Cal Evans' Blog: My First Mashup Slides and Code
603617
Attendees at this year's PHP UK Conference were able to listen to Cal Evans' talk about mashups in PHP - now everyone can check out his slides:   Ok after procrastinating a week, I've finally gotten around to posting my slides and sample code for my presentation at PHPUK, "My First Mashup".   He has the file offered in both a zip format and in a tarball.
13585
The Zend Developer Zone has posted their latest episode of the PHP Abstract podcast hosted by Cal Evans himself covering ways you can attract quality talent to your organization.   Along the way I've picked up a few truths, mainly stolen from people like Joel Spolsky. Some of these ideas can be found in an article I wrote a while ago titled "Nerd Herding", a link to which can be found in the show notes. Recently, I've had many people ask me variations of the same question, "How do I find talented programmers?" So today, I'm going to share with you some of the things I've learned.   The latest show is available for direct download or, as always, you can subscribe to their feed to get this and lots of other great shows.
532255
Elizabeth Smith has a new post to her blog today covering some of the fun she's been having with compiling things like Gtk+ and PHP-Gtk2.   So I've been using microsoft visual studio (actually it's Visual C++ Express, but uses the same stuff behind the scenes) to work on getting things compiled on windows. PHP-Gtk2 allows for some nifty extensions, well at least on linux. So I've been working to get versions of libglade, scintilla, gtksourceview and mozembed working on windows. It's a long, slow process. Here's the deal so far.   She talks about her current situation (what's compiling and what's not) and the software that she's trying to get up and running. She also mentions a problem she's been having with an error message talking about "unresolved external symbols" she'll need to track down (or get some help on - anyone out there seen it?)
647262
In a new post to his blog today, Mike Potter talks about the WebORB for PHP software and a new feature based on Adobe technology - a Flex-based console.   [It] includes a service browser, as well as a number of useful examples, showing both the client side code (in Flex) and server side code in PHP. The getting started guide (again, built into the console or available on the web) provides a good tutorial for creating your first WebORB powered application.   He likes the project overall, but notes a small issue he has with starting a new project - a prompt to use the Flex Data Services. Overall, though, he has high hopes for the future of the project.
732767
In a new post to his blog today, Stuart Herbert continues the theme he started in a previous post about a business case for PHP. In this new entry, he shares some things he's done to further the effort.   To turn this from an idea into reality, I've setup a Google group where anyone who is interested can join in, and help build this resource. Please come along with your ideas and concerns, and let's see what we can achieve together.   He also suggests some "first steps" to get the ball rolling, namely a list of topics the business case needs to cover.
662669
In this new post to his blog today, Tim shares some of the tools that he uses to develop his PHP applications (including supporting the CodeIgniter project).   IÃ¢ÂÂve been asked on several occasions to spill the beans on my development environment. Sadly, itÃ¢ÂÂs probably not the easiest setup - but it works for my stubborn mind.   Applications included in his list are things like PHP Eclipse, CuteFTP, XAMPP and Subversion. He also mentions a Firefox extension, Devboi, that offers quick access to several different reference manuals on the web.
498024
A look at three GUI front-ends for the LilyPond music notation software.
737544
Over on Marco Tabini's Weblog today, there's a new posting that might hit close to home with quite a fe developers out there - a discussion on code documentation.
722662
As both Andrei Zmievski and Clay Loveless mention in new blog posts from each, things in the PHP framework scene are getting a bit out of hand.   Andrei's comments:   I know you might be lusting after Rails for some reason and want to have the fame, the glory, and the dancing girls of DHH, but are we not going to be satisifed until Sourceforge is filled with the object-oriented diarrheal remains of our overblown egos and delusions of grandeur?   And Clay's thoughts:   Build a cool app. Forget about your own personal stamp on the framework world; you missed the boat on that one. But, if you want to make a mark, the world is wide open for new and cool applications. Pick an existing framework, start building your app, and contribute fixes back to that framework's community as you find shortcomings in your needs for your app.   They're both in agreement, and on more that one point. They recommend the best course of action for anyone out there with "the itch" to really work with a framework - fine one of the already established ones and dive right in. It might not be your own code, but you can contribute your own functionality and thoughts into the project and establish your own little niche.
736397
Tycho:  After seeing Chore Wars mentioned yesterday, the opportunities for manipulating people seemed...  rich.  The possibilities for mashups based on this data are also rich - I wonder if it could be exposed, somehow.  When my charge is old enough to manipulate in this way, my crib is going to fucking sparkle.
