PHP Fast & Easy it is! What Julie C. Meloni does is lead you by the hand as you type in the code (which you often don't understand until several pages later) and learn PHP character by bloody character. I came to this book with a firm background in HTML but only brief forays into programming and scripting. This book let me see the logic of it all and had me writing useful scripts before I was halfway through. It falls down in a couple things: 1. Installation turned out to be more difficult than Meloni predicted. I had a wayward .dll file and no way to find out why PHP wasn't working. Meloni tried to help through email (how many authors would do that?!?!). Eventually, I stumbled on the problem and all was better. 2. Searching a database is only just barely touched upon. Why else would you have a database than to be able to search it? This could easily be an entire book, of course, but this one could have gone into that a little further. In summary, it's a really great way to start PHP and gives a solid foundation to continue. Best of all, it leaves you excited about this tool, wanting to know all the ways to use it best.