In the age of the Internet, building a web application is no longer a tough task, but building the web application in the right way is not a trait mastered by many. Building a Web Application with PHP and MariaDB: A Reference Guide is aimed at taking readers to the next level and to transform them from beginner-level programmers to intermediate or advanced-level programmers. Building a Web Application with PHP and MariaDB: A Reference Guide is a well thought out guide that begins with the basics of PHP and MariaDB and covers complex topics such as caching, security, building a REST API, and performance optimization. Building a web application that will be secure, scale well under pressure, and have an API available to different subscribers is not a simple task, but this book will make this a simple, easy-to-learn, and a memorable journey.
Chapter 1, CRUD Operations, Sorting, Filtering, and Joins, deals with introducing readers to basic SQL operations such as create, read, update, and delete. We then go to the next step by discussing sorting, filtering, and end by discussing the concept of joining tables.
Chapter 2, Advanced Programming with MariaDB, deals with various data manipulation operations such as alter and drop. After a clear understanding of the DML operations, we will discuss the more advanced concepts such as stored procedures, stored routines, and triggers.
Chapter 3, Advanced Programming with PHP, introduces readers to more advanced programming concepts such as unit testing and exception handling. We also discuss the new features that have been added to PHP 5.4 and 5.5.
Chapter 4, Setting Up Student Portal, deals with using all the concepts encompassed in the last few chapters to build a student portal.
Chapter 5, Working with Files and Directories, deals with the introduction and implementation of file imports, file uploads, and application logging using files in our student portal application.
Chapter 6, Authentication and Access Control, deals with the introduction and implementation of authentication and access controls for our student portal application.
Chapter 7, Caching, introduces the readers to the concept of caching. We later discuss the different types of caching and how each method of caching is implemented.
Chapter 8, REST API, introduces readers to the concept of REST architecture, followed by building a REST API for our student portal.
Chapter 9, Security, deals with an introduction to the different security optimizations that can be performed for Apache, MariaDB, and PHP to secure the web application.
Chapter 10, Performance Optimization, deals with the introduction of different performance optimization techniques that can be used to scale the application more effectively.
Bonus chapter 1, Installation of PHP, MariaDB, and Apache, deals with the installation and configuration of PHP, MariaDB, and Apache. This chapter is not present in the book but is available for download at https://www.packtpub.com/sites/default/files/downloads/Bonus_chapter_1.pdf.
Bonus chapter 2, Object-oriented Programming with PHP, deals with introducing the readers to the concept of Object Oriented Programming (OOP) with PHP and we continue by discussing various OOP features such as inheritance, encapsulation, polymorphism, interfaces, and abstract classes. We end this chapter by discussing a few popular design patterns. This chapter is not present in the book but is available for download at https://www.packtpub.com/sites/default/files/downloads/Bonus_chapter_2.pdf.
This book deals with building web applications; so, to successfully host a web application, you will need the Apache web server. Once the request is received by the web server, it will forward that request to the server-side program, and we will be using PHP for our server-side scripting. We will be using MariaDB as our database server to store our data. We are using Memcache for memory caching. The software needed are: PHP, MariaDB, Apache server, cURL, and Memcache.
This book has been designed to cater to the needs of developers at all levels. This book contains numerous examples, tips, and recommendations that will guide the readers from the installation and configuration phase to deployment phase. Prior knowledge of PHP, MariaDB, and/or Apache web server will be very helpful, but not required.
In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.
Code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter handles are shown as follows: "Upon executing the show databases; command, the list of existing databases will be outputted to the screen"
A block of code is set as follows:
<?php /** * Array declaration before PHP 5.4 * */ $arr = array(1,2,3,4); //Print an element to the screen echo $arr[0]; /** * Array declaration with PHP 5.4 or greater * */ $arr2 = [1,2,3,4]; //Print an element to the screen echo $arr2[0]; ?>
Any command-line input or output is written as follows:
phpunit --version
New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes for example, appear in the text like this: "Now that the database has been successfully changed, note that the database name reflects in between the brackets next to MariaDB, which denotes the current database."
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