Learning PHP/MySQL

I have a question for all the web developers here. The company I work for has an IT departrment living in the stone age. The are set on their ways of using Progress to run the back end of our web site and other in-house sales applications. Dealing with them to make changes and to fix problems is a nightmare. That is one of the worst parts of my job (well, that and having to use a PC here at work).

The cool thing is that a few months ago I got a new manager and she's sick of our IT department as well and is open to suggestions. I've been interested in PHP and MySQL for a few months now since I can run both of these locally on my G5 and all the reviews/case studies I read are awesome. I've picked up PHP and MySQL for Dynamic Websites by Larry Ullman which seemed to be a cool book except that I've already ran into problems where some of the most simple scripts weren't working locally or on an external testing server. So I feel like it would be good for me to have some more training. I'm in search for a place I can take classes. Do any of you know where I could do thatt in the Pennsylvania/Maryland area? Or any other ideas on how to learn these programs? Also - what's everyone's preference on a GUI for MySQL? I've seen PHPmyAdmin and Cocoa MySQL but I'm wondering what others use.

Maybe the IT department is scared because some software could put them out of a job. That's my theory. If I can build an example site to show how strong and cost effective these programs are I think it may get some higher-ups thinking of the possibilities.

There are plenty of online tutorials that will teach you how to use php/mysql through examples, that's where most of my knowledge came from. As for a GUI for mySQL, go with whatever you like the look of - but do try to learn how to use it through the terminal. Sometimes that's a bit easier.

Well I have plenty of sites that use php/mysql so if you want a couple to shows your manager.. PM me.

As for MySQL gui.. my preference is phpMyAdmin, I've tried others, but nothing seems to have the power of phpMyAdmin.

Where to learn is a harder one. I learned exactly the way muso did, and then thing is that I've been doing this for a good 6 years now and I have learned a lot! Now my whole business is based around these technologies. I purchased these books: PHP Developers Cookbook and MySQL/PHP Database Applications and those were what I referred to all the time.

Good luck!