7 lessons to learn PHP, MySQL and WordPress

Oct. 26, 2022

It is so exciting to learn PHP and MySQL this past month of October, and I like to write down some lessons I learned from my experience in 2022. 

Introduction

I have to learn how to support a WordPress website. I was so curious to learn so many things about WordPress. I did read a few books in detail to try to figure out how WordPress is architected and then why it is so popular. I also did learn a few plugins and then try to read PHP/ MySQL source code. It is hard to learn, and then I had to work on a few project first, and then improve my knowledge of PHP and MySQL. It is challenge for me to go back to a daily life, push myself 100% to finish a coding project. I did spend first two months to read and learn so many things. 

There is nothing special about WordPress; Before I can learn better about WordPress, it is better to work on coding project using PHP/ MySQL first on XAMPP. 

Learning is hard 

Most important is to work hard. There are so many things to learn, and it takes time to get used to PHP and MySQL work environment. 专心学习编程， 不要考虑其他事情。 

I did watch a few Linkedin learning courses related to PHP and also WordPress. 

My lessons

1. I spent time on youtube.com videos related to WordPress and PHP first; 40+ hours;
2. I decided to subscribe Linkedin premium, I took a few courses on LinkedIn learning related to PHP, mySQL. The exercise files are very helpful, and it saves me a lot of time. 40-100 hours;
3. I did not code the first three months; I wasted time, and I needed to learn project management; Do not waste time on other things in my life; I have to work hard on projects, and then I have chance to learn something new;
4. Try to put code into Visual studio or Visual studio code; there is big difference to learn, if I learn by working on coding project, I will be much more smart to learn important things;
5. There are so many things to learn once I started the project to code PHP; 
6. I had difficult time to make it AJAX work using JSON; I spent a few hours at the day, and I did not know client or server side should set configuration code: header('Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *');