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Blogs ยป Archive for November, 2004
Which PHP libraries do you use?
For interest, wondering what PHP libraries people use? By use I mean libraries you actually trust and are willing to use / have used on a live website.
To get the ball rolling, some I’ve used before;
Email: phpMailer – 100% happy. Also a great place to help beginners understand the basic purpose of OOP
DB: ADOdb when working with Oracle – the API is much friendlier than the native Oracle extensions
XML-RPC: Incutio XML-RPC Library – the “off the shelf” version has one or two bugs which show up in less common situations but this is one of the most complete and easy-to-use XML-RPC implementations in PHP available, IMO. What I like most is it takes full advantage of PHP’s dynamic nature, rather than needing a ton of glue code to map types.
HTTP client: PEAR::HTTP_Request – there’s one of two things I’d like to fix but in general it’s a workhorse I can live with.
Forms: PEAR::HTML_QuickForm for one-off, standalone scripts. WACT otherwise.
RSS Generation: Manuel Lemos’s RSS Writer
Caching: PEAR::Cache_Lite – when I’m in a hurry. Running it through a profiler though makes me consider writing my own, specific / tuned to a particular problem.
Please check out the new Sitepoint article about growing your business
In case you haven’t read it already, please go to Sitepoint today to check out my latest article about growing your business. It is ideal for people struggling to get past the independent contractor stage, as well as for anyone running a small- to mid-sized firm.
Also, I’m always looking for good ideas for the next articles. Any feedback appreciated.
Link to this month’s article:
http://www.sitepoint.com/article/become-a-business-owner
Change Multiple Text Layers in Photoshop
Bob McDonald from Akatombo Media was kind enough to share this trick with Photoshop text layers.
If you have lots of text layers that you want to make the same change to (for example, change the font, color — anything in the options bar), you DO NOT have to go to every text layer and make changes. (Which would take a lot of time.)
Instead, link all the text layers you want to change, then select one of them and use the option bar to make the changes WHILE holding the Shift key.
Thanks, Bob!
HTCs and Service Pack 2
I haven’t played with XP Service Pack 2 yet due to not having ready access to a Windows smachine that I can upgrade, but it seems that one of the security changes made to IE has greatly increased the importance of serving up the correct Content-Type header. Aldo Hoebon writes about this in HTC components in XP Service Pack 2, and describes how the wrong Content-Type for a proprietary IE HTC file (as seen in the alpha-transparent PNG fix for that browser) can cause the HTC file to have no effect.
The IDE divide
Via Keith: the IDE Divide raising some interesting points regarding developers who are language oriented vs. developers who are tool oriented.
While the division probably isn’t so clear cut in reality, as this response points out, it is an enlightening simplification.
Personally would say I’m language oriented and often mystified by the alternative point of view. My resistance to “unified IDEs” (EMACS / VIM excepted) is based primarily on wanting the most “raw” access to the source code as possible, rather than what I would regard as a “dumbed down” view which makes me dependent on the tool (and the vendor).
I’d also rather keep pace which changes in a language’s functionality vs. changes in a tool’s features / interface (which tend to be more frequent and frustrating, IMO).
Which is why I found the Oliver Steele’s arguments enlightening, because I find myself agreeing with things like this;
Here is an example from the apache merlin web site
ReferenceDescriptor reference =
new ReferenceDescriptor( Widget.class.getName() );
ComponentModel model = (ComponentModel) m_model.getModel( reference );
model.commission();
Widget widget = (Widget) model.resolve();
Notice how you have to type everything three …
If I had a hammer, I’d hammer in the morning…
With this blog as the catalyst for my curiosity, I’ve gotten into many new areas of Java development, lately — not all of them Web-based. While it’s certainly stressful having so many balls in the air at once, it’s also a lot of fun.
Firstly I have a new mobile (that’s a cell phone) with MIDP 2.0 support, so I’ve spent some time investigating just what is possible on the mobile Java platform. The subtle improvements to the APIs in this version make developing some of the common program types–like games–a whole lot easier! I’m already looking for excuses to write programs for my phone.
Meanwhile, I’ve discovered YourKit, a Java profiling tool that is able to track and analyze the CPU and memory usage of any Java program, including an applet running in a browser. This tool has made it possible for me to improve dramatically the performance of Editize, SitePoint’s rich text editor for content management systems (expect a new release soon). Optimizeit Profiler, the tool I used previously, simply wouldn’t work for me within a Web browser.
They say that if all you have is a hammer, then everything begins to look like a nail. While …
Thanksgiving for the self-employed
Well, it’s Thanksgiving here in the USA, a great day to give thanks for all we have (and drink and eat a lot, too; I must confess to being a bit buzzed on champagne while escaping from in-laws to write this).
In terms of business, here is what I am thankful for:
- Being 100% in control of my own destiny. I get out what I put in.
- Not having to report to a boss that I don’t respect.
- My commute is 15 seconds, from my bedroom to my office.
- Lots of clients, instead of just one employer.
- No risk of a random layoff from an executive team that neither knows nor cares about me.
- I can choose my own clients and assignments.
- In this world of broadband and virtual teams, I can call on world-class resources anytime from anywhere.
- A network of top notch resources and business partners to keep rolling out and testing new ideas.
- My time is my own. If I want to work at 6 am, walk the dogs at 11 am, play tennis at noon, and work again in the afternoon (or see a matinee of Sponge Bob with my son, or go to the beach), I …
2005: New GNU General Public License Coming
Earlier this week eWeek ran a story on the efforts to update the GNU General Public License to version 3 sometime in 2005. The GPL, at version 2 since 1991 is maintained by Richard Stallman and the Free Software Foundation.
The FSF hopes to evolve the license, preserving the integrity of its framework and open source philosophy while attending to more modern concerns of copyright and patent law globally. The FSF plans to seek public comments on the forthcoming changes.
Top 20 IT mistakes to avoid: Underestimating PHP
Nice article over at Infoworld: The top 20 IT mistakes to avoid in particular point 18: Underestimating PHP;
IT managers who look only as far as J2EE and .Net when developing scalable Web apps are making a mistake by not taking a second look at scripting languages — particularly PHP. This scripting language has been around for a decade now, and millions of Yahoo pages are served by PHP each day.
Others can’t be repeated enough like “11. Developing Web apps for IE only” and sound advice like “15. Never sweating the small stuff”;
CTOs and CIOs like to talk about the strategic application of technology, but ignoring basic tactical issues can lead to simple but extremely costly mistakes. Missing a $30 domain name registration payment can be enough to grind your business to a halt. In one notorious example, last February a missed payment by The Washington Post knocked out employee e-mail for hours until the renewal was paid.
Something to leave lying conspicuously around the office…
Java Plug-In Security Vulnerability Fixed
If you haven’t already made the leap to Java 5.0, you’ll want to at least update the version you’re using. The just-released versions 1.4.2_06 and 1.3.1_13 plug a security hole in the Java Plug-In for Windows, Linux, and Solaris, whereby a malicious applet may gain access to your local file system and do evil things. Java 5.0 is not affected.
The official vulnerability report from Sun contains a pointer to a more technical explanation of the vulnerability.
Hopefully Sun will put the update on Java.com and the automatic Java Update system soon. They seem to be dragging their heels a little, perhaps as a “soft launch” to ensure the update doesn’t produce any serious side effects.
