Getting started - web programming from scratch in PHP (Level 0)

The seventh in a twice-monthly series of programming lessons starting from scratch. All welcome to attend, from complete beginners up (the more experienced can help teach!). This will be very informal, I'll be plugged into a large screen to demo some stuff and we'll sit around a big table and code-along.

If you are brand new, this one is for you. If you've been to a couple events already, then it might be worth checking out a Level 1 event, like this one:
https://www.meetup.com/Glasgow-Coding-Meetup/events/263390016/
Of course, you'd be welcome to come along if you wanted to brush up on what you learned already, or if you wanted to help any newcomers out.

More details about what we'll cover are on the wiki:
https://coding.openguide.co.uk

Goals for this event, for those that have been to 1-2 sessions already:

- Create a basic quiz web app using PHP, HTML and a MySQL database

Goals for this session, for those that are brand-new or not completely set up yet:

- Create your programming environment
- Set up an Amazon EC2 instance
- Make sure you can securely connect to it from your laptop
- Install a web server and database (Apache and MySQL)
- First steps in programming PHP
- Create a hello world program

You can get a head start by reading the 'Getting Started' page on the wiki:
https://coding.openguide.co.uk/wiki/

We'll set aside some time for general Questions and Answers.
If you have any technical questions before coming along, you can reach us on the Fediverse at https://glasgow.social/tags/coding or via #coding on irc.glasgow.social (read about IRC at https://irc.armchairscientist.co.uk).

Once you've mastered these skills you should be ready to start making basic web apps (quizes, todo list etc). From there, the only limit is your imagination.

Next meetups will cover more advance topics like user logins, session management, frameworks and more. But we'll try to keep these beginner level events happening around once a month. Also happy to work/teach in Python and demo some real-world apps and tools depending on demand.

Note:
- There is free tea and coffee at the event, but the Avalon give us this space for free, so ideally if you buy a coke or a beer that'd help keep them happy.
- Bringing a laptop will help you get a lot more out of this event.