Today we're changing our usual intro to call attention to the plight of Richard Lynch. Richard, for those of you who don't know, has been a real advocate of PHP and ran the Chicago PHP Users Group for many years. Unfortunately, Richard has Brain Cancer and doesn't have the finances to make things comfortable for himself.
Go to Richard's blog page and learn about his situation in his own words. There you will find a Paypal link in the top corner. Any financial help you can give this brave man would be so appreciated.
Naturally we have the usual links, articles and information that we normally have so hope you don't mind us hijacking our usual intro with something that we feel is important.
All the best,
Ade and Katie |
Articles
The Pros and Cons of Zend Certification
As a PHP developer, you may have been asking yourself how to improve your skills, gain reputation or become more professional in your work. One of the ways of doing so is to get through a certification programme. The only one that covers PHP itself (not a particular framework or software solution) is being delivered by the Zend company.
What is the Best Programming Language to Learn in 2014?
It’s been a year since Craig Buckler revealed the best languages to learn in 2013. Once again, he has examined the data produced by Jobs Tractor who analysed more than 45,000 developer jobs advertised on Twitter during the past twelve months. Find out his results here.
PHP In The Afterlife With Zend
PHP firm Zend has extended its Long-Term Support (LTS) policy for PHP. This means that users can use a major version of PHP (for instance PHP 5.3) for more than five years after its initial release date. This adds an additional 2 years (a time span representing 40%) to the lifecycle of a major PHP version, after its end of support from the open source PHP community.
There's No PHP User Group Here!
When going to conferences you always hear "join a local user group, and if there's none in your area you're the person who needs to start one". But then what? Where do you get started? How do you organise a PHP user group? Basically, you're left in the dark and you're missing out on all the great stuff everyone else can enjoy. So how do you get started?
Coding Standards: Humans Are Not Computers
Padraic Brady has a part rant and part "poking fun" look at coding standards. |
Tutorials and Talks
PHPStorm - Top Productivity Hacks and Shortcuts
This article shares some keyboard shortcuts and tips which you should make part of your regular routine if you work in the IDE PHPStorm.
Mockery 0.9.0 Has Landed…Mostly In One Piece!
Mockery is a simple yet flexible PHP mock object framework for use in unit testing with PHPUnit, PHPSpec or any other testing framework. Its core goal is to offer a test double framework with a succint API capable of clearly defining all possible object operations and interactions using a human readable Domain Specific Language (DSL). Designed as a drop in alternative to PHPUnit’s phpunit-mock-objects library, Mockery is easy to integrate with PHPUnit and can operate alongside phpunit-mock-objects without the world ending.
Implement Flash Messages using Session in PHP - Part1
A Flash Message is a message that will be shown/displayed only once. If you reload the browser, or navigate to another page and come back again, the message will no longer be displayed. This article shows how to implement Flash Messages using PHP Session.
CAPTCHA Image Using GD Library
Although not usually a fan of CAPTCHA images, Martin Psinas found himself in need of one when he realised alternative methods are not always foolproof.
How To Make Custom PHP Changes Using A .user.ini File
At times, you will want to use software that requires a custom php.ini file or custom PHP configuration changes, such as increasing the memory limit or upload limit that your site is allowed. Since these are settings that we can not change on a server-wide basis, you would need to make these changes locally on your account. Fortunately, with these easy to follow steps, you can have a .user.ini file created and customised within minutes!
Managing Gettext Translations on Shared Hosting
If you’re working for a big company, chances there are that sooner or later your employers will start to target the global market. With this ambition will come the need to translate the company’s website into one or more languages. Even if you don’t work for a big company, you may have a new service to launch in your native language (assuming you’re not a native English speaker) to target your local market, and in English for the global one. As developers, our role isn’t to translate texts but to prepare the website to support translations. The most popular method to do that in PHP is via Gettext.
Verify Email Address Using PHP
Sometimes you may need to verify a user’s email address. This article explains how to do this with PHP.
What Application Layer Does A DI Container Belong In?
Paul M.Jones received this question via Twitter this week. Read his response here.
HHVM and Hack – Can We Expect Them to Replace PHP?
This article will focus on HACK, which is an evolution of the PHP language designed to be safer, to enable better performance and to improve developer efficiency. Note that both HACK and PHP are equally supported by the HHVM. Despite the fact that HACK is in use at Facebook on all the production servers, only little info has been leaked for now. In a nutshell, HACK is Facebook's PHP6 – it proposes to fix most of what's wrong with PHP today, while adding some new features like static typing along the way. You can install a Vagrant virtual machine to start experimenting with HACK and run the code snippets from this article.
