MySQLi (MySQL Improved) has many advantages over the older PHP MySQL driver.  It takes advantage the newer features built into MySQL 4.1.3 and newer.  Below are some simple examples of basic MySQL functions (SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE and DELETE).

SELECT

$mysqli = new mysqli('$server', '$user', '$pass', '$db');
if (mysqli_connect_errno())
        {
        printf ("Connect failed: %sn", mysqli_connect_error());
        exit();
        }

$query = 'SELECT first_name, last_name FROM table WHERE id=?';

if ($stmt = $mysqli->prepare($query))
        {
        $stmt->bind_param('s', $param);
        $stmt->execute();
        $stmt->bind_result($first_name, $last_name);
        while($stmt->fetch())
        {
        	echo 'Your name is' . $first_name . $last_name;
        }
        $stmt->close();
        }
$mysqli->close();

//id=? in query statement denotes that the ? will be defined in bind_param
//'s' in bind_param is the data type
		#i - interger
		#d - double
		#s - string
		#b - blob (will be sent in packets)

UPDATE

$mysqli = new mysqli('$server', '$user', '$pass', '$db');
if (mysqli_connect_errno())
        {
        printf ("Connect failed: %sn", mysqli_connect_error());
        exit();
        }
$query = 'UPDATE dfunct_dynamic SET title=?, description=?, code=? WHERE id=?';
if ($stmt = $mysqli->prepare($query))
        {
        $stmt->bind_param("sssi", $title, $description, $code, $id);
        $stmt->execute();
        $stmt->close();
        }
$mysqli->close();

INSERT

$mysqli = new mysqli('$server', '$user', '$pass', '$db');
if (mysqli_connect_errno())
        {
        printf ("Connect failed: %sn", mysqli_connect_error());
        exit();
        }
$query = 'INSERT INTO table (first_name, last_name, title) VALUES (?, ?, ?)';
if ($stmt = $mysqli->prepare($query))
        {
        $stmt->bind_param("ssss", $first_name, $ last_name, $title);
        $stmt->execute();
        $stmt->close();
        }
$mysqli->close();

DELETE

$mysqli = new mysqli('$server', '$user', '$pass', '$db');
if (mysqli_connect_errno())
        {
        printf ("Connect failed: %sn", mysqli_connect_error());
        exit();
        }
$query = 'DELETE from dfunct_dynamic WHERE id=?';
if ($stmt = $mysqli->prepare($query))
        {
        $stmt->bind_param("i", $id);
        $stmt->execute();
        $stmt->close();
        }
$mysqli->close();