PHP 6 and MySQL 5 for Dynamic Web Sites: Visual QuickPro Guide (Visual QuickPro Guides) [Paperback]

I can't say this is an excellent book because of some glaring logic errors in the code.
It's a is good as an introduction to PHP/MySQL and there are some meatier recipes towards the end of the book that are useful - forums/shopping cart/registration.
I bought this book to help with writing custom WordPress Plug-ins and to get into Drupal and for that need it fulfilled that itch I had to scratch.
It was easy to follow and informative if you can overlook the silly mistakes.
I think the good point outweigh the negatives.
Primarily I was irritated by the lack of thought that went into validating form input. Notably checking if field is empty then trimming it. So if a user enters a space, then logic is flawed and null data would be written to the database for it's constraints to pick up.
To me there also seemed to be a lack of precision in defining an email regular expression. For a UK email address, you need to allow for more than one 'dot' after the 'at' symbol.
Also the database design for threaded messages in the forum recipe (chapter 15) didn't seem right for me. It used timestamp to order messages in threads. This sequencing logic/database design is flawed for threaded messages if two people respond to different branches of a thread.
I come from a Java/Spring/Grails background and the lack of structure/seperation of concerns of a framework that implements a MVC architecture struck me the most. I didn't like the fact that variables were defined in one template and used in another for example without even passing parameters around so it's hard to tell at a glance what needs to be setup before a script can run.
I think that can be forgiven as I think this book is targeted for a beginner audience.
O-O coverage only extends to as far as showing how to use the new statement. I'm no PHP expert, but I guess this would be a good book to get before venturing into Symphony, Zend, Cake, etc.
I did learn a couple of new things about MySQL along the way too which was an added bonus for me.
Finally the book is classified as for PHP 6, but the Appendix install guide is for PHP 5. Haven't tried to follow these yet, and wouldn't think it hard to make the switch but buyer/reader be warned. Author was in tricky position of writing book before PHP 6 came out. It sounds like Unicode is primary difference.
i18n/l8n coverage in PHP and MySQL were both good. (though I prefer message properties in Java!)
It would have been nice if there was another Apppendice summarizing all the PHP functions or even URL reference to look online for this stuff. I think that holds the book back from being a good quick reference, although the index looks quite thorough.

Although this book is useful. I found the layout of the code very annoying. The page is split into two columns, with the code inline with the text, thus also flowing in the two columns... this makes for reading the code very difficult. Also Im no expert but I found some of the coding techniques very messy, for example his form validation, which can be done much neater than the example in this book. Another gripe, is he uses stupid variable names, which are totally none descriptive, for instance in clearly written code you might write $query he'll abbreviate it to just $q, also where everyone else would write $result he just puts $r, which if youre learning can be very un-helpful when trying to make sense of the example... coupled with poor layout, this book gives me a headache when trying to learn from it.

p234 example:
7. Add user to the database.

require_once
> ('../mysqli_connect.php');

$q = "INSERT INTO users (first_name,
>last_name, email, pass,
>registration_date) VALUES ('$fn',
>'$ln', '$e', SHA1('$p'), NOW() )";

$r = @mysqli_query ($dbc, $q)

YES! the code really is formatted like that!!! Its terrible. That query should be on one line, not spread over four. And try making sense of it as a beginner, when he uses $r and $q. I know what this all means now, now that ive coded many sql queries. But when I was learning, this book was a nightmare.

I use this book in combination with the Luke Welling, Laura Thomson "PHP and MySQL Web Development" book (which is a far deeper book IMHO - and much better laid out) along with examples on the web to get a better understanding of a particular area of PHP/MySQL I need to learn.

The layout for this book needs reviewing for the next issue - use the full width of the page guys!

This book is bad. It is also misleading. PHP 6 doesn't even exist, yet this book has been out for a few years now. However, I could easily forgive that little fib if the rest of the book was actually a decent PHP tutorial. Unfortunately it isn't though. This is because its layout makes it nigh on impossible to follow the examples. The two column format adopted by the book is ridiculous for presenting code samples. I found myself jumping back and forth between pages as I was trying to match the narrative with the sample code.

This is what I mean by impossible to follow. I don't mean the examples themselves were hideously complicated. I mean they were laid out atrociously. Who knows, if you don't want to bother with the source code, then you may get more out of this book than I did. However, I found it a complete waste of time.