I want to know what packages/web services I Should download to get started with PHP and MySQL. I am a beginner in both PHP and MySQL, so this will be my first time.
I am using Windows 7 ULTIMATE
I'd recommend you to buy Head First PHP & MySQL, an extremely good book for beginners, you can learn a lot! All the packages/downloads required are all mentioned in the book.
XAMPP is a perfect choice if you want to start. It works on Windows and has good documentation.
It will give you a web server (Apache), PHP, MySQL, phpMyAdmin, OpenSSL and several other useful tools. It is easy to manage and set up.
You should try http://www.apachefriends.org/en/xampp-windows.html ...it's verry easy to install and get on coding :)
You could always try installing Virtual Box with Ubuntu on it and have all the benefits of linux PHP :P ... here's how: http://www.psychocats.net/ubuntu/virtualbox ; http://www.ivankristianto.com/os/ubuntu/howto-install-apache-php-mysql-and-phpmyadmin-on-ubuntu/1027/
You can download WAMP (Windows Apache MySql and PHP package) that as it names implies contains Apache ,MySql and PHP and install them on your machine very easily.
You can download Eclipse PDT that's an open source and powerful IDE.
There are a lot of EBooks and resources out there to learn PHP you can find a list on amazon here.There's also this site that contains some tutorial videos discussing how to build web sites using PHP and MySql .
Instead of a editor such as Eclypse, Aptana, Dreamweaver I would suggest using Notepad++, it has pretty much all you need and since its very light you won't have the damn long loading times to boot the program. other than that have a look at http://w3schools.com and http://tizag.com, those will teach you the basics. once you got those http://php.net will pretty much provide you with any info you need.