Web Design

This Howto will cover the basics of connecting to a MySql Database with PHP. Before you can connect to a database with PHP you must setup your database giving it a new name, user with password and you must apply rights to the new user to allow them to edit the database. If you are […]

Whether you are grabbing an XML feed off of the Interwebs someplace or from a local database or file accessing the data in the nodes can be a drag. In this example we will be loading the raw xml into SimpleXML for processing then we will find the node that has the data we want […]

Lately a number of people have been complaining to me about how their websites are not passing tests that are performed by testing sites.  These test sites load your page and go through a number of so called tests to see if your site has been optimized for fast loads, SEO and proper use of […]

Whether you are working on your own project or redesigning a theme for your site much of your design formatting will be found in your CSS file. It is important to organize your css file not only so you can find things but also for function. In this howto we will look at a basic […]

You will find that there are times when processing numbers or displaying results is better done with a rounded number then an exact one.  For instance if you were displaying the number of songs on your website or the number of hamburgers you have sold you may want to use a description such as 25,000 […]

Sometimes when dealing with output from your database or other numbers you are processing you will want to format the number in a readable comma separated value. This is very simple to do with PHP by using the number_format() function. simply find the number where ever you are reading it from and store it in […]

Whether you are deploying a store for yourself or your design customers what you need in a Shopping Cart system is the ability to quickly manage products, inventory and allow for a variety of different payments and calculate shipping and handling costs based on one or more carriers. The osCommerce Online Merchant store continues to […]

Whether you are setting up a store for one of your customers or designing a payment method for your own customers one of the easiest ways to accept credit card payments online is PayPal. PayPal offers two basic ways to let your customers pay for products and services. The first which we will cover here […]

When you are working with data from Databases and Spreadsheets you really shouldn’t overlook the CSV format. Although it is an older container type the CSV format can provide the ability to capture and manage data between many different sources. I have been working with a number of Government datasets in the past year and […]

There are three basic types of websites that you will come into contact as a designer and understanding the difference that advertising makes on each will go a long way in providing services to your customer. The first is a Personal website, Second is a Corporate Business Website, Third is an online service or business. […]