Developing on PHP without MySQL and load onto CD-ROM

Report · Jul 20, 2011

Hello,

I'm trying to develop a small application for my internship. Our customers are going to receive a disc with a pseudo-website loaded onto it that will contain all of the references they need for the projects we complete for them. I've been going for a modular approach and - not being very well-versed on much outside of HTML and CSS - am at an impasse.

Ideally, this is what I want the finished product to do:
My coworkers want to be able to prepare these once I leave this Fall with little to no effort. The disc is to take you to an index page and allow easy browsing of the .pdf's and others stored in predetermined folders. My goal is to have easily accessed folders for each project that will contain these files, and I want the webpage to automatically update when its contents change. That way, all my coworkers have to do is drag and drop files to populate the page, then just burn the disc.

I've been reading up on several things and it seems like PHP scripts are what I should be experimenting with. I accidentally ended up learning all about MySQL as well, but it seems outside the scope of this project (all of the content is stored directly on the disc). Javascript (an ActiveX control) was initially another option, but the fact that ActiveX only functions in IE proved too restrictive for me.

I have tried using some PHP scripts in Dreamweaver without setting up a server but they don't seem to behave properly. For example, the following code is in the main body of my page:

<?php

$myString = "Hello!";

echo $myString;

echo "<h5>I love using PHP!</h5>";

?>

Previewing this in a browser shows this on the page:

I love using PHP!"; ?>

I'm at a loss as to why, unless it's a simple syntax problem - though after researching I don't think it's that. I have some programming experience so I'm not concerned about the scripts and their implementation, but just getting them to function would be great.

So my question is basically this: how can I utilize basic PHP scripts completely off a disc, with no MySQL dependency? Or, if this is impossible I would love to hear an alternative solution or really any advice at all.

Thanks a bunch

Report · Jul 20, 2011

This is what I get

Hello!

I love using PHP!

Try a different browser or a new window...

Report · Jul 20, 2011

PHP is a server side scripting language. The pages you create will need to get installed into a server running PHP. Is that your intent here?

Report · Jul 20, 2011

No, this environment is meant to be run standalone on a CD-ROM. I'm guessing that means I should try a different approach. Are there other ways to list a client's files (on the same disc)?

Also, I have tried what I posted in IE, Firefox, and Chrome... all yielded the same thing.

Report · Jul 20, 2011

There are software packages that will allow you to run php from a CD. There is another thread here

http://forums.adobe.com/thread/879298?tstart=0

where the poster is using Litepxp. I have not used it but I went to their site and it seems to be what you are looking for.