GBdirect's PHP Training Courses: An Overview

Our PHP Training Courses:

• Introduction to PHP Programming A public course for individuals with UK scheduled dates
• PHP for Programmers An intensive course for in-house company groups, delivered globally

The PHP Programming Language

PHP is a scripting language written by and for web developers: it is quick to learn, easy to deploy and provides many of the programming tools a web developer could wish for ... all in a single, free, cross-platform, open-source package.

PHP enables you to build highly interactive, dynamic, e-commerce web sites using server-side scripting techniques similar to or better than those offered by Microsoft's ASP (Active Server Pages) and Sun Microsystems' JSP (Java Server Pages).

Because PHP scripts run on the web server, they avoid most of the incompatibility and maintenance costs associated with client-side (browser-based) approaches to interactivity, e.g. Javascript.

On the other hand, PHP scripts can be more efficient and portable than some other server-side approaches (including traditional CGI programs), e.g. PHP scripts developed for MS Windows 2000, SQL Server and the IIS web server, can be deployed easily and profitably on robust enterprise class Unix systems running the Apache web server and Oracle. In short, PHP enables cross-platform, vendor-neutral solutions, which can be built and deployed on any popular web architecture.

PHP provides a wealth of tools for interacting with, transferring and transforming data stored in any number of ways, e.g. it can handle plain text, HTML, XML, XSLT, Postcript, PDF, ODBC, SQL, most RDBMs, encrypted authentication, secure sockets (SSL) and many other secure transaction procedures.

If you are new to programming or web development and are contemplating the use of PHP we suggest that you read our notes on introductory courses first.

PHP Training: The GBdirect Perspective

GBdirect's consultants have been implementing industrial strength PHP solutions across a range of e-commerce web sites for many years now. Those consultants write and teach our PHP training courses, so their experience directly informs course content.

Our PHP courses are designed to teach you how to select and apply the best PHP techniques to do a specific job, which means that we will also tell you when PHP does not provide the best tool for a particular job (we like to think that our willingness to point out the limitations of the technologies we teach distinguishes us from some of the "sausage factory" training companies).

PHP is such a domain-specific language, that it is possible to teach most of its elements in a a single course. The main distinction between our two PHP courses is not one of specialism or difficulty, but rather one of speed, i.e. experienced developers, especially those who know C-like languages (e.g. C++, Perl, Java, etc) don't need to spend time on core concepts or syntax and can move quickly on to learning specialist ("advanced") functions.

Like all of our courses, these two place particular emphasis on the PHP map-reading skills needed for independent learning and skills acquisition in the future.

Course Delivery

Our PHP training in the UK is now divided, roughly equally, between in-house delivery to corporate groups and publicly scheduled courses for individuals.

At present our public schedule provides monthly courses in Leeds (UK) and London (UK), although the option of offering a less frequent schedule in other European cities is being actively considered. The cities currently under consideration are, in order of priority, Amersterdam (Netherlands), Munich (Germany), Edinburgh (UK), Cambridge (UK), Manchester (UK) and Bristol (UK).

In-house PHP training usually takes place on-site, i.e. at the premises of the purchasing company. Arrangements can be made for off-site training at a range of facilities, although this can incur costs which have to be added to our normal charges for tuition and course materials.

Which PHP Course?

If you are looking for an "off-the-shelf" PHP course the choice is relatively simple.

If you do not have background in traditional programming (e.g. your experience is in Web design, using HTML, Javascript, VBscript, Flash, etc. and/or editing packages like FrontPage, Dreamweaver, etc.) your best option will probably be the course called Introduction to PHP.

If, on the other hand, you have a strong programming background (with or without specific web-related experience) we would recommend the course called PHP for Programmers.

Please ring our training advisors for help in assembling a course with appropriate content, speed of progress, prerequisite knowledge, and consistent subject matter, etc.

• N.B. GBdirect write fully-bespoke PHP courses for clients. If you have such a requirement and the budget for it, please contact our course developers for advice and support in assembling a course with appropriate content, speed of progress, prerequisite knowledge, and consistent subject matter, etc.

Arranging an On-Site Course

Naturally, you will first need to arrange details of price, date and duration with us first, either by email or phone. Once the course has been agreed, you will need to arrange for suitable systems and software to be available to the delegates. We provide some software and logistic information to assist you.

References

We have provided PHP training to numerous clients. We are happy to arrange for references on request, after some intial discussion to ensure that we fully understand your PHP training requirements.

PHP public courses schedule