Macromedia dreamweaver 8-using dreamweaver User Manual

641

28

CHAPTER 28

Database Connections for 
PHP Developers

To use a database with a PHP application, you need to create a database connection 
in Macromedia Dreamweaver 8. This chapter describes how to create the 
database connection.

For PHP development, Dreamweaver only supports the MySQL database system. Other 
database systems such as Microsoft Access or Oracle are not supported. MySQL is open-
source software you can download for free from the Internet for non-commercial use. For 
more information, see the MySQL website at 

.

The chapter assumes you have set up a PHP application (see 

). It also assumes a MySQL database is set up on your local 

computer or on a system to which you have network or FTP access.

To connect to the sample database provided by Dreamweaver, see “Setup for Sample PHP 
Site” in Getting Started with Dreamweaver. To learn more about databases and database 
connections, see 

.

Connecting to a database

This section describes how to connect to a database when developing a PHP application in 
Dreamweaver. It assumes you have one or more MySQL databases and that the MySQL 
server is started.

To create a database connection to your MySQL database:

1.

Open a PHP page in Dreamweaver, then open the Databases panel (Window > Databases).

2.

Click the Plus (+) button on the panel and select MySQL Connection from the pop-up 
menu.

The MySQL Connection dialog box appears.

TI
P

For development purposes, download and install the Windows Essentials version of the 
MySQL database server.