Setting up Xampp and DataAssist

Hello everyone,

I am new to Xampp, Data Assist, and site design in general. I naturally learn by doing something, and I wanted to start to mess around designing dynamic sites with Dreamweaver using MySql and Data Assist. I downloaded Xampp and I have Data Assist installed. Before I begin messing around with something I know almost nothing about, I was wondering if anyone could provide with a checklist or walk through of sorts so I can set up a Sql database and connect it with Data Assist so I can begin practicing creating Dynamic sites. I am sorry if this is a stupid question, I just don't want to do something wrong because I purchased all of this software.

Thank you for your help in advance,
DTK

The XAMP should install an Apache webserver, MySQL, and PHP. Once you have it installed on your system you should be ready to create your connections from within Dreamweaver and start using DataAssist and any other dynamic tools.

We have a some guides, tutorials and how to docs on getting your server and connections set up. They can be found on the DataAssist support page under Related Articles and tutorials, and also in the general tech notes area you can find the Web Development: Before you Begin doc. If you have any specific questions about any part of this please let us know.

dataassist/

Pay attention to which php version your Xampp uses, 5.2.9 or 5.3.0.

I have run into several issues on 5.3.0 that were not seen in 5.2.9 and went back to that versions because 5.3.0 didn't really have any improvements that I need right now.

John is rite on, there are a few things about 5.3 that differ a bit, there is a thread in the announcements area of this forum that discusses these differences.

In addition to the Before You Begin guide there is also a new Web Development Work Flow guide that has gone up. It is a step by step approach to the workflow that is involved in creating a dynamic site. Here is a link to the page:

web-dev-workflow.php

In section 4 there are some topics about setting up the connection and other dynamic activities.