Best practice??

I've got a site that I'm doing in php using several includes that are shared by pages in various folders so I've got to use a full path to the links, graphics, etc.

We're developing on a test location on the client's server and will eventually migrate to the production area.

Is there an easy way to declare a php variable in the first include to set the path for all the graphics, links, etc.?

For example, I've got index.php and contact/index.php which call:

Code:

---

<?php include("header.php") ?>

---

and

Code:

---

<?php include("../header.php") ?>

---

respectively...

Now, in header.php I've got:

Code:

---

<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="http://clientsite.com/css/style.css" />

---

and

Code:

---

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://clientsite.com/js/jquery.js"></script>

---

and

Code:

---

<a href="http://clientsite.com/page.html"><img src="http://clientsite.com/images/image.jpg" alt="1" border="0" /></a>

---

Is there a way (in header.php) to do something like:

Code:

---

<?php 
$root= "http://clientsite.com/";
?>

---

If that will work, how would I write the above calls? Would I just have to wrap the php tags around them, or do I need to use echo?? Something like:

Code:

---

<?php 
<link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href=$root.'/css/style.css' />
?>

---

Haven't done this with php before so I'm not sure what the best practice is and what the code details are...

THANKS!!