We have all seen many question on StackOverflow that are founded upon the idea that PHP works like Javascript. Where the person clearly does not understand that PHP is a Preproccessor and only works before the page is sent out.
A clear example of this is in the following code, where runCommand() will not run when the user presses the button.
<a href="<?php runCommand(); ?>">Click Me!</a>
as it would in Javascript
<a href="javascript:runCommand();">Click Me!</a>
I’ve seen many questions like this that are from new people that just simply don’t realize ‘how’ PHP works.
My question is: Where is a great resource that explains how PHP works?.
I want to be able to redirect people to a page that can get them going on the correct track and know what being a Preproccessor means.
(This also allows me to be lazy and not have to write an explanation every time it comes up, but don’t tell anyone!)
If you don’t know of a place that describes this well, feel free to provide your own interpretation.
As Carl Smotricz points out, there is a part of PHP that can be used outside of the browser. But I’m mainly talking about in a Apache enviorment where a user requests a web page, and expects to get something back, usually in HTML.
Wikipedia is always a great resource of information. I suggest:
Server-side scripting
vs
Client-side scripting
And Wikipedia also has pictures: