Using PDO to connect to a database

PDO is a highly performant and actively maintained database extension that has a unique advantage over vendor-specific extensions. It has a common Application Programming Interface (API) that is compatible with almost a dozen different Relational Database Management Systems (RDBMS). Learning how to use this extension will save you hours of time trying to master the command subsets of the equivalent individual vendor-specific database extensions.

PDO is subdivided into four main classes, as summarized in the following table:

Class	Functionality
PDO	Maintains the actual connection to the database, and also handles low-level functionality such as transaction support
PDOStatement	Processes results
PDOException	Database-specific exceptions
PDODriver	Communicates with the actual vendor-specific database

How to do it...

1. Set up the database connection by creating a PDO instance.

2. You need to construct a Data Source Name (DSN). The information contained in...