hi, my dream in life is to be a great php programmer, and at this point it seems impossible now, so im pretty depressed. the only code i fully understood was this guestbook which was very simple code, but when i went to put the "captcha" code to my guestbook i had no clue. im always running into code that is way over my head when i try to do a project in php. i went through the w3schools.com tutorials and looked at php.net functions, and don't know any sql commands, but the captcha code is so advanced. i was wondering if anyone could give me advice on how to understand the more complex code when it goes over my head, because at this point , i stopped studying and just sat around all day depressed because i cant figure out the code. please, if anyone can give me some advice on exactly how to proceed and what i should do exactly in steps i would FOREVER be grateful, because at this point im at the end of my rope. thank you in advance. sorry for posting similar subjects but i dont think i was as clear in my last posts about this. thank you. derek

Every programming language is capable of doing very complex things, and these things can be overwhelming to anyone who has a limited amount of time to figure them out.

Start small. The first thing you need to have memorized is all of the procedural constructs. if(), for(), while(), do... while(), switch(), foreach(). Know how all the operators work, =, ==, ===, <, >, <=, >=, !=, !==. Understand arrays completely and know what they are for.

Once you have the bare basics committed to memory, create some problems that are interesting, and try to solve them procedurally. Don't even worry about OOP, or MySQL yet, you can study that later.

i teach PHP if you're interested

also i have a new question. could the "facebook" website be written in PHP alone without any other language? just php? i dont want to have to learn javascript. i do know that facebook was written in php. just not sure if anything else.

thank you both! davidj i would like to learn from you. my main problem isnt learning the syntax , i learn that from w3schools.com. my main problem is that past learning the syntax. i try to do a project, and they start out way over my head, even just making more than the basic guestbook, im lost, i cant add to it, or embellish it, i wouldnt know where to start.

the implementation of the language into projects are my problem. and every time i ask, someone says "do this project" or that project, and when i try it, it is too complicated. and i dont understand that specific implementation of the language.i just realized that i should do my database designing locally , then put it live. but anyway, yes, david, i would be FOREVER grateful if you'd be able to help me learn from small projects to big projects in that order. i signed up at your website for a booking and provided my email.

Start small, learn to make some simple things first, perhaps make some small changes to scripts other people have made and build from there. It seems daunting but if you never start you'll never progress.