PHP Books

What's the best book to learn PHP?
What's the best book for a PHP reference?

My goal is presently limited to construction of a custom 404 page for my web
site and PHP is the only scripting language my ISP allows us to use server
side.

--
http://www.standards.com/; See Howard Kaikow's web site.

> What's the best book to learn PHP?
> What's the best book for a PHP reference?

To be honest, the documentation at php.net is pretty good.

Head to: http://www.php.net/docs.php for a start.

They have a list of books there, too.

--cd

"Coder Droid" <coderdroid@likethiswouldstopspam.hotmail.com> wrote in
message news:ZZD9d.12700$sY3.12390@fe2.texas.rr.com...
> > What's the best book to learn PHP?
> > What's the best book for a PHP reference?
>
> To be honest, the documentation at php.net is pretty good.
>
> Head to: http://www.php.net/docs.php for a start.
>
> They have a list of books there, too.

That list seems to just kust what us available, not what is best.

<Michael Vilain <vilain@spamcop.net>> wrote in message
news:vilain-29D44B.17363608102004@comcast.dca.giganews.com...
> In article <ck74dr$oo6$1@pyrite.mv.net>,
> As with all learning material, there's either a book out there that will
> match your learning style or there isn't and you'll have to write it
> yourself. Some of us find this list to be 'a good start' and don't
> always look for 'the best'. This is a personality thing, mostly. I'm
> satisfied with 'good enough'. The other way lies madness.

There is a wide variety of "quality" in the books on just about all
(computer) subjects.
Many of them are outright crap.

Local bookstores do not devote as much shelf-space to computer books because
they realize such shelves are very often, if not largely, used as a
reference library and that many folkes buy computer books at online vendors
because the books are heavily discounted.

I have found that "reviews" at places such as amazon are not always
reliable, especially for the more specialized books.
So, recommendations in app specific forums is the best path.

"Howard Kaikow" <kaikow@standards.com> wrote in message news:<ck6ame$slq$1@pyrite.mv.net>...
> What's the best book to learn PHP?
> What's the best book for a PHP reference?

Hi
I've got "PHP and MySQL Web Development" by Luke Welling and Laura
Thomson
and I love it.
It's very easy to read and full of helpful examples. Admittedly it is
a bit thick but once you've read it you know pretty much everything
there is to know about PHP (apart maybe for a few functions that you
can look up on php.net)
I thought it was fun to read and now I also use it as a reference (the
index is very good).
Definite recommendation!