doubts on setting up webserver for local development

hello,

I'm setting up my mac (running leopard) to run as webserver so that i can do web development locally. i set up apache 2.2.9 and turned on php 5.2.6.

I have a set of webpages written in html, php and flash to update (not written by me originally). although they are running ok remotely (www.ct.com.br/emy32), it is not working locally. specifically, when i click on the menu items on the top (locally) only the first page is (re)loaded (no matter which item). even if i type, say, http://localhost/~emy32/index.php?id=2, the http://localhost/~emy32/index.php?id=0 page is loaded.

I'm just learning web development (no professional purposes) so i feel a bit lost. Is this a matter of not having configured the local PHP properly? (as the same pages and codes are running ok at the remote site?)

thanks
prtc

It it works properly remotely, then it sounds like everything is working as it should be. What I'd check is if the coding is referring to external site names (like your domain name) directly. Internally/locally that normally won't work. For example, if in your code you are pointing/referring to "http://domain.com/code.php" instead of just "code.php" you may find that it doesn't work when you test locally.

I would advise you to set up a MAMP
MAMP - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

it is a software bundle that includes Apache, Mysql and PHP all into one.
This means you only have to install one application and it will run everything at the same time.

Here is a good one which wikipedia recommends
living-e AG: MAMP - Mac - Apache - MySQL - PHP

download the
- only MAMP 1.7.2 dmg Image (universal binary)
I tried the other ones and they don't seem to work.

You can follow this easy video tutorial to set it all up
Install a Local Web Server on Mac OSX | Lullabot

I've been developing PHP applications on Windows using easyPHP which is the same thing as a MAMP but for Windows and the one for Mac is so much easier to use.