Mac OS Unix Tutorials

Creating a Search Engine for the Animal Rescue DB
Using PHP scripts in HTML pages to connect to MySQL Databases
Creating a Log in system with the Dreamweaver MX 2004
But First a Database: Using phpMyAdmin to create a simple database
Prepare the Apache Web server for dynamic pages with PHP/mySQL
Free Web Resources for learning to set up OSX to use php and mySQL
Tutorials for installing and using GoLive's pre-configured server
Adding an Upload File HTML form page & php processing page to your Web site
Installing and setting up phpMyAdmin

Philosophy of the "Least I have to know" tutorial series
When GoLive 6 and Dreamweaver MX came out, OX users got really excited that there was finally a visual tool for creating database driven Web sites on the Mac. There was a bit of shock, however, when designers discovered this was not exactly an out-of-box software. Before you can begin to use it, there's a lot of setup involved—setup of the computer's server, enabling of the scripting language through the terminal, installation of the database server, and setup of the site itself to use database connections and php.

There are great tutorials out there, and I have listed the ones I used to get my OSX server ready to test out dynamic sites, but many of them go into too many gory details. Hence the birth of this series “The Least I Have to Know.” In the coming weeks I'll wade through the details and distill the facts to the bare minimum.

Don't forget to stop by the GoLive in 24 Hours site if you use GoLive 6 for your dynamic content development. There are several tutorials related to installing and setting up the pre-configured server that ships with this program. You can download and print out the pdf files created by Adobe's Adam Pratt.

After the server is prepared, we'll go through the steps to create the various components of web applications—insert record pages, delete and update record pages, login systems, and file upload utilities. We'll do this in the context of an imaginary cat rescue organization.

Tutorial 1

Because there is no visual object to upload files to the server with the file browser form object, and because there have been so many questions about how to accomplish this, we won't start at the beginning this week, but I promise you we'll backtrack in the next tutorial.

Tutorial 2

Although technically not a PHP/mySQL feature, another frequently requested tutorial is one about forms connected to cgi scripts. This tutorial was constucted using GoLive, but can be easily adapted to work in Dreamweaver as well.

Tutorial 3

Now I realize that we are not going in order here, but I seem to be addressing issues about which I get the most questions. If you can forgive that, you might be interested in this week's topic: how to install phpMyAdmin on your server.

Tutorial 4

OK, so we're not sticking to much of a schedule here, but the one you've been waiting for is finally here. The real do it yourself, start from scratch, prepare the Mac OSX Apache Web server with PHP and mySQL so you can create dynamic pages tutorial.

Tutorial 5

I have had a lot of requests for a tutorial on actually using phpMyAdmin to create a simple database. So, here it is!

Tutorial 6

This requires you to have Dreamweaver MX, but you can always download the 30 day free trial. There is a PHP Authentication Extension at the Macromedia Exchange that you can download for free to create a log in system for restricted pages.

Tutorial 7

This tutorial takes you through the essentials of connecting to the MySQL server with PHP scripts in HTML pages. The browser then displays the output. You might want to download the source code before you begin.

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