Posted by Phil Nospam on 09/27/52 11:30

I'm looking at starting a web site that will have a couple mySql databases
and I have a couple high level questions that should be easy for you guys
and gals.

First, my background --- I'm familiar with HTML but haven't done anything
with PHP yet. I'm familiar with MS Access and somewhat familiar with Sql
select statements from modifying sql queries in some data mining software we
used at work (Brio with Oracle/Informix databases). It's been about 4 years
since using Visual Basic and 10 since using tcl/tk. I understand the
concept of having a development environment and a production environment for
databases (you can't risk users being offline or receiving errors by
monkeying around with the real thing).

Now the questions ---

1) If I use one of these inexpensive hosting companies, the kind that have
web sites with mysql/php capabilities for under $100 per year, how should I
set up my development environment? Should I set up a development database
system at home or on the cheap web host?

2) If my databases will have some fields containing URLs to pages on my site
and other URLs to other web sites, what kind of problems will I face when I
try to update the production DB with what I've developed on the development
DB?

3) Concidering the above question, should I try to stick with relative or
static URLs for links to my web site?

Thanks in advance for your replies,

Phil

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