OT: Q re getting started in web publishing....

[AMF]

Hi all,

I'm thinking about getting into web publishing, educating myself about it, and eventually building a website for myself (maybe for my own business, or something like that). I have a basic level of knowledge of html, C/C++, TCP/IP, etc....but not SQL, Java, Perl, flash, and most stuff that is new from the past few years...

I am thinking about learning all of the above (especially SQL and perl) and then getting something like Macromedia Dreamweaver MX and using it to make pages that I'll put on an apache server on a linux box. I want to make a professional looking site linked to a SQL database (and a mail server), but probably not with credit card verification or video or anything too flashy. I really don't want to get a windoze server...but I have no trouble developing on a windows box then porting stuff to my linux machine. Is this all feasible/typical? Any suggestions on software, research, and hardware to use in this regard? What are the best books for a beginner like myself to start with?

This is really just a proof-of-concept question, and all of this will happen, if it does at all, over the next few years, but wanted to get started on the fundamentals, since I figure it will take me a while to learn how to do things properly...

thanks,

Alarik

[Evil_Duckie]

Alarik,

I found the best way to go is simply dive in and get it done.
I've personally done a lot with PHP, which I found relatively easy to learn coming from a Basic/Delphi background. For database, I used Postgresql and at one point I had set up a rather complex database with browser front-end for managing customer information. Don't ask me to do it again though, it was rather time-consuming. The concept works and I like it a lot. It gives you ultimate power over your website.

One thing though: if you're using Dreamweaver to work on stuff like PHP or Perl, be prepared for some frustration. The previews are all messed up because Dreamweaver will not evaluate the code, so always test it on a local server.

My current website ( http://www.redgeographics.com , shameless plug) uses a combination of HTML with PHP. I develop it locally, using Dreamweaver. For testing, I'm running a local apache server. Since I have hardly any experience in setting that up, I got a standard package from http://www.apachefriends.org/en/

Not sure on which books to look at, because I hardly use them myself. There's some excellent online docs for PHP available, I assume it'll be the same for Perl. You can always try your local library.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

My advice is, work in a professional publishing house for a while. It will give you experience and contacts. (I'm assuming you're talking commercial) If you have a magazine with say, eight mediocre stories, no-one will bother. But if one or two of those stories every month is good, you'll probably have a readership. A small one, maybe, but you'll have one.

If you're not going commercial, then you just need stories that are better than the average fan-fiction.

[Fyron]

Leave Flash alone. It is a festering eye sore on the face of the internet, mostly used for insidious advertisements. You would be better off not looking into it, in my opinion.

Perl is antiquated and very annoying to work with. Go with PHP. It is more powerful and easier to use, as well as based off of C++, so it is very easy to learn. PHP and MySQL go hand in hand very well.

In my opinion, Dreamweaver is a waste of money... it doesn't really provide much useful functionality. You can get a better IDE for many languages, such as PHP, if you get Eclipse and some plugins for it. All for free, rather than shelling over big bucks for 2nd rate software...

[AMF]

Duckie: Thanks! your site http://www.redgeographics.com/ site is sort of like what kind of website I'm thinking of. about the same level of functionality, layout, etc...

NPCBoom: I probably confused the issue by saying "web publishing" - I'm not looking to actually publish documents so much as have a website for a business that I might start in a few years. It would contain articles, but it would be more of an advertisment+ email + document repository thing...so nothing too exciting, really, I'm just ignorant about anything but the basics. I did have a "website" I set up a while back, on a linux machine, consisting of a single sentence "look, it works!" but that's it.

Fyron: thanks for the advice re PHP Eclipse et al. Will take it on board.

Thanks all for the great advice,

Alarik

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Ah, ok.

[Ragnarok]

Imperator Fyron said:
Leave Flash alone. It is a festering eye sore on the face of the internet, mostly used for insidious advertisements. You would be better off not looking into it, in my opinion.

Flash can be a very good thing for a website if used properly. Many individuals use way too much flash in their sites which make them seem like poorly designed sites but others who use it in good balance are the best sites on the internet compared to just plain HTML pages.

PHP and MySQL would be the way to go in the choice in developing a website. Those are the best tools (and free to boot) to use in web development.

The statements about DW are accurate as well. It really is not worth the money they ask for it. It is the best WYSIWYG editor out there but that only comes into play if you do not know any HTML at all. If you are knowledgeable with HTML then a simple editor will do the trick just fine.

[Evil_Duckie]

Ragnarok said:
The statements about DW are accurate as well. It really is not worth the money they ask for it. It is the best WYSIWYG editor out there but that only comes into play if you do not know any HTML at all. If you are knowledgeable with HTML then a simple editor will do the trick just fine.

I used to code hardcore manual html, but just to speed up things a 'real' editor comes in handy, although still I go into the code view of DW to manually do some things, lists is one thing DW has a problem with...

Oh, and Alarik, be sure to check some online communites for code snippets that you can use. I got both the tree menu and the statistics module from http://php.resourceindex.com/
although I did the news bit and the email forms all by myself.

[Will]

Just to echo some of what has already been said, PHP is very likely the cheapest and easiest way to do any sort of dynamic content. For a while, MySQL has sort of been the default SQL server with PHP, but recently PostgreSQL has been gaining more popularity because it's also free, and doesn't have some of the syntactic differences that MySQL has from SQL proper (a lot of developers complain about the "weird" non-standard ways MySQL does things).

As far as Dreamweaver, it's really a tossup whether to get it or not. If you're already fairly advanced in HTML, and can create a basic page quickly (a minute or so), I would say ditch the idea of using Dreamweaver. The cost isn't really worth it for something you'll have to cut up to use PHP in anyway. If you're slower at it, Dreamweaver might be worth the cost to get the general layout right before you add in the PHP stuff.

And I think Fyron just had some bad experiences with perl. It's an increadibly useful language as long as you get a decent manual. I have the O'Rielly book "Programming Perl", which focuses on more general purpose uses of perl, and I also have an old book on CGI that uses perl and C examples for CGI scripts. For your uses, I would say look for a book that both introduces perl, and shows how to use the various packages for CGI stuff.