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[ratthing]

Would the denizens please recommend references/guides (online, books) similar to "The Advanced Bash Scripting Guide" for SQL?  The ABSG is an on-line reference with fully explained syntax examples--kind of like a commented syntax primer crossed with a recipe-type book.  Though I'm not sure something like ABSG would make sense for SQL, now that I think about it...  I have a little db experience from back in the old days of db3, Clipper, and db4, so I somewhat understand database concepts (tables, indexes, rows, basic normalization ideas) but SQL is miles from that.  Similar suggestions for PHP would be appreciated as well.

I'm trying to get to the point where I can read other people's code and tweak it myself; I'm not trying to get to where I can write programs from scratch, as I am pretty sure I don't have the programmer's gene.

Thanks in advance--
=RT=

[perkiset]

Teach Yourself MySQL in 14 days, Perkins & Morgan @ Sams (Excellent starter, believe it or not)
MySQL Bible, Suehring @ Wiley
Pro MySQL, Knuckenberg & Pipes @ Apress
MySQL Stored Procedures Programming, Harrison & Feurenstein @ O'Reilly

http://www.php.net/manual/en/ref.mysql.php

Teach Yourself PHP in 24 hours (3rd Ed) Zandstra @ Sams
PHP Cookbook, Sklar @ O'Reilly
Object Oriented PHP, Lavin @ No Starch

This is a really small list of the books that I own and have been through. I have many more, but these stick out as great starting points. The 14 days and 24 hours books are great because if you're like me, you can do them in a day or 2 and get a really fast immersion into the languages and tools.

As an old dBase III and Clipper guy I can relate and probably answer any of your structural or conversion type questions. You've made the right choice, believe me.

Biggest difference: dBase (and Clipper therefore of course) a "database" was actually a table. Silly of them.

Good luck!
/p

[ratthing]

Thx, Perk.  I'll check those out.

Never considered that the dbIII "db" was actually a table, but I get what you're saying.  That was about 20yrs ago for me, so my memory's kinda vague.

=RT=

[gnarlyhat]

I'm reading this if it's of any help.
http://www.freewebmasterhelp.com/tutorials/phpmysql/1