Smith Matt. PHP Crash Course: The Complete, Modern, Hands-On Guide

San Francisco: No Starch Press, 2025. — 731 p. — ISBN-13 978-1-7185-0253-6.Tired of cobbling together PHP solutions from scattered online tutorials? Frustrated by outdated PHP practices that leave your code vulnerable and hard to maintain? Whether you’re building your first dynamic website or modernizing legacy systems, PHP Crash Course gives you a complete, practical foundation for writing professional web applications.PHP is one of the engines that drive the internet: it plays a role both in what the user sees on web pages and in what happens behind the scenes, such as processing form submissions, talking to other websites, and interacting with databases. The language was first released in 1995, but it wasn’t until the late 2000s, when my computing students encouraged me to introduce PHP into their web programming classes, that I began working with it in earnest. They wanted to improve their skill profiles for the job market since they felt the internet was going to continue to grow in importance in the work of computing. They were right.PHP is currently in its eighth major version, so as well as being tried and tested, it’s faster and more secure than ever before. It’s a free, open-source, and well-maintained language. While other popular web programming languages are available, about 70 percent of the web is run by PHP programs, including Etsy, Facebook (using its dialect of PHP, called Hack), Spotify, Wikipedia, and WordPress. PHP also has a relatively shallow learning curve. We’ll start with just a few lines of code, and once you’re comfortable with the basics, we’ll move on to larger, more structured web application systems.In this comprehensive, example-driven guide, you’ll learn how to.
Write clean, maintainable PHP code using modern language features and best practices.
Build secure web applications that protect against common vulnerabilities.
Master database integration using PDO and object-relational mappings (ORMs).
Implement professional features like shopping carts and user authentication.
Structure applications using object-oriented programming and model-view-controller (MVC) patterns.
Leverage powerful tools like Composer and Twig to accelerate development.Starting with PHP fundamentals, you’ll progress through six carefully crafted sections covering essential patterns, security best practices, database integration, and advanced concepts like object-oriented programming. Each chapter builds on real-world examples, giving you the skills to solve common development challenges.Language Fundamentals.
Working with Data.
Programming Web Applications.
Storing User Data with Browser Sessions.
Object-oriented PHP.
Database-driven Application Development.
Appendix A: Installing PHP.
Appendix B: Database Setup.
Appendix C: Replit Configuration.
True/Retail PDF.