Product Description

Learn by doing! Follow along, step-by-step, as you upgrade a static HTML site that uses obsolete code to an XML standard-compliant, CSS-formatted dynamic site using Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP), Macromedia ColdFusion, or the open source PHP. Create several integrated applications for a fictional travel tour operator, including a searchable listing for tour descriptions, country profiles, and a tour price calendar. In this official Macromedia guide, you’ll learn how to:

• Use a relational database—Microsoft Access or MySQL—as the driving force behind a site
• Use Dreamweaver’s built-in server behaviors and application objects to assist in the rapid development of dynamic Web applications
• Read and hand-code ASP VBScript, ColdFusion Markup Language, and PHP scripts well enough to understand how dynamic Web pages work, troubleshoot errors, and customize scripts
• Collect and  manipulate user-entered data, performing calculations on the fly
• Use SQL to pass information between your pages and the database
• Validate forms using client-side and server-side scripts
  

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #331303 in Books
• Published on: 2005-11-24
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 528 pages

From the Back Cover
Learn by doing! Follow along, step-by-step, as you upgrade a static HTML site that uses obsolete code to an XML standard-compliant, CSS-formatted dynamic site using Microsoft Active Server Pages (ASP), Macromedia ColdFusion, or the open source PHP. Create several integrated applications for a fictional travel tour operator, including a searchable listing for tour descriptions, country profiles, and a tour price calendar. In this official Macromedia guide, you’ll learn how to:

• Use a relational database—Microsoft Access or MySQL—as the driving force behind a site
• Use Dreamweaver’s built-in server behaviors and application objects to assist in the rapid development of dynamic Web applications
• Read and hand-code ASP VBScript, ColdFusion Markup Language, and PHP scripts well enough to understand how dynamic Web pages work, troubleshoot errors, and customize scripts
• Collect and  manipulate user-entered data, performing calculations on the fly
• Use SQL to pass information between your pages and the database
• Validate forms using client-side and server-side scripts
  

About the Author
Jeffrey Bardzell is an IT Trainer and multimedia instructional developer at Indiana University. He has developed many courses and authored numerous books on Macromedia Dreamweaver, Flash, Fireworks, and ColdFusion, including the previous edition, Macromedia Dreamweaver MX 2004 with ASP, ColdFusion, and PHP: Training from the Source from Macromedia Press. He co-founded Allecto Media, an eLearning development and consulting company, with his wife.

Customer Reviews

Perfect for learning PHP and MySQL (foundation level)
Previous to starting this book I had a knowledge of Dreamweaver 8 and CSS but absolutely no knowledge at all of dynamic pages. Readers need to have a knowledge of Dreamweaver but not to any great depth.

The book is aimed at teaching good understanding of what is possible with ASP, Coldfusion and PHP. The book deals with all 3 different scripting languages simultaneously. Where there are key differences in the methodologies between the different languages the author takes time to implicitly outline the steps needed for each one.

I completed the book with respect to PHP and using MySQL on an Apache server (all open source, and therefore free). The author takes you through the installation of the languages and databases to enable you to create a testing server on your local machine. I had a few problems with respect to the installation of PHP and MySQL as the versions outlined in the book have been superceeded due to the fast way in which open source software is developed, and therefore have slight differences in install procedures. This caused me a problem BUT I am glad it did as the problems that I had to solve gave me real-world experience of what kind of things can affect a good install of these packages. Once I had corrected a few files and PHP, MySQL and Apache were all living in unison the book had good flow and I think the right amount of knowledge being taught in each lesson.

I recommend this book with respect to PHP, MySQL and Apache. I cannot refer to the ASP or Coldfusion code as I did not follow that route.

I would of given this book 4.5 if possible as I felt it wasn't quite a 5 star buy, but highly recommended never-the-less

Pretty Good
I have used previous version of Dreamweaver and wanted to start using the Database Features in Dreamweaver 8, so I tried this book. It showed me how to do everything I needed to do.

However it focuses on the coding, I would much prefer to use the features built in to dreamweaver.

So if your a coder then it's perfect, if not it's still pretty good, but you'll have to find out which things Dreamweaver will do for you, and which ones it won't