689688
Both Sara Golemon and Christopher Jones are attending this year's php|works conference and have posted their own "first day summaries" of their experiences so far.   From Sara:   Day one's of php|works is over and as usual, I have nothing but good things to say about this php|architect presentation. [...] My tutorial, PHP Extension Writing, was next in the Paris room (after lunch), and it went off a little better than I'd feared and I managed to give out three copies of my book as attendance/participation prizes.   And from Christopher:   The great thing about staying in the conference hotel is that you can roll out of bed at 5:30am body-clock time and still make it to the first session 30 minutes later with time to grab a complimentary pastry. [...] After [Paul Reinheimer's YUI] session I took a few moments to verify my notebook drives the projector - all fine once the projector picked up my screen resolution. [...] Now I'm back in my room, trying to polish up my second talk - the new one - so that I can spend the evenings talking properly with PHP users and developers.   These quotes are just the tip of the iceberg for what the two shared, so be sure to check out their full posts to get their perspective on the conference. Also keep an eye out for more great summaries to be posted here to get other developers' thoughts and happenings during this two-day conference.
660667
Solar fans will be happy to see (as mentioned in the latest post from Paul Jones) that all of the previous (and future) posts he's been making as tutorials on certain parts of the framework have been integrated into the Solar manual.   The translation went pretty quickly, because I wrote the original blog entries using Solar_Markdown, which converted them to HTML for the blog. Then I did some quick edits and re-converted them using Solar_Markdown_Wiki (which is the markup format for all the class API and manual entries at the Solar website).   Posts adapted so far include the posts covering views and layouts, using HTTP and sending email from Solar.
611923
This week, Cal Evans is reporting live from this year's php/db|works conference in Toronto. Since today is "Tutorial Day", the schedule is a little lighter, and he makes to time to catch Rob Richards' talk on PHP and Advanced XML and Web Services.    Rob Richards is the author of Pro PHP XML and Web Services. He literally wrote the book on using PHP and XML together. At php|works, he is leading a tutorial on using XML in web services using the DOM extension.    If you ever get a chance to hear Rob do a presentation, let me warn you, it is not for the faint of heart. As I learned last night when I sat down with Rob to record an interview, Rob likes to speak on leading edge and advanced topics. This tutorial is an excellent example of that philosophy.    Cal talks more about the content of the talk - its simplicity despite the complex topic, how much info is jammed in, and the fact that it's not just one giant pitch for Rob's book.
413162
Daniel Crook points out the next meeting of the New York PHP Group where Dan Gisolfi will be talking about some of the latest things that IBM has been up to in the mashup arena.   Centered around the concept of "situational applications," IBM's work with mashups targets a growing trend in Web site development. [...] IT specialists should embrace the model as a foothold for PHP in the enterprise.   Some of Dan's presentation is outlined as well - a demo of IBM's Mashup Starter Kit, a look at best practices, and talk on the collaboration of IBM with Zend and ProgrammableWeb. If you're wanting to attend, be sure you RSVP as soon as possible (before the 21st @ 3pm) to reserve your spot.
124078
I think I've mentioned this before but on Saturday Feb 12th I'll be talking  about the Jakarta FeedParser at CodeCon  in San Francisco.  I published an outline  of the talk on the FeedParser wiki.  I'm hoping to have a 0.5 release done before then and havepotentially another suprise in the works.
737118
The folks heading up the Dutch PHP Conference this year (happening in 5 short days) have posted the complete list of speakers for this year's event including:   Cal Evans - "My First Mashup" Gaylord Aulke - "Zend Framework" Stefan Koopmanschap - "Symfony Framework" Derick Rethans - "Test-driven Development"   Unfortunately, if you haven't gotten your tickets already, you're going to have to wait until next year. According to Ivo Jansch, the conference sold out right before the early-bird deadline came around. With such a great showing from developers and a great lineup of speakers for this year, you can almost guarantee that there'll be a conference next year too - so keep your eyes out for it.
465884
Cal Evans has made a new post to the Zend Developer Zone gathering together all the slides he could find from the recent Zend/PHP Conference & Expo (2007):   Most of these have already been posted on the speakers blogs. However, I thought it would be a good idea to gang them all together on one post for those who are looking for them. I've also linked to the blog posts of any speakers who blogged about ZendCon as well. Watch this page for updates, as new slides come in, I'll update the page.   If you were a speaker at the conference and you don't see your slides linked, send Cal at note at cal [at] this domain with your info.