaded dynamically with AJAX?
I did extensive searching on Google and Stack Overflow on this topic and this is the most relevant article I could find:
Why would one use Dreamweaver Templates over PHP or Javascript for templating?
The answer is helpful, but I would really like to understand in more detail why exactly we shouldn't switch to a new method if it's simpler and has more potential. My manager insists that "the result is the same, so if there isn't something that makes me say, 'oh wow that's amazing and much better!', then we should just stay how we are now."
(I do apologize for the length of this question, but the guidelines asked that I be as specific as possible.)
Like I said in comments, without knowing what exactly sites you are working with it's hard to tell which PHP features are most important to showcase. However, I can try and describe the most simple kind of sites I was dealing with, and where and how PHP came in handy. If you work with something more complicated, the need of programming language may only increase.
The simple website may have a few different pages with text and images. I'm assuming nothing interactive (i.e. no inquiry form), no large amount of structured data (i.e. no product catalog), only one design template which is used by every page with no differences whatsoever. Here's the typical structure:
One PHP file (index.php) for handling all sorts of php-ish stuff
One design file (template.php for example) for storing everything html-ish (including header, footer and more. Basically all html with placeholders for text and menu)
One CSS file for, well, the site CSS
Most of the texts are stored in database or (worst case) just txt files. Menu (navigation) is stored in database as well
Images folder with all the needed images
The key features here are:
Simplicity. You only have as many files and code as you really need to keep things organized and clear
Reusability. You can basically copy/paste your php code with little to no changes for a new similar website
No duplicates whatsoever.
Data and design separation. Wanna change texts, fix typos? You do it without as much as touching design (html) files. Wanna make a completely brand new design for your website? You can do it without even knowing what those texts are or where they are kept.
like deceze said, no lock-ins. Use whatever software you like. (Including Dreamweaver)
PHP is responsible for taking texts, menus, design and rendering them all into a web page. If website is in more than 1 language, PHP code choose the right texts for the language of visitors choice.
If texts are stored in database, you don't even need notepad and ftp. You just need, i.e., phpMyAdmin (stored in server) so you can connect directly to database and edit any text you like using only web browser; from anywhere in the world. (I am assuming no real CMS). If you need to add one more page, you connect to database using myAdmin and browser, enter the page name (for menu) in 1 or more languages, enter the text for new page (in 1 or more languages), done! new page created, name placed in the menu, all hyperlinks generated for you. If you need to remove a page, you connect to database and click delete. If you need to hide a page for a while (i.e. for proof reading before publishing), you connect to database and uncheck "published" box.
All this doesn't come with just using database ofcourse, you need to program these features with PHP. It may take about 1 - 3 hours depending on experience and the code is fully reusable for every similar website in the future. Basically you just copy/paste php file, copy/paste database tables, enter new text and menu into database, put placeholders into your html file and done! brand new site created.
Which immediately makes most of the reasoning for DWT irrelevant. You don't move files around because you have only one html file and no directories, you don't need grayed out template because texts/images (content) and template are not even in the same file, there's no such thing as changing links in dwt file because it's PHP that generates them on the fly (these are not real links to real html files but rather links with parameters to tell PHP which exactly page must be rendered.. because remember we have just 1 file). The bottom line is, comparing features of the two side by side is like comparing features of a sword vs machinegun. Sharpness and length of the blade concepts are meaningless in a case of machinegun; while lifetime sword user won't really get the meaning of velocity and caliber before he tries and uses machinegun. And yet, while you can't compare their features one by one, no one brings sword to a gunfight for a reason :)
As for #3, currently there are many more people working with PHP than DWT (in a case you will need more employees in the future, or if other people will need to work with your websites later, etc.) As for #5, you can edit PHP websites with Dreamweaver as fine as DWT websites.
That's just off the top of my head. I wrote this in my lunch break so I likely forgot or missed quite a few things. I hope you will get a proper answer with detailed DWT vs PHP comparison too.
You simply can't compare PHP vs. DWT.
