My next year project for computer science is to create a program, a large one. I've done basic java before, next year they're going to teach us php, MySQL, and more on http and css. My idea for a program is to create one that automatically picks parts for the user depending on conditions they input, (ie: form factor, pc use, price limit, etc), I want to make this program self update, Scan websites for details on the parts, then self choose the parts, rather than me just adding parts. I don't really know where to look for tutorials on coding?, and I was also wondering, if the languages I know and am going to learn would be best suited to this?
Thanks for any replies. I'm still relatively knew to coding.
so to really make it snazzy fancy, you would have the parts in the database. the php would only be an accessing api. and then you would write a java UI to access it and interact with the php over HTTP GET/POST. bet that will get you an A easy. as for where to look, google what you want to do and see what comes up. thats how i do it. also become comfortable reading documentation. php's isnt that terrible to read. java's is pretty good too. also look on youtube
As an alternative to yet another php/mysql application... seeing as you already have some java experience why don't you consider writing an app engine application? The free-tier quota is more than enough to run a simple academic demo project. Here's a java tutorial to get you started:
https://developers.google.com/appengine/docs/java/gettingstarted/introduction
I am not even a coder, so my opinion may have very little value here, but the bit about your software scanning websites very heavily relies on websites providing the right sort of data in a standardized fashion. This can be done to aggregate news articles for example, but I'm not so sure about i5 compatible motherboards. You may end up having to write custom scripts for each individual website. A Client/Server pair of applications sound a lot more feasible. Client would work as one would imagine and server would provide a list of components to choose from. That list might need to be entered and maintained manually, but you'd have good odds of actually looking up various websites for prices.