Course change

It seems that my professional development course has changed. I was focusing on studying for the CCNA certification but that will have to be put on hold. It’s not because I don’t want to study for it anymore. The reason is because the study material that I got requires me to have access to Cisco equipment or simulators. Right now, I can’t afford either (the simulators would be cheaper). I’m just going to keep doing some side jobs and save up the cash to buy the simulator pack from Cisco. I don’t even want to attempt taking the CCNA test without having some hands-on time with a Cisco IOS.

I could just charge the material on a credit card but that would defeat another goal I’m trying to accomplish. I’m trying to get all my debts paid (car, credit card, hospital, etc.) except for my house. Dave Ramsey makes total sense and I recommend everyone listen to his show. You can catch it on several radio stations or over the Internet.

Since I am putting the CCNA certification on hold for now, I’m going to focus my full attention on learning PHP. I want to be learn to write web applications and PHP is great because it is truely cross platform. My development environment is as follows:

Windows XP Professional
Apache 2.0.53
PHP 5.0.3
Microsoft SQL 2000

Wait, before you even say what I know you’re going to say, let me explain. I’m not doing it on MySQL because I am working on a web application for my job. Where I work, they only have MS SQL and they will not install MySQL so I want to develop using the same database server. This will make it easier for me to backup up the database on my workstation and restore it on the SQL server at work.

I’m using a book I purchased at Barnes & Noble called PHP 5 in easy steps (because it really simplifies the basics) and an online tutorial called Practicial PHP Programming to learn how to code in PHP. I’m using the really basic book because I am completely new to programming so I needed something to really build off of. The online tutorial is great but the writer does expect you to know some programming. The only web development I’ve been exposed to is HTML and some ASP, but it’s been a couple of years since I did ASP pages and I don’t remember a whole lot.

The learning process is going pretty well, so far. I’ve already designed my SQL database and set up a database user. Using the database user I set up, I created a PHP page to connect to the database and it worked on the first try. I know, not really hard for those of you that know PHP but it made me happy.

Life is a journey, not a race.

25.Feb.05 General, Technology