Which PHP version good for newbie?

[masterguns]

I'm wondering which PHP version I should download, being a complete newbie and not knowing anything about PHP. (but want to learn) ?

I understand that PHP 4 will not be updating anymore as of end of year.

thanks

[Watdaflip]

Re: Which PHP version good for newbie?

You don't have to download php unless you want to run it on your own computer. If you have an account with vodahost, or any webhosting company, php is installed on the servers, you can learn and experiment and run any php code right from the server.

If you really have your heart set on installing php on your computer, you going to want to make sure that IIS is turned on. You can use php version 4 if you want, you are correct in that at the end of this year that the organization that maintains php will drop all support for it (meaning no more updates) for php 4. I would suggest installing php 5 simply because there are more fun things you can do with it, but its doesn't matter.

There is a package you can download that has php and mysql bundled, but I can't for the life of me remember the name

[navaldesign]

Re: Which PHP version good for newbie?

Here is a nice bundle: http://www.easyphp.org/?lang=en
with Apache 2.2. php5.2.0 and MySQL5.0.27
easy to install

[masterguns]

Re: Which PHP version good for newbie?

Hey thanks guys---I want to DL it onto my computer and learn it a little before paying for hosting fees. Could I not see how some of the programs I create work without uploading it onto a server. Once I get a little more comfortable with what I'm doing I will get hosting.

Should I dl the easyphp 2.0 beta 1, or the non beta version 1.8?

[navaldesign]

Re: Which PHP version good for newbie?

I would suggest installing the stable version. For the moment, since you are starting, it is more than enough. In the future you can upgrade

[Watdaflip]

Re: Which PHP version good for newbie?

If you download what naval told you to download, that will let you run php on your local machine. This way you can pretty much create your entire website in php and then purchase hosting and host it online.

Some good resources for php are:
http://w3schools.com (tutorial website)
http://tizag.com (tutorial website)
http://php.net (php documentation)
http://codewalkers.com (php community, very good resource)