Oracle Database Ajax and PHP Web Application Development Book Review

A lot more Oracle programmers are now using PHP as their chosen development language, and the great thing about AJAX is that pages don’t need to reload in order to update data on the screen.

The Oracle Database AJAX and PHP Web Application Development book contains everything you need to know in order to develop applications using AJAX and PHP with Oracle as the back end database. It would also be quite easy to make the SQL statements ANSI compliant and easily change the connection methods you could then use either a Postgres or MySQL database.

As AJAX is based on JavaScript the book begins looking at the scalability, modularity and object programming of both JavaScript and PHP.

Part two of the book introduces you to using the AJAX XMLHttpRequest object, which is the main JavaScript object you will use to request data. This part of the book also demonstrates how to program a drag and drop library.

Part three of the book talks more about PHP and how to retrieve data using PHP. You are then instructed how to generate a simple chart and retrieve data using AJAX. The final part of this section tells you how to program the use of a back button in your applications and how to use the history iframe.

Part four includes tracking and using login state on both the client and server and how to store and define user preferences between sessions. This part in the book also tells you how to create a mashup page, which is where you can blend two or more applications which interact with each other to create a whole new type of application functionality.

There are 5 appendices in the Oracle Database AJAX and PHP Web Application Development book, containing a primer on programming in PHP, a primer on administering Oracle, a primer on programming with Oracle SQL and also a primer on programming with PL/SQL.

With all these primers available, it means that anyone could use this book and if they got stuck, just look at the appendices for help with any of the technologies that are discussed.

This is a great book if you want to learn how to start putting together applications using Oracle, PHP and AJAX. There is also some useful information on how to integrate VOIP, Instant Messaging and file sharing functionality into your applications. Another nice touch is that a medical data application is used throughout the book to demonstrate what can be achieved using these three technologies.