NYCPHP Meetup

[B.A.S.]

Ken Robinson wrote:
> I would join one of the on-line PHP related forums. I joined the 
> PHPFreaks forum <http://www.phpfreaks.com/forums/index.php> 2.5 years 
> ago and found it very helpful.

Thanks. I've visited the site before but not the forum--I'll definitely 
take a look.

>> What about IDEs? Because of my HTML coding & graphic design 
>> background, I'm still using Dreamweaver--would I perhaps learn faster 
>> or be more productive using Zend Studio (or even something less 
>> expensive like phpDesigner)?
> 
> I've never used Dreamweaver, so I can't tell you anything pro or con. 
> I've used TopStyle Pro, since it's very good at HTML, CSS, & PHP 
> editing. I would also recommend installing a local copy of 
> Apache/PHP/MySQL on your everyday computer, so you have a place to 
> experiment. I use xampp <http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html> on 
> my Windows XP laptop. I've been able to develop code on Windows and 
> upload to my Linux host with no problems.

I've got PHP installed on my primary computer and Apache/PHP/MySQL 
installed on a secondary one on my home network for testing purposes. 
The only problem I've run into is a situation where the server was 
running an old version of MySQL that caused a problem with importing 
tables. It was relatively easy to fix though.

>> Please forgive the numerous questions, but I'm 40+ years old and want 
>> to approach this professionally, not just be some hack who writes 
>> sloppy code for for beer & pizza money and doesn't care about the client.
> 
> Questions are one of the best ways to learn. 

Indeed they are. It's good to know you guys are tolerant of them. I was 
a little intimidated by the level of experience & knowledge I noticed 
here, but I figured as long as I asked reasonable questions no one would 
bite my head off. IOW not like some of the questions I often see in 
web-related forums like, "hI gUyZ! I just got a copy of Dreamweaver and 
I wanna build my first web site. I want it to be like YouTube. Can u 
tell me how to do it? BTW, can u also tell me how to set up a site in 
Dreamweaver?" Ummmm... to answer question #1, NO. To answer question #2, 
press F1.

> And don't worry about being older, I didn't start to learn PHP until 
> I was almost 50 (47 or 48 to be almost exact).

Well I'm 45, so I guess there's hope for me yet. ;-)

Regards,
Bev