PHP is a programming language, where templating is just one of it's numerous features, and DWT is just a silly proprietary system to build simple web pages.
there is actually nothing to compare.
I would say that using DWT templates over PHP do have some advantages.
It does not need any extra server-side process, like PHP to process the files at the server.
You can serve all files to the user as .html files rather than .php files, though I suspect that it is possible to hide the .php extension. Why should any user see anything other than .html?
You don't have to learn PHP syntax/programming. It is true that you can do more with PHP that plain .dwt files but for plain templating the .dwt files can be just as clean.
It is not true that .dwt files are a lock-in technology. The feature is also implemented by other web editors, e.g. Microsoft Expression Web.
I'm developing my first web application using PHP, MySql, and HTML, but I'm at a roadblock: now I have to start piecing all the pages, modules, and included files into an actual 'application'. I'm really trying to make this an answerable question, and not a discussion topic, but now I'm thinking about 'web design' - and I don't want to have to learn css and all that, because I want to speand my time programming and not designing. So what I'd like is a utility where I can visually design, say a menu bar, and just paste the code into my application where I can work with it. Or I want to format text visually, and paste the css file into my application. I guess what I want to easily design a layout with forms, images and graphics, and have them show up with my dynamic tables. So my question is - is it a good option to go with a big design program like Dreamweaver for this, or is there an easier way? I'm not really even a programmer (can you tell?), and I'm figuring this out as I go. As an aside, I'm pretty pleased with what I've got so far - I think the functions and modules are pretty useful, and the end product (however I get there) will be great. Apologies for the rambling question, and any advice is really appreciated.
In a perfect world, development would happen entirely independently of design and you could focus on only what most interests you.
But that isn't reality.
Learning HTML and CSS will be invaluable if you expect to have any success with this project or your next. And they are not that hard to learn.
My advice? Download Notepad++ (or TextWrangler if you're on a Mac), FireFox, FireBug, and start playing around. Do some tutorials. Force yourself to go through the process.
No reason to avoid learning something.
You should really learn HTML and CSS or alternatively hire a web designer. Code produced by Dreamweaver and similar programs is terrible. Especially if you try to mix it with PHP you'll get problem. Really, at least write the markup yourself, the styling may be done by another person ;)
I think even if you don't want to become a "web designer", it's still worth learning the basics of CSS. Just read through the W3Schools CSS tutorial - that will give you enough to get started, and won't take long.
I wouldn't recommend going the Dreamweaver route - you'll learn a lot more if you code by hand.
I'm relatively new to Magento and working on a site build for a client and they simply need a list of phrases used throughout the site to be sent to a translator. I'm a little surprised that there isn't something simple and built into Magento for easily pulling this stuff out, which is why I'm writing here now. Is there a relatively simple way to extract translation phrases from a Magento app? Something built in that might not be obvious (to me)? or some useful library out there? This includes everything used in the templates (or controllers) like so:
$this->__("Some phrase on my website...");
... as well as cases in the layout XML where the 'translate' attribute is set, etc.
And taking this one step further, I'm aware of the available translations available from Magento here: http://www.magentocommerce.com/translations -- is there something simple to make sure I'm not double-doing it for phrases that might already exist in these packs?
And further still, is there a something to pull all translatables out of the database?
And if the answer for all this turns out to be 'no', I need to be very thorough with this so any advice on pitfalls or particular spots I need to be aware of where I might not think of pulling translations from, how you might have achieved something like this before, etc. -- I would love to hear your tips. Thanks!
I know I'm late, but anyway, I’ve just uploaded an extension that does that: Language CSV Files Generator.
It only extracts strings from .php and .phtml files, I have no idea of how to get the .xml ones. Hope that someone out there could share some idea.
hope you like it
Take a look in /app/locale/(language_country)/*.csv files.
There are different solutions to get the strings from CSV files of Magento:
check the links The Ultimate Guide to Translating Magento (using Translation Memory software)
and How to translate Magento using OmegaT software