In this chapter, we will look at installing the XAMPP server stack for both Windows and Mac OS X, installing the Aptana Studio integrated development environment (IDE), and then start looking at using jQuery Mobile and the various methods you can use in your project to include the framework. We will then create a small application to get our feet wet with jQuery Mobile. For some of you this could be a simple refresher, but for others this could be a crash course introduction.

You may be asking yourself, "Why am I installing a full server stack, and is jQuery Mobile usage tied to PHP or any of the technology in the XAMPP stack?" While this book is focused on development with jQuery Mobile, we will be doing a very small bit of PHP with MySQL, just to show the interaction between the two, and so we will be setting up our XAMPP stack. However, the usage of jQuery Mobile is completely independent of PHP and any other technology in the XAMPP stack, so developers should feel free to use any other server stack that they prefer for development. If you are not a PHP pro, don't worry; the code will be basic and we will explain it all. If you wish to enhance your PHP skills, check out any of the number of PHP titles Packt has published.

Also by no means are you bound to using your local machine. If you have a web server, feel free to use it; we just find it easier to develop on a local machine so we don't have to worry about making a change, uploading, testing, and repeating.