PHP, SQL, XML or something else - need advice

[lets-eat-gary]

Hi people.

I am a webmaster of a small but expanding website

I am looking to start making the website more automated (database driven) and am wondering what it the best language/method to do this, i'll list the type of things i am looking to be able to do.

- To populate parts of a webpage with text coming from an external (online) spreadsheet, database,txt file - so I just have to edit the text without editing the entire web page.
- An automated password system (where people sign up at our site and automatically get a username and password)
- To cancel usernames /passwords at a specific date

Also what would be the best way to put a smallish database on the web - so users can filter data, search, etc.

I am starting to use Linux (mandrake 9.1 is ace!) so preferbly no microsoft solutions.

Thanks guys (and girlies)

[technobeast]

There are already made decisions: WebApp is something like that and is available either in Perl and PHP modes. So this is really cool to use something that is developed by teams and is bugfree. : http://www.web-app.org/

Also there are phpBB, phpNuke, VB for forums, etc. tools that may help you. Good luck.

But if you decide to make it by yourself maybe you should try PHP with MySQL.

[Colin-uk]

i would say PHP and MySQL are the best thing to use

[iAvalance]

Today I think you got two choices, use PHP or JSP for server side scripting.
From there your database options are a little various. MySQL is very popular, but limited in it's ways of use. PostgreSQL is more 'complete' havinfgtransaction management and a more stable setup. SQLite is a very tiny SQL database which will be too tiny for you I guess. Besides those three there are several other opensource or commercial databases.
Support for MySQL and PostgreSQL from PHP and JSP is good. Good documentation, a lot of examples in PHP documentation. JSP is a bit more tough, but faster and more common for Java programmers. If not, you better start using PHP.
With regards to MySQL vs PostgreSQL you probably find more examples and docs for MySQL, but if you go something deeper into database usage, you will find it is a pain in the @$$. So if you think you will only use your database for relative simple tasks/relations MySQL is your buddy.

XML:
PHP has experimental XML and XPath support which I found out to work quite well.
Java's XML support is still experimental as well IMHO, but it's possible to work with it too. I recently found out it was not an easy thing to do... but I might have overseen something, since almost all Apache Java application use XML-based config or data files.

[JamesT]

PHP/MySQL Hands down. I have never worked with ASP. I can only comment on PHP.

[fireydeviant]

ASP is made by microsoft, and unless you have a windows server, i wouldent use it
PHP has support for lots of thing and is widely used and easily installed, although its easier too use linux based(same for mysql)