You are at the stage a lot

greg — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 21:30:00 +0000

You are at the stage a lot of people go through when learning web development. You've sussed the simper stuff like HTML and CSS, now you want something more powerful like PHP.

It is something you have to take some time to learn, as with all the other aspects of web dev, and this includes all the new tools and requirements you need to use PHP.

yash059 wrote:

Basically i was hoping someone had some instructions that would be best suited for me on how to test my php code either in dreamweaver or notepad.

PHP is a server side language, and therefore it needs server software to run. As per the two options you listed, either a web server or LAMP on your own PC.

While there's more to learn to get a web server and set it up, get a domain name and learn about pointing the namesevers to your new host (etc etc), LAMP isn't always a quick install and you're away.

Many people come across problems getting it setup. Even if it all goes smoothly, there are still necessary settings to configure like your host folder and phpmyadmin. They often have issues and don't work straight away

LAMP is arguably less to learn and once set up and working you are "likely" to have less problems with it (as long as you don't mess around with it, change settings etc)

That said, I'd really advise you to learn about using a web server and your own testing domain. Simply because if you are learning PHP, you are likely at some point going to put those skills into use with a website. So if you learn with LAMP, you then STILL need to learn all the requirements later with a web server.

LAMP is free of course, whereas a web server, although really cheap to get one, are not free.
A domain is £6-£10 and a basic host server about £5 per month.
But in your sig you have a link, is that not your site? If so, then you already have a domain and a hosting server, so can test there.

Otherwise, continue with getting LAMP working and perhaps tell us why it's not working and we can help you get that setup and running.