Question about working with php

[CosmicChick45]

I purchased an extension (security assist) and it says that you have to work in PHP? I'm a little confused. I realise it's an extension, but how do I do this so that I don't affect my files? Is this just an easy fix?

[Ben M]

It sounds as though the extension you purchase utilizes PHP server-sider scripting to use.  This shouldn't affect your site at all except that you need PHP installed on your web server and you need .php extensions on your documents.  Nothing should be affected on the pages themselves.

[CosmicChick45]

I've got Dreamweaver 5.5 - doesn't it have php already installed? If not, how do I add it?

I've saved the file as a .php and it seems to work alright; it's converted the page to a php page file.

[Guest]

A php page and an html page are the same, the extension alerts the server that their may be php to process.

If the host you use is a paid service, it is almost a sure bet that they have the php as one of their scripting languages.  If you are on a free host, you might have an issue.

PHP is not really something you install on your dreamweaver. DW has supported php for several versions now, so you dont have anything to do to write in php.

SA will write most of what you want, but every now and then you have to go in and edit code, so you will most likly need to learn php, which is a good thing anyway.

Gary

[Lon_Winters]

Most of the SA functionality relies in the whole PHP/MySQL environment. For example, if you're running the wizard to create registration and login pages, it requires that you have the database set up and configured, and certain tables created, and existing database connection in DW. Web Assist has some good documentation available for all of this and the WA people themselves are usually pretty quick to answer questions posted in the forum.