I am not talking about marriage here. Nor am I talking about the movies made by that title. It is just that I love the Apache + MySQL + PHP + WordPress combo so much that I would consider them made for each other. I am a novice to Web programming. I mean creating pages with dynamic content was alien to me. I was pretty scared when it came to creating a data base driven website. I was just content with creating static web pages using plain HTML. I observed with envy, those who create pages that modify and present themselves in an instant, to any given criteria. I wondered whether I had even lost the race, and qualified only to browse as a spectator.

But that was until I read a book titled, “Building a database driven website using PHP and MySQL” by my guru Kevin Yank. In a few pages he does a commendable job explaining what constitute a database, how to build one and finally how to access one using a web page to add/delete/modify its contents. Normally whenever I read a good book, it lingers in my mind for a few days and then I forget about it to make way for another book. But this time it was different. Could it really be as simple as he makes it out to be? Somehow this book impelled me to take action.

But there are several hurdles I need to pass. First of all I don’t know Apache; I don’t know MySQL and PHP. But only a smattering of WordPress. I haven’t installed any program of my own in years. Imagine me installing all four under Windows to make them work together flawlessly. Luckily there was this wonderful site that came along that taught me how to install Apache + MySQL + PHP as a package and led me every step of the way successfully. Now that it is installed, I am ready to follow the example program given by Kevin. And I did. The result, I could see Kevin’s database of Jokes on my site.

But the idea is to create my own database of notebooks currently available in the market and present it to my readers according to their chosen criteria. And I wanted to make use of the beautiful themes available under WordPress. So I became a bit bolder and installed WordPress too and tried the same example codes under WordPress. WordPress neither executed the code nor showed an error message. What am I going to do?

Again I turned to the omniscient Google, requesting me to show the way. Sure enough it led me to this site that provided me the plug-in for WordPress. With that plug-in properly installed I was able to run my own database driven website. The result is there for you all to see.

My dear readers, I must confess that there are some aspects of my life that I am not currently satisfied. But I rejoice that I live in an era, where friends like you(unknown to me) provide expert advice and the resources almost instantaneously. What’s more, you provide them free of cost. I am really, really thankful. Long live open source movement!