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Re: [LUG] Databases part 3

 

Neil Winchurst wrote:

> Much more research needed, and I will do just that. Meanwhile, just one
> question. LAMP stands for Linux, Apache, Mysql and PHP, yes? Or the
> letter P could be for Perl or Python. I don't know Perl or PHP but I
> do know Python. Is that acceptable or should I make the effort to learn
> one of the others? And if so which one?

Any language that can be run by apache as a script and can talk to
databases can be used. PHP is just very common for server side scripting
I can't specifically comment on python as a server side script but i am
sure it is entirely ok.

If you were not running your own web server you may find the number of
hosting companies that support python limited compared to php.

> 
> And, since it appears that PHP is a scripting language, does it replace
> Javascript, or is that needed too? And, unfortunately, I don't know

No different beast, PHP and other server side scripts are run by the
webserver as it is generating the page, ie you can read stuff from a
database and display it in a nice table. You may not need javascript at
all but if you require any significant user interaction then javascript
can help out it depends on the complexitity. Remeber php etc run as the
page is generated, javascript runs once the page is displayed and can
interact directly with the user, php would require you to fetch another
page from the server to do user interaction. To put data back in the
database or update somthing you would probably call a page update.php
and use the http POST method to send all the new data as fields, php can
turn these directly into variables and then you can do what you like
with them.

Sounds really complicated but its not that bad once you get going. Find
some examples and see how they work. Neil W's isbnsearch code (as
previously mentioned) might be worth a look as examples.

> Apache either. Big sigh...... To have proper control takes a lot of
> hard work.
> 

Apache is not a lot of hard work, especially if you use a nice distro
that sets things up well in the first place.

Regards

Robin

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