But Adam West admits “Practical PHP and MySQL Website Databases - A Simplified Approach” is not the snappiest title

Colyton-based web designer Adrian W West has had his second book on the subject published by an American company.

He admits its title is almost an essay in itself – “Practical PHP and MySQL Website Databases - A Simplified Approach”.

It is a design manual for producing interactive websites and was snapped up by his USA publisher Apress, a subsidiary of Springer the biggest producer of science and technical books in the world.

It fills a gap in the range of subjects covered by design manuals on interactive, database driven websites, which assumed too much prior knowledge on the part of the reader. “It was clear that a practical book for absolute beginners was needed,” he said.

Mr West resigned as a chartered engineer to become the UK director of a correspondence school. He has been teaching in one form or another since 1982. He introduced computers into his workplace in 1987 and taught the staff how to use them. For four years, he taught undergraduates computer skills at a college in Cheshire in the United Kingdom.

For the last 15 years, Mr West has designed and maintained websites for local and national businesses and charities.

For a time, he also served as a computer technician and teacher to about 100 people in the community, until he decided to concentrate on his favourite occupation, designing websites. To avoid disappointing his former clients, he launched a free computer-help website at ://www.colycomputerhelp.co.uk.

Mr West also writes monthly computer-help articles for two local magazines.

He has donated a copy of his two web design books to Colyton Library and Exeter Central Library.