I agree with others on w3schools- not the best site- others have mentioned most of the points I would make. Personally, I started off with a basic php book (Beginning PHP 5.3 by Matt Doyle). It's not bad- I still use it as a reference. I also spent time just learning the basic functions and their syntax, input/output data types, etc... Online tutorials help, as do online videos (there are a number of tech tutorial video companies that have some good videos. I am sure there are a number of free ones. Most important suggestion I can give is to come up with some project you want to accomplish and use that as your motivation. It is hard to learn code if you do not do code. It's like mathematics that way. Try to watch out for "best practices" suggestions and "design patterns". I think knowing basic design patterns can not be stressed enough. Since you are new to programming- I would suggest also getting a book which gives you a good overview of basic programming principles. Usually that choose a language to demonstrate examples. I am not familiar with one that uses php but I would not doubt it is there is one out there. Also, keep an eye out for stuff on unit testing. Call me a zealot but to me you can not separate programming from debugging- unit testing can dramatical reduce debugging time. So to summarize: 1) Personally, I am a believer in getting a good book. 2) Use online tutorials as a supplement 3) keep an eye out for design patterns and best practices suggestions- Model View Controller architectural pattern is a good one to keep an eye out. 4) Familiarize yourself with unit testing techniques and get used to using it (look up phpunit) 5) Find an intro level book on basic programming principles -- PHP General Mailing List (http://www.php.net/) To unsubscribe, visit: http://www.php.net/unsub.php
