Introduction
What PHP is, how the web works, installing PHP on every major operating system, writing your first script, and understanding the PHP request lifecycle.
Variables & Types
Declaring variables with the dollar sign, understanding PHP's data types, working with constants, type juggling, and inspecting values with var_dump.
Operators & Expressions
Learn how PHP combines values with operators -- arithmetic, assignment, comparison, logical, and string concatenation. Understand loose vs strict comparison and operator precedence.
Control Flow
Making decisions with if/else/elseif, switch and match, looping with while, do-while, for and foreach, and combining control structures in real programs.
Functions
Defining and calling functions, parameters and return values, type declarations, variable scope, closures, arrow functions, and built-in PHP functions.
Strings & Arrays
Master PHP strings -- concatenation, heredoc, common functions, and multibyte handling. Then dive into indexed and associative arrays, looping, essential functions, and practical examples.
Forms & HTTP
HTML forms, GET and POST requests, superglobals, input validation, and building a contact form.
OOP Basics
Classes and objects, properties and methods, constructors, visibility modifiers, getters and setters, static members, class constants, and a practical Product and ShoppingCart example.
OOP Advanced
Inheritance, abstract classes, interfaces, traits, namespaces, autoloading, and building flexible object-oriented systems.
Error Handling
PHP error levels, configuring error reporting, exceptions with try/catch/finally, custom exception classes, and debugging techniques including Xdebug.
Files
Reading and writing files, CSV and JSON, directory operations, file uploads, path functions, and security best practices.
Databases
Relational databases, PDO, CRUD operations, prepared statements, transactions, and building a simple task manager.
Sessions & Cookies
HTTP statelessness, cookies with setcookie(), PHP sessions, flash messages, and building a secure login/logout system.
Composer
Dependency management with Composer, installing packages, PSR-4 autoloading, semantic versioning, and security best practices.
Modern PHP
PHP 8.0 through 8.4 highlights including named arguments, enums, readonly properties, property hooks, and choosing your PHP version.
Web Application
Build a complete Notes application with registration, login, CRUD operations, routing, templates, and database integration using concepts from the entire guide.
Practice Projects
Six hands-on project ideas -- from beginner to advanced -- to reinforce everything you learned in the PHP Beginners Guide.