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Need some direction

Posted: Wed Dec 14, 2011 8:22 pm
by dharmeshb
Hello,
I am an amateur developer.. well I am more of a designer but want to learn some programming to aid my web design. I am a business analyst as a professional but have deep desire to do web design and development.

I have basic knowledge of PHP by learning Wordpress. I want to develop an application in order to learn PHP. Following tutorials is a bit frustrating since without any basic knowledge of classes or OOP I find it difficult to put together what I learn from tutorials.

Will you suggest learning PHP with or without framework?

For framework, I started to read a bit about CakePHP but then got lost :( however I will practice some CakePHP tutorials and then see how it all works. I am thinking of CakePHP, Code Igniter or Zend. Which of these has good forum support and documentation to learn from?

Thanks for your advice.

Dharmesh

Re: Need some direction

Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2011 1:46 am
by Christopher
You will need to learn PHP even it you learn to use a framework. So keep trying ... it takes time. For frameworks, I would recommend trying a couple of them to see which one makes the most sense to you. If you can get the example site working and understand generally how it works then that might be a good framework for you. All the frameworks you list are good. Symfony would be another one to try.

Re: Need some direction

Posted: Thu Dec 15, 2011 8:53 am
by dharmeshb
Thanks for the reply Christopher. I was not looking for a shortcut to learn PHP :) I will have to learn PHP no matter what. May be I was not clear but I want to know if learning PHP will be easier with a framework. I did a bit of test run with Code Igniter yesterday. Smashing Magazine has some nice video tutorials walking through right from installation. I think that will be better than CakePHP. As a complete beginner a combination of video tutorials and reading tutorials will be very helpful.

So again, will a framework speed up my PHP learning or make it any easier?

Re: Need some direction

Posted: Fri Dec 16, 2011 1:28 am
by Christopher
dharmeshb wrote:So again, will a framework speed up my PHP learning or make it any easier?
I think it might because it will allow you to focus on the code within the pages without having to worry about the structure of the program itself.

Re: Need some direction

Posted: Mon Apr 16, 2012 7:30 am
by Jazzy222
Obviously its going to help you,