The purpose of this exercise is to give you familiarity with setting up a three-tier web application--that is, an app that runs in the browser and interacts with a database on the server side.
Work through the tutorial PHP Login Script Tutorial or Php Simple Login Tutorial. And here's another that Trishan likes: Wiki HowTO.
Create a MySQL database for this exercise that contains a users table with fields for username (VARCHAR), password (VARCHAR with MD5 hashing), and last_login (TIMESTAMP). Populate the users table with some fake data.
Create a simple HTML login form with fields for the username
and password and a 'Login' button, such that when the login button is
clicked, the user's data will be sent to the server and validated
against the already created users table, sending back a page that
reports "Hello Java Programmers. If you would like to develop a Web app in Java
rather than PhP, you will have to install Apache Tomcat server on your
laptop and follow the instructions
here on how to set up a simple Java web application. This will be more
complicated than doing it in PhP.
Handin instructions: Post your well-documented, well-structured solutions to the CPSC225 wiki.