StackOverflow2013

Note that there are some explanatory texts on larger screens.

plurals

PO
text
Body
copied!<p>There is a wide variety of web application languages you could get into. The ones I have most experience with (and therefore will be talking about here) are PHP, eRuby and Ruby on Rails. All of these have good tutorials available on the internet - I'll link to some of them below.</p> <p>Which to choose depends on exactly what you're looking to do. Using PHP and eRuby you have to do most things yourself - whereas Ruby on Rails will do lots of stuff for you (useful, but can also be dangerous if you don't know what you're doing). Ruby on Rails is good for doing database related things - for example the standard CRUD (Create, Read, Update, Delete) application. The standard kind of app Ruby on Rails (often abbreviated to RoR) tutorials teach you is a blog application (Create entries, Read entries, Update entries, Delete entries) or an Address Book Application. It is possible to do many of these sort of applications almost in one line of code - using RoR's 'scaffold' function.</p> <p>PHP and eRuby make you do more of the work yourself - but this can be better in some situations. PHP is more well known and used than eRuby, but I like the Ruby language so I tend to like using eRuby. These are both good for doing simple applications (like contact forms on websites) or more complex applications (phpBB - a piece of forum software is written in php).</p> <p>As for which one to choose - I'd have a play with them and see what you think. Try running through the first few bits of a tutorial with each and see how whether you like it or not.</p> <p>Here come the links to various tutorials:</p> <p><strong>PHP</strong></p> <ul> <li><a href="http://devzone.zend.com/node/view/id/627" rel="nofollow noreferrer">PHP 101</a></li> <li><a href="http://www.w3schools.com/php/php_intro.asp" rel="nofollow noreferrer">PHP Intro from W3Schools</a></li> </ul> <p><strong>eRuby</strong></p> <ul> <li><a href="http://www.osix.net/modules/article/?id=384" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Beginning eRuby</a> - not great, but shows you how you can embed it in HTML</li> <li><a href="http://tryruby.hobix.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Try Ruby in your Browser</a> - helps you learn Ruby which you need to know for eRuby</li> </ul> <p><strong>Ruby on Rails</strong></p> <ul> <li><a href="http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/onlamp/2006/12/14/revisiting-ruby-on-rails-revisited.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Rolling with Ruby on Rails</a> - the latest 'revisited' version for the latest version of RoR</li> <li><a href="http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/onlamp/2007/01/05/revisiting-ruby-on-rails-revisited-2.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Rolling with Ruby on Rails part 2</a></li> </ul> <p>There are a few tutorials to get you started. Some of these take you through installing the necessary software (webserver and anything else needed - eg. php or ruby) and some don't. A good way to get Apache (webserver), MySQL (db) and PHP installed on windows is to use <a href="http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">XAMPP</a>. If you're on linux then apache, mysql and php will be in your package repositories and there may be distro specific guides to setting them up.</p>

Querying!

Guidance

An individual column

Larger individual text columns get their own page to allow for proper reading.

SQuiL has stopped working due to an internal error.

If you are curious you may find further information in the browser console, which is accessible through the devtools (F12).

Reload