Here is a good question that I have not seen yet. Not to say it isn't here, I just haven't seen it.
How on earth are we supposed to edit our sites if we do not know .php?
I just don't get it.
Wait.
You've got it all twisted up here.
You do
not have to know PHP to be successful in GDI or to be able to build a website.
For starters, there are so many other back-end languages you can use for websites today. In fact, you don't even
need a back-end language for your site (as long as you don't want to implement cool features).
But with the above said, you
should learn it. Here's my story:
I've always been a computer geek ever since I was 8, when I received my first computer. At the age of 8-9, I experimented on the Windows OS, just working out how to do cool things, although, most of the time, I would end up breaking something and then being nice to my uncle to have him fix it for me. At the age of 10, I wanted to know how things worked. So I started looking things up, which mostly pointed to programming. At the age of 11, I started looking into web development. How websites work, both back and front-end wise. Throughout the age of 11-15, that's all I did. I made small web apps and experimented with other things, loving every second of it.
At the age of 16, I re-invented Facebook (no joke). That was my first big web application. Obviously, it wasn't as good as Facebook, but it was pretty damn close. I had all my class mates using it, and I received a nice £423 check (which I spent all on sweets and chocolate after school) through the letterbox from advertising on it.
Remember guys, I was only 16 and I had mastered PHP.
The point I'm trying to get out here is that learning a programming language is not as hard as it looks. Neither is it as complicated as most of the gurus make out.
But with that said, IMO, the only way one can truly learn programming is if they actually
want to. And I don't mean for the money, I mean you have to be interested in the language and you have to be excited about the end result of the project. If you're just trying to learn PHP for example just to setup a website that will make you money, then expect to go nowhere in terms of good programming practice.
PHP is the way to go in terms of web development. It's the easiest to learn and capable of so much. But, note this: there are many security holes that can easily be opened when using PHP. So always make sure you look into things before implement it into your site/project/whatever.
So, if you haven't got the messege already: Learn it.
