Rating: 
Summary: Good book for PHP beginner
Review: I've found this book very useful for a PHP beginner as me. I could make the whole website working with Dreamweaver MX 2004, PHP5 and MySQL 4x on my local machine and test it on a webserver using PHP4x and MySQL 3x.
Hints to work with this book:
ON YOUR LOCAL MACHINE:
1. Do not create password for MySQL
2. When creating Database Connection in Dreamweaver, type in the username as root, but do not type the password.
3. For Admin page, if you get an error, use the error handler shown on page 300, 301 to handle it.
ON A WEBSERVER:
Go through pages and specify host, MySQL username and password (don't miss page 254).
I have enjoyed the book very much.
Minh Lam
Rating: 
Summary: Overxplanation of DW basics instead of PHP creation
Review: If you have even rudimentary knowledge of Dreamweaver and MySQL, you can skip right to chapter 6. The first 6 chapters laboriously discuss Dreamweaver, PHP and MySQL, without giving any practical usage...instead the book repeats the same concepts over and over and over.So, I was happy when I finally got to the part of actually using Dreamweaver to create a PHP application in Chapter 6. But I was disappointed to find that a lot of the steps simply tell you what to click on and what to enter, without giving you an explanation of what's going on behind the scenes and what it is you're actually doing. For instance, when you're developing the example application of a hotel booking system, when you create a Recordset the book sometimes says things like "Setup the Filter so it reads ID=Form Variable bookingID. This creates a record where the ID field matches the bookingID sent from a previous page." Well, OK. But there is absolutely no mention of what the other options are in the Recordset Filter dropdown menu, or what they do, or why the Form Variable works the way it does, or exactly how it pulls the information from the prvious page. Please tell me WHY this does what it does? It surprises me that they could be so meticulous in explaining every little miniscule detail of everyday Dreamweaver functions, yet casually throw around the idea of using Dreamweaver to create PHP as if we already know how to do that, but are trying to learn the very basics of Dreamweaver instead. I guess what I'm getting at is this: you could simply fly through the tutorial and build the example in no time, but when you're done you won't have a clue as to why half the things the book told you to do function the way they do, let alone take the knowledge to build YOUR OWN application. So, I'm taking the lessons VERY slow to try to soak it all in. Oh, and one other annoyance. This book seems to be written by authors who use English as second language...the obscene overuse of the word "whilst" (sometimes 6 times per page) will have you pulling your hair out by Chapter 2. Who uses the word WHILST in real life???? I'm still laboring through the book...perhaps I'll write a follow-up when I finish. It's not terrible, but it could be better. Bottom line: an even so-so, not a thumbs-up or thumbs-down.
Rating: 
Summary: All windows, No Mac
Review: If your doing development on a Mac, this book is NOT for you. I started reading the intro chapter 1, which did mention how to configure PHP on Mac OSX, but when i got to chapter 2, installing and configuring MySQL, everythign was windows related. So that leaves me with a worthless book. Ive been workign with HTML and Flash for a few years and really want to start using the dynamic aspects of site development instead of hiring out every time i need PHP or server tech done. On my own again....
Rating:
Summary: Matt Review - Dreamweaver MX: PHP Web Development
Review: Matt Review - Dreamweaver MX: PHP Web Development - Gareth Downes-Powell, Tim Green, Bruno Mairlot - Glasshaus I am stunned. Real deer in the headlights stuff here. I have gone through so many books in the years I have been in the business and edited about 12 of them. This has to be the best, I mean the VERY best book I have ever seen dealing with databases and web programming. If I had had this book in 1996, I would have *owned* that damned sock puppet and half the other dot coms as well. This is a MUST have book not just for PHP but for any other application server because of the excellent treatment of SQL and how to build a complex application in Dreamweaver MX. In fact, I would recommend this book and an install of PHP and MySQL for any developer to prototype their site regardless of the final application server or database you plan to use. On to the meat. The good... The good stuff starts early and goes on for the whole dang book. There is a great overview of PHP (including an explanation of the original name for PHP, Personal Home Page Tools) and MySql that is enough to get a good picture of why to use the tools together. The first chapter also walks you trough the setup of PHP simply and correctly. I had to reformat this machine and had not reinstalled PHP before reading this book and it was a perfect reference to install and I remember it being a lot harder when I went through the instructions at the PHP.net site where I got PHP in the first place. The chapter on MySQL was as good as the PHP install instructions. It is followed by a good overview of setting up a site in DMX so that by the end of Chapter 2, you are ready to get to work and have done a real job of setting up your app server, database, and the connections to them in Dreamweaver MX. This is about 75 pages of the 350 page book. A real investment in getting you started well. You have built a site before or you wouldn't be looking at a book like this, but have you really *planned* a site? Not to fear if you haven't you are going to get a good overview of that as well. Tim Green, the author of this chapter covers good design and planning of the sample site, a hotel, using flowcharts and modular design. There is also a detailed explanation of the tables that you need to create for the site and how they relate to one another. This discussion is VERY