I want to divorce ASP!

[Craigy]

Hi everyone, I have been a mac user for years... But have developed web based applications using ASP on a Winodze paltform.. PC servers drive me crazy, as does the speed and restrictions of ASP.

I would love to start developing on OSX with UNIX and MYSQL - one slight problem, I know nothing about either! Unix looks like alien and every MYSQL resource I look at seems to assume a knowlege of UNIX.

Can anyone point me in the direction of a great book or online guide to get me started off on the right path!

 

[aphexist]

I have no experience running a OS X web dev server. Usually Linux will be used since the hardware is cheap and the software is free. However, the software you will be installing will be similar. I am assuming that you want to RUN your web apps on a non-Mac platform once development is completed.

Apache is the web server of choice for UNIX platforms. I would start with version 1.3.28, which can be downloaded from http://httpd.apache.org/ -- Look for the OS X binary installer.

You will want a scripting language to power your web apps, and since it appears you are at odds with ASP, you might like to try PHP. You can download version 4.3.3 from http://www.entropy.ch/software/macosx/php/ -- Note: This only runs on Jaguar. You will also have to configure Apache to work with PHP by editing some lines in a file. The installer *MIGHT* do this for you.

Finally, MySQL is available for powering your database. You can download an installer from http://www.mysql.com/downloads/mysql-4.0.html

You will not have to know much about UNIX to get these pieces working. Also, any books (that I know of) will concentrate on Windows and Linux installations rather than Mac. I would definitely pick up a PHP book to learn the basics of the language. Try installing all of these pieces and running some PHP files in your web directory. It might "just work!" Hahaha...

 

[Rower_CPU]

PHP/MySQl is a great route for OS X development. You can install and run MySQL both on OS X client and server thanks to the fact that Apache and PHP are pre-installed on both.

I started out with a Visual Quickstart Guide, but since you're already familiar with ASP, you might try this Sam's book.

http://www.php.net and http://www.mysql.com are also great resources

aphexist-
After modifying httpd.conf, it does "just work".