It's also almost 8 years old now, so it predates all of the PHP good stuff.
Programming books that look like phone books are usually lousy, especially if they have three or more authors.
PHP and MySQL Web Development
Read it, not a bad book.
Good
It's MySQL coverage is better than any of its contemporaries--it was one of the first intro texts to recommend using the mysqli extension instead of mysql
It devotes four good chapters to security.
Bad
It's getting old. It was obviously written before PHP 5.3 and the rise of the Web frameworks.
It definitely skimps on object-oriented design.
Kind of phone-booky.
PHP Objects, Patterns and Practice
Own it. Great book, but--as mentioned elsewhere--not the best if you're a true newb.
Good
It's remarkably well-written. Zandstra is a good communicator and teacher.
It object-oriented design, not just object-oriented programming. Most PHP books teach the small-scale mechanisms of OOP--how to make a class, how inheritance works--but PHP O,P&P teaches how assemble classes into an application. Patterns are introduced in the context of a problem. Different solutions to the problem (in the form of design patterns) are examined. The consequences of design solutions are weighed. It does a good job of explaining what makes applications well-designed (loose coupling, separation of concerns, flexibility, etc) and why we should care.
It's fairly up-to-date, covering things like PDO and unit testing that are central to PHP development now.
It is a real book, not a phone book. Apress books aren't big blocks of paper that occupy your reference shelf. They're meant to be read.
Bad
It isn't an introductory book. If you don't understand at least the basics of programming you won't be able to follow it. It's a great second book, but not a great first one.
It doesn't thoroughly cover the "webby" or "databasey" side of PHP. It won't teach you about sessions or HTTP headers or parsing XML or any of that important stuff. The assumption is you already know. While there's a good chapter on database patterns, it assumes you already know enough about SQL to create and manipulate a well-designed, normalized database.
For a true newb I'd recommend Beginning PHP 5.3 by Matt Doyle. It's a solid intro to modern PHP. Follow that with the Zandstra book or a good database book.
PHP5 and MySQL Bible
Never read it, but I'll review it anyway.
Good
Bad
PHP and MySQL Web Development
Read it, not a bad book.
Good
mysqli
extension instead ofmysql
Bad
PHP Objects, Patterns and Practice
Own it. Great book, but--as mentioned elsewhere--not the best if you're a true newb.
Good
Bad
For a true newb I'd recommend Beginning PHP 5.3 by Matt Doyle. It's a solid intro to modern PHP. Follow that with the Zandstra book or a good database book.
A good book for PHP 5.3 is http://www.amazon.co.uk/Beginning-PHP-5-3-Wrox-Programmer/dp/0470413964
I can't remember if it covers outputting to PDF but once you've got the language and MySQL down doing that is only a Google away.