Abstract

This book is the result of teaching the laboratory component of an introductory course in Database Systems in the Department of Computer Science & Software Engineering, Concordia University, Montreal.. The intent of this part of the course was to have the students create a practical web-based application wherein the database forms the dynamic component of a real life application using a web browser as the user interface.

It was decided to use all open source software, namely, Apache web server, PHP, JavaScript and HTML, and also the open source database which started as MySQL and has since migrated to MariaDB.

The examples given in this book have been run successfully both using MySQL on a Windows platform and MariaDB on a Linux platform without any changes. However, the code may need to be updated as the underlying software systems evolve with time, as functions are deprecated and replaced by others. Hence the user is responsible for making any required changes to any code given in this book.

The readers are also warned of the changing privacy and data usage policy of most web sites. They should be aware that most web sites collect and mine user’s data for private profit.

The authors wish to acknowledge the contribution of many students in the introductory database course over the years whose needs and the involvement of one of the authors in the early days of the web prompted the start of this project in the late part of the 20th century. This was the era of the dot com bubble. The corporations that survived this bubble have grown, thanks to data and its mining, to become the most powerful monopolies in the history of mankind. It is hoped that the open source community will replace these with locally controlled alternatives.