Constructing Hard Regular Expressions with VerbalExpressions
Most newbie (and some seasoned) programmers have difficultly constructing Regular Expressions. There may be a time when one needs to create a Regexp quickly to test a a particular piece of code. However, not being comfortable with Regexps can be a problem. VerbalExpressions is a PHP library that enables you to construct regular expressions using natural language like constructs. Think of it like a DSL for building Regexps. This article features a sample PHP code that constructs a regular expression which tests whether a given string is a valid url.
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News and Announcements
PHP 5.4.25 Released!
The PHP development team announces the immediate availability of PHP 5.4.25. 5 bugs were fixed in this release. All PHP 5.4 users are encouraged to upgrade to this version.
PHP 5.5.9 Is Ready For Download
The PHP development team announces the immediate availability of PHP 5.5.9. This release fixes several bugs against PHP 5.5.8.
PHPNE Conference - 18th March 2014, Newcastle
PHP North East Conference 2014 is a one day event held in the stylish and beautiful Tyneside Cinema. We have 14 passionate speakers across 3 focused tracks, followed by an awesome evening social event at Newcastle’s very own Lane7 bowling establishment. Sit in comfort and have your mind blown as our passionate speakers talk about the latest libraries, tools and practices instrumental in shaping the future of PHP development. Get your ticket now!
MidWest PHP Conference - March 15-16th 2014
Minnesota's premier PHP conference takes place next month. Over 30 sessions on topics such as Zend Framework 2, PHPUnit, Vagrant, Continuous Integration, Cloud Computing and more by speakers who are experts in their field and community leaders. Tickets are still available so register now.
Joomla! 3.2.2 Released
The Joomla! Project and the Production Leadership Team are proud to announce the release of Joomla! 3.2.2 which resolves a significant number of issues and bugs. |
Voices of the ElePHPant - It's The Booze Talking #6 : APIs Part 1
This latest podcast episode from the team was recorded at the Sunshine PHP Conference in Miami, last week. The panel of guests includes Matthew Weier O’Phinney and Phil Sturgeon.
An Interview With the Founder of the Slim Framework for PHP
Josh Lockhart, of NMC, noticed a void in PHP and decided to fill it by building his own framework. He collaborated not only with NMC'ers but also with programmers around the world to build Slim. Below is an interview with Josh about the idea, its reception and how it has been put to use.
A Talk with PHP Recruiter Lonnie Brown
You have all heard of recruitment; we have it in all sphere and The PHP Sphere is no exception to that. Are you considering reaching out to a PHP recruiter? Or maybe, as a company, you are looking to hire one to fill your PHP recruitment needs? The team at 7PHP brings you an interview with PHP Recruiter Lonnie Brown, who has been in the business for over seventeen years and who suggests "Forget about money and take care of the candidates".
Pro Drupal as an Enterprise Development Platform (by Jamie Kurtz and Thomas Besluau, published 23rd January 2014)
This book explains how developers can save themselves time and money, and build their applications faster with fewer bugs, by using the Drupal CMS as a foundation for their projects. The days when custom client applications were built entirely from scratch are over. Today, it makes business sense to use a flexible, highly scalable framework such as Drupal, Joomla or DotNetNuke as a foundation. This book focuses on why Drupal makes a particularly strong choice for the majority of developers.
Practical PHP and MySQL Website Databases: A Simplified Approach (by Adrian West, published 24th January 2014)
This is a project-oriented book that demystifies building interactive, database-driven websites. The focus is on getting you up and running as quickly as possible. In the first two chapters you will set up your development and testing environment, and then build your first PHP and MySQL database-driven website. You will then increase its sophistication, security and functionality throughout the course of the book. The PHP required is taught in context within each project, so you can quickly learn how PHP integrates with MySQL to create powerful database-driven websites. |
Jobs
If you have a position that needs filling, let us know and we will include it.
Kinesis Seeks Senior-Level PHP Talent! (Austin, Texas)
Kinesis is the established world leader for mobile survey software. We’re in the midst of refactoring our flagship product and reimagining our infrastructure as code using cutting edge tools and techniques. We’ve implemented distributed version control, continuous integration and inspection, and are aggressively re-architecting to support continuous delivery. We’re looking to add some experienced talent to our team to help us get there.
Single Founder seeking Senior PHP Talent
This one is a bit different! We decided to post it as Dan intrigued us. Single founder seeking either freelancers or employee number 1, with potential co-founder status. Read more on Dan's blog.
PHP Job in London with Signkick
Join a startup that is revolutionising the $33b outdoor advertising market.
