Improve my PHP & MySQL programming skills

I'm at the point where I can do basically anything that I want for my self with PHP and MySQL, unfortunately a lot of my code works slow, is not optimized may even be vulnerable for hacker attack...

I would like to know how to improve my skills now, is there a book that you could recommend me, a website or anything else.

Thank you in advance

 

Thats more like you learn as you go along. There are tons of good books on Amazon on this.
Best approach however is working on websites hands on.

 

I severely doubt that. I doubt very many people who use this forum -- if any at all -- can do everything in regards to programming or even a specific language. I don't think I've seen anyone code the PHP artificial inelegance unit yet, for example.

That probably means you're running too many queries, which seems to be the root of a lot of speed problems. Make sure to avoid the * operator in queries, which fetches all of the columns (even the ones you don't use).

Can't really be helped. I suggest you google up a couple security articles to close up some of the common wholes though.

It's all experience. However, I suggest you learn java, though, because if you are familiar with a more strict language like that then you will find your PHP code becoming less sloppy.

 

Thank you both for your reply. Webcosmo do you have any specific book in mind, does anyone know of a mysql/PHP dos and don'ts list ?