The SQL to get a list of all available letters is quite simple:

SELECT DISTINCT SUBSTR(`term`, 1, 1) AS `letter` FROM `terms`;

If you’re familiar with PHP’s substr function, you will notice that the syntax is exactly the same:

substr(’string’, start_position, length)

Be sure to check up on the SUBSTR function in the MySQL manual for more information.

I’ve subscribed to many PHP related podcasts over the last two years or so and only two really stand out amongst the rest. It only seems natural that they come from two of the industry’s most influential leaders: Zend and php|architect.

PHP Abstract is a newer podcast offered by Zend’s Developer Zone. They have short episodes (usually no longer than 10 minutes) that are very informative for most PHP developers. At the time of this writing, they have released nine episodes all of which I’ve listened to at least twice. Zend has worked very hard lately at putting a focus on helping out the community and this is just another great resource that is freely made available to us.

The Pro::PHP podcast, presented by php|architect, is another podcast hosted by Sean Coates and my good friend Paul Reinheimer. Pro::PHP is offers more of a casual, less formal approach to podcasts. You can really have fun while listening to Sean and Paul’s conversation and still learn quite a bit. Also, you can expect these podcasts to be considerably longer than those in PHP Abstract (usually averaging about 30 minutes in length).

Make sure to add these to your iTunes (or whatever client you happen to use). You certainly won’t regret it!

It’s quite obvious that you can’t just abandon a version’s users once something new and improved has come out — that wouldn’t be profitable for the community. Instead, do as all good communities do: train, educate, and allow some time for upgrading. Now three years have passed since PHP 5 was announced and it’s time to move on.

GoPHP5.org is a site/movement that have set a firm date to stop community support of PHP 4 and to make the minimum version requirement to 5.2. Their proposed date is February 5, 2008. Although the site is a bin minimal and doesn’t provide any resources beyond a list of supportive hosts and applications, I still feel that this movement is a good one and carries with it great potential. I made the switch to coding entirely PHP 5 about one year ago and I have yet to run into any problems whatsoever.

What is the communities reaction to the thought of dropping support for PHP 4?

• Saturday, August 4th
• Saturday, August 25 (Instead of September 1, allowing traveling for Labor Day on September 3)
• Saturday, September 29
• Saturday, October 27

Meetings for the above dates will be held at DeVry University in Room 108 from 3pm to 5pm. I will be presenting a talk on Web Services on August 4th (witty title coming soon, I promise). I would love to see some folks step up and give some talks for the other three slots. Please propose any ideas in our discussion group.

Be sure to plan around these dates! More information will follow once more specific details come my way.

If you haven’t checked it out yet, the Zend Framework is a rock-solid framework written in PHP 5 that offers solutions for most of the issues web developers face on a day-to-day basis. It is completely open source and falls under a very loose license and their contributers must also agree to and fill out a Contributer License Agreement which is based on Apache’s. In other words, feel free to pick it up and use it in your projects without fear of IP violations.

While using it, you may notice that it has a PEAR-like feeling to it (even though they don’t use all of PEAR’s coding standards throughout the library). As a result, its “use at will” architecture allows you to load only the necessary components in your application as well as insures that it plays well with other frameworks.

One criticism that I have with the framework is that there is no project creation utility, specifically for the MVC libraries. Granted, this slightly goes against the deliberate openness of the framework, but MVCs aren’t noted for their ease of set-up. This could be a bit premature since the framework is still a little young. I’m sure that we will see it evolve quite a bit over the years.

I’d love to see someone [else] put together a talk about this so everyone can benefit from a full presentation of the code. Let’s hear what you think!

If you are looking to take your programming to the next level, come to this presentation.
If you are looking to code 10x faster, come to this presentation.
If you never want to code a line of SQL again, come to this presentation.

This talk will be a continuation of the object-oriented concepts discussed in the previous meeting, however attendance to that meeting is not required. Come prepared to learn a lot and get ready to have your programming skills improve exponentially overnight.

Time, date, and location information follow below. If you have any questions, please be sure to post them in the CFPHP Discussion group: http://groups.google.com/group/cfphp.

Date:

Saturday, June 9th, 2007

Time:

3:00pm to 5:00pm

Location:

DeVry University

4000 Millenia Blvd

Orlando, FL 32839

See you all there!!

