Help with databases

[Dodgyknacker]

I Know html and basic css even though I still cant het a 3 column layout I would like to learn how to make my website more interactive with forum like comments I imagine that for this I need to know mySQL and PHP or some other scripting language, where do I go from here I want my pages to be more dynamic with less static pages like for example a news site, all tips are welcome - Thanks

 

[entity512]

thats where blogs, forums come in. IF your not so skilled yet..dont bother..just get some webspace and use provided scripts!

 

[Lord Kalthorn]

You can get templates for these types of things. Xoops I think is a Portal Template which uses Modules and Databases to get complete Dynamic Pages. Forums, like this, everybody uses templates for (all the ones with sense) - and unless you plan on making your own Forum then its probably best to use phpBB which is free, or this which is vBulletin which is around £40 for a year. There are some ASPX Forums around, ASPPlayground for instance is a £120 one of fee - but you'll need far superior hosting to that of the PHP Boards.

You can read books for PHP learning - and eventually would will pick up Database and Dynamic uses for them.

If you can't get a three column layout though... you should learn more HTML before you get into PHP.

 

[root]

you don't necessarily need a database to make a site dynamic. you could use an xml file or other single file source to store information...

 

[Lord Kalthorn]

Hmmm... yeah... Databases are nicer though. I think; XML is not as clean and scalable. It gets nasty quickly.

 

[jcbyrd_com]

I have a built in Cpanel that allows you to manipulate an SQL database through HTML. You don't need to know any coding..

I also have snippets of code that I can send to you to get you started programming some of your own dynamic content...