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Using PHP to Access MySQL Databases

The PHP language is a server-side scripting language that is usually embedded with the HTML of a web page. Upon a page request, the PHP script inside the HTML page is executed by the web server and substituted with HTML elements before the page is displayed by the browser to the user. PHP has many libraries and more are developed as time goes by. All of these libraries are available in many cheap PHP hosting resources and provide for a fast access to database management systems and is thus an ideal tool that is used in application logic development. PHP also includes library functions that provide for execution of SQL statements. In addition, these functions also help in the management of database queries, error handling and in the data control between the PHP engine and the database resource. This means that the server that hosts the PHP engine will need to host the SQL engine as well or have access to it. Cheap PHP hosting destinations are available that offer these services.

There are many PHP scripting techniques that are used to query a MySQL server and get the HTML results displayed on the web browser. Usually, connecting to the server with PHP involves a number of steps. The first step involves opening the database connection using a script like the following;

$connection = mysql_connect (“localhost”,”David”,”Mike”);

Next is to select the specific database we want to query. Again you use a script of the sort; mysql_select_db (‘Microsoft’, $connection). At this juncture you have a connection to the database and you can now manipulate data. Of course, at to this point, we have assumed that your web server has both the SQL and PHP scripting engines installed. In most cases though, you do not need to worry about this; even cheap PHP hosting and MySQL servers offer support to these engines since they are the most widely used. It is always good to confirm first with your service provider before deploying such scripts to avoid disappointments later.

Back to our ‘Microsoft’ database, we then have to run a query on the Microsoft database. For example, this query can be a listing of the employees in the company or their products. You can then query a specific row and have the results printed out. To ensure that the results are formatted correctly, print a carriage return using something like ‘print “\n”’. Remember that we are using PHP and thus you will need to have the appropriate tags in place when doing the querying. This is an example of the power that PHP and SQL offer in database access. There are many cheap PHP hosting servers on the web that you can use to try this out with. You will be amazed at the power of these web tools.

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