]]> https://cfphp.org/2007/06/06/baking-cakes-with-php/feed/ https://cfphp.org/2007/04/10/lists-for-you-to-join/ https://cfphp.org/2007/04/10/lists-for-you-to-join/#comments Wed, 11 Apr 2007 02:47:43 +0000 Michael Girouard Useful Information news https://cfphp.org/2007/04/10/lists-for-you-to-join/ I have just taken the time to set up two Google Groups for the CFPHP group.

Central Florida PHP

The Central Florida PHP group is an open discussion for any PHP developer who wants to discuss anything related to PHP or this group’s activities.

Central Florida PHP Announcements

The Central Florida PHP Announcements group is an announcements-only group (IE: nobody can post except for admins and super heroes).

You will find signup forms on on the sidebar of this page if you want to quickly join.

]]> https://cfphp.org/2007/04/10/lists-for-you-to-join/feed/ https://cfphp.org/2007/04/02/may-meeting-a-gentle-introduction-to-object-oriented-php/ https://cfphp.org/2007/04/02/may-meeting-a-gentle-introduction-to-object-oriented-php/#comments Tue, 03 Apr 2007 02:42:30 +0000 Michael Girouard Events https://cfphp.org/2007/04/02/may-meeting-a-gentle-introduction-to-object-oriented-php/ [Update: I’ve updated the outline to be a little more detailed]

I’m proud to say that after a brief hiatus CFPHP is finally back. On top of that, we now have a permanent meeting location thanks to our gracious host, DeVry. They have agreed to host our meetings for the remainder of 2007, providing us with a location, ample parking, an overhead projection system, internet connection, and seating for up to 38 people.

The meeting will take place in room 114 from 3:00 pm to 5:00 pm on May 12^th, 2007.

Directions

From Yahoo! or Google

1. Take exit 78 off I4 (Conroy Road)
2. If you are coming from the East, turn left on Conway from the offramp. If you are coming from the West, turn right on Conway from the offramp.
3. Turn left on Millenia Blvd.
4. The DeVry campus will be on the right. Park in the Visitors Parking in the front of the building.
5. Enter the building using the center-front entrance

Meeting

The topic for the May meeting is “A Gentle Introduction to Object Oriented PHP” and will be presented by yours truly, Mike Girouard. A rough outline is as follows:

• OOP: A Paradigm Shift
  • Procedural Code vs Object Oriented Code
  • When Procedural is Right
  • When OO is Right
  • The OO Mindset
• Basic OO Concepts
  • Classes & Objects
  • Properties & Methods
  • Constructors & Destructors
  • Inheritance & Finality
  • Visibility
  • Static Members
• PHP 4 vs PHP 5
  • PHP’s Progressive OO History
  • PHP 4 OOP
  • PHP 5 OOP
• Case Study: Simplifying Requests
  • Understanding the Problem
  • A Procedural Approach
  • An OO Approach
  • Comparison
• Homework
• Suggested Reading

Please leave your suggestions or comments.

]]> https://cfphp.org/2007/04/02/may-meeting-a-gentle-introduction-to-object-oriented-php/feed/ https://cfphp.org/2007/03/02/looking-for-a-meeting-location/ https://cfphp.org/2007/03/02/looking-for-a-meeting-location/#comments Fri, 02 Mar 2007 13:54:02 +0000 Michael Girouard Uncategorized https://cfphp.org/2007/03/02/looking-for-a-meeting-location/ Greetings all!

We’re looking for a solid meeting location to conduct our next meeting. If anyone has any suggestions, please be sure to reply to this post or contact me directly!

]]> https://cfphp.org/2007/03/02/looking-for-a-meeting-location/feed/ https://cfphp.org/2007/01/26/phptek-is-coming-to-chicago/ https://cfphp.org/2007/01/26/phptek-is-coming-to-chicago/#comments Fri, 26 Jan 2007 04:53:23 +0000 Michael Girouard Conferences https://cfphp.org/2007/01/26/phptek-is-coming-to-chicago/ The guys at PHP Architect are at it once again with another sweet looking conference. I attended the php|works conference in Toronto back in 2005 and met some amazing people. If it’s in your budget (or if you can get a boss to pay for your fare), do it.

http://hades.phparch.com/ceres/public/tek/

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