Payroll/Management System

I work for the IT at my University and we want to create a system that people can login through and it would record their IP address (to know if they are on campus) in a database and when they logged out.

Also, some sort of simple message board/work order system would be integrated with this as well.

I know there are some solutions that I could find already made but I am doing this for my senior programming project as well.

I was thinking PHP/MySQL. My school has a license for Cold Fusion and my boss says it would be easier that way but I figured I should learn MySQL over CF since I would be able to use it more places.

So I suppose my question would be: Does PHP/MySQL sound like a good combination for a system like this, and how hard does it sound?

TIA,
Frank

PHP/MySQL would be fine for something like this. I don't know PHP, but I use ASP for similar programs. It's not that hard to do in asp, so I would presume that php would be just as easy if you know the language.

Ditto. I use ASP with a backend MySQL database. Piece of cake once you learn the basics.

There are a billion books on using PHP with MySQL, too, so you shouldn't have any problem finding help. That's a fairly common tool-set for designing database-driven websites.

I've never used ColdFusion. I typically create webpages in straight HTML (I'm talking old-school, using Notepad to write HTML, none of that Frontpage garbage!) then use the ASP scripts to grab data from the database and fill in the HTML templates I've created. I'd think you could do something similar in PHP. That way, you can separate out your design and layout (HTML and CSS) from your scripting (ASP or PHP or whatever). Makes it easier to maintain than having a bunch of HTML and scripts jumbled together in one file.

i know asp better also, but either would work. they both have a bunch of server variables available when the page loads, and the ip address is one of them.

here is an example
http://www.asp101.com/samples/servvars.asp
your ip is "REMOTE_ADDR"

and there is something similar for php.
as far as the message board, can you use phpbb? or do you have to build it yourself?

ahh, alright thanks for the quick and informative replies. Sorry I could not respond sooner.

Thanks for the confirmation!


Frank