PHP has become popular over a very short time due to the ease of development. You can emulate most cgi programs with PHP and you can also embed it in client side HTML for truly dynamic web sites. It also has excellent support for a wide range of databases.One special area is integration of PHP and Javascript in an optimum manner for best speed and minimum load on servers. As an example, visit the author's article on "PHP - MySQL Interface for HierMenus" in www.webreference.com and then come back to see the script in action at the PHP Download section.
In the "Codes" section you will find some useful PHP code snippets and in the "Download" Section there are complete PHP demonstration packages for download.