useful regardless of the app server and database you are using. The techniques here are very easy to transfer even if some of the details are different than they would be in other databases. The chapter on manipulating the database, Chapter 6 shows through some excellent examples how to use a lot of the built in features of DMX, not only covering the usual add, update, show records, but using showif commands in detail. Something that I see users ask about often. The Advanced SQL Usage chapter is the best in the book though. Bruno Mairlot goes through SQL in a practical sort of way, showing examples and giving reasons of why you do things. This is a real gem. This chapter alone is worth the price of admission. I think that with this and the Learn SQL in Ten Minutes book that I swear by, you are going to have all the tools that you need to do almost anything. The remainder of the book covers hand coding in DMX, tag libraries, debugging your web app, and a number of other issues that are not well covered everywhere else. The one remaining gem in the book is the coverage in Chapter 11 of the Server Behavior Builder. Given that Dreamweaver MX does not have the breadth of functions for PHP, that is does for ColdFusion or ASP.Net, this is a really important chapter. For the user of other server models, it is still a great way to get your feet wet with this tool. The bad... Short section here. I tried to find things I don't like about the book and I couldn't. The worst that I can say is that the pages are pretty full and I would have liked a little more whitespace to take notes. Pretty banal point really. Face it, there really is nothing bad here. (It would be nice to have a CD, but the code is available at the glasshaus site.) The review... What can I say. This is THE book. I am going to go through this again to go over some of the Advanced SQL over the weekend. This book is a must have if you are doing dynamic sites and a must-must have if you are doing PHP and MySQL. 10 out of 10 Matts.
Rating: 
Summary: Could be better, but best there is so far
Review: The bad news first - The first 50 pages do a fairly decent job of explaining what PHP/MySQL are, and how to get them running on your system, but I found myself feeling as if they assumed I knew a few things that I in fact did not. Took me a week (and a few visits to some user forums) to finally get my WinXP (NTFS) system configured correctly - and I'm sure they were simple fixes that I needed. I recomend having other PHP/MySQL documentation nearby before starting. You'll want them anyway to dig deeper once you're through with this book. All that aside - once the applications are running smoothly this book does a wonderful job of not only walking you through the process of building a database-driven site, but explains the whys and why nots. I consider myself quite comfortable and familiar with DW, but even I learned a few new tricks. I'd gladly pay more if the book included more help with set-up, but it's still the best I've found and I'll be trying other titles from Glasshaus.
Rating:
Summary: Errors!
Review: The book seamed perfect to help me learn PHP and MYSQL using DWMX. Too bad it's so full of errors and mistakes. Remeber trying to learn how to drive a car. Now imagine trying to learn on a car that stalls and breaks down constantly. That's what the book feels like to me. I find myself trouble shooting all the code and that is pretty hard when you are just learning.
There is no CD but you can download SOME of the code. Having a final (working) version of the site would have made all the errors stand out a bit more.
I am learnig from it, it's just a bit frustrating and slow.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent for Dreamweaver MX's PHP_MySQL server model
Review: This book is a must-have for anyone who wants to use the PHP_MySQL server model in Dreamweaver MX. The authors, who are very helpful members of the Dreamweaver user community, have given us something that is useful for new as well as experienced web developers. Those who are new to dynamic web site development and do not have prior PHP knowledge can also easily get up to speed with how best to use PHP and MySQL with Dreamweaver MX.
Rating:
Summary: Great book, but lacking some detail
Review: This book is a really great read that ties dreamweaver and php together. And since it is basically the only book out there that does that, it is a must have for any dreamweaver/php developer. You will learn a lot from this book. But there are some problems with the book. The main problem I had with the book is that in various spots throughout, the author just leaves things out. They'll tell you to do something, but give no explanation as to how to do it or even why you are doing it. I guess they assume too much. For example, they'll tell you to add some php code to the application and show you the code to enter including numerous variables, etc... But they will only give a general overview of the code and not go into detail why certain lines read the way they do and why you're calling certain variables or why the syntax is a certain way. It can leave you scratching your head at times. But, like I said, if you are a dreamweaver/php developer, this is a must have. You will definitely learn alot, but you may have to do some searching to fill in some gaps.
Rating:
Summary: very poor writing
Review: this book is not for beginners ... poor writing and have a lot of nonsence layouts . wasting money to buy ...
Rating:
Summary: Very Useful but full of mistakes
Review: This book is one of those rare books on programming PHP with Dreamweaver. The explanations and instructions are very good but you have to be carefull about the mistakes in conflicting database names and some coding. We spent almost 2 hours in finding where we are doing wrong. We finally found out that it was because the coding was misspelled... But we recommend this book to those who want to build php, mysql pages with DreamWeaver MX.
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