Junior Developer for Performance Telecom, Newcastle Based.
Performance Telecom are looking for a Junior developer, based in Newcastle upon Tyne, to work on exciting big data and telecoms projects. This role would suit a recent graduate, though also someone who can drive and has access to their own transport. Contact [email protected] with your CV/Resume. This is NOT a remote position.
Developer at Sailthru (New York City)
We're hiring! Sailthru has many open roles, including: VP Data Science (NY), Android Developer (NY), Test Engineer (NY), Senior Developer (NY) and a lot more in the office of New York, San Francisco and London. Contact [email protected] for more information.
DeskPRO is hiring Full Stack PHP Developer (Symfony/AngularJS) in London or Remote.
Join our small London based team (excellent remote workers considered as well) building a large PHP application where your work will have immediate impact on our millions of end users. Lots of interesting projects coming up including adding elasticsearch and memached to our stack, writing a DeskPRO app for telephony based upon Twilio, integrating our software with other companies APIs, adding functionality to our phonegap mobile app as well as continuing the development of our core software platform.
PHP (Drupal) developers at Torchbox (Bristol and Oxford, UK)
Passionate about PHP, delirious about Drupal and want to work on a wide variety of challenging yet fun projects for fantastic clients? If yes, then Torchbox would love to hear from you! In return, we can offer an enviable working environment (country park or buzzing Bristol), a competitive salary, all the usual kit and sometimes even a ski trip.
Full Stack Developer
Major television production company seeks an experienced web developer to join its digital division. The ideal candidate possesses a deep expertise and abiding love of web development, an incredible track record of producing stellar web applications (with a long list of URLs & GitHub repositories to prove it), a near-supernatural work ethic and a fantastic sense of humour.
Machine Learning / AI skills (project based)
Inovica are looking for someone to work with them on detecting ecommerce products on sites and extracting relevant information. In the first instance please email [email protected] stating the experience you have in this field. They don't have a job description online but will reply to every email they receive.
Message Digital Design Ltd is Hiring a Web Developer (PHP)
We are looking for an experienced developer to work in our spacious offices in central Brighton, helping to deliver high-quality websites, e-commerce and online systems to a wide range of clients. At Message we give a damn about building the web the right way, and the successful applicant will too.
Ballers Bridge is Hiring a Sr. Yii Developer
We are looking for a motivated and outstanding candidate to lead our product development. The ideal candidate is an experienced problem solver, quick thinker/learner, self-motivated and not afraid of challenges.
PHP Engineers for Bright.Com in San Francisco
We are looking for PHP engineers to join our growing team! The ideal candidate is language agnostic, and can work with both scripting languages (such as Python and PHP) as well as strongly typed languages (such as C++ and Java), and has a passion for taking an idea and exploring, tinkering, debating, and demonstrating the fastest, most efficient, flexible and scalable implementation approaches. Experience working with traditional SQL databases as well as newer technologies, indexes and data stores is key (such as Solr, ElasticSearch, Redis, or Neo4j), and you must be comfortable using Linux and other open source technologies.
Senior PHP Developer in Bucharest, Romania
We are searching for a passionate PHP developer who will be part of a team of senior programmers and experienced testing engineers, directly involved in technical development projects, using Agile Scrum as methodology.
Freelance Dev Leads
A concierge service for your freelancing business. Whilst this is a paid service for developers Glen, who runs this site, provides good solid curated freelance jobs to his list. We have used it ourselves and recommend giving it a go. |
Interesting Projects, Tools and Libraries
riak-admin
Admin panel for RIAK written in PHP (v0.4).
envoy
Elegant SSH tasks for PHP.
omnipay
A framework agnostic, multi-gateway payment processing library for PHP 5.3+.
kamele-framework
Simple PHP framework.
Nette Tester
Enjoyable unit testing.
psolr
A simple PHP client for Apache Solr that is built on top of Guzzle and inspired by RSolr.
locale
CakePHP Plugin to work with localised data.
kisma
PHP Utility Belt v0.2.x.
acquia-sdk-php
The Acquia SDK for PHP allows developers to build applications on top of Acquia services.
phpAssemblaTicket
A PHP library for interacting with Assembla's ticket API.
negotiation
Content Negotiation tools for PHP provided as a standalone library.
facebook-connect
Laravel Facade for Facebook PHP SDK.
altax-server
Running php built-in web server via altax.
bnmoney
PHP Library for dealing with money and currency.
emyi
Sleek, intuitive and powerful PHP micro-framework for fast and easy web development.
epublib
PHP5 library allowing metadata retrieval from an ePub file. |
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