My Xdebug configuration

With the release of Xdebug 2.3, I have updated my xdebug php.ini settings, so it seems sensible to write them down where I won't lose them! The new-for-2.3 features which prompted this are xdebug.overload_var_dump, which Derick has written about and xdebug.halt_level which I have previously written about. I find both of these very useful. This is my current php.ini configuration: ; Xdebug settings ; var_dump() displays everything, including filename and line number xdebug.overload_var_dump = 2… continue reading.

Posted on 2 June 2015 in PHP

Turn warnings into exceptions

As I keep looking this up in other projects that I've written, I'm putting it here so I can find it more easily. There are a number of built-in PHP functions that generate a notice or warning that you can't turn off when something goes wrong, such as parse_ini_file and file_get_contents. One common solution to this is to suppress using the @ operator: $result = @file_get_contents($url); if (false === $result) { // inspect error_get_last() to… continue reading.

Posted on 26 May 2015 in PHP

A Slim3 Skeleton

Warning Slim 3 is currently under active development. Expect BC breaks! I'm creating a number of projects in Slim 3 (which is currently under development) at the moment in order test things out and found that I was setting them up in essentially the same way. To save me having to do this each time, I've now created a skeleton project that is set up with the directory structure that I like and also includes… continue reading.

Posted on 19 May 2015 in Slim Framework, Slim Framework 3

Role models

Wikipedia defines a role model like this: A role model is a person whose behavior, example, or success is or can be emulated by others All my life, I have identified people that I perceive to be a little better than I am in some facet of life that I want to get better at and I emulate them. I've been doing this all my life. They have been my role models. My first recollection… continue reading.

Posted on 12 May 2015 in Me

Styling rst2pdf tables

I currently use rst2pdf to create presentations slide decks from reStructured Text files. I like rST a lot as it's more expressive than Markdown and allows for extension. Tables in rST are marked up like this: +———–+———–+———–+ | Heading 1 | Heading 2 | Heading 3 | +===========+===========+===========+ | a | b | c | | | | | | aa | | | +———–+———–+———–+ | d | e | f | +———–+———–+———–+ | g… continue reading.

Posted on 5 May 2015 in rst2pdf, Software

ZF2 validator message keys

In Zend Framework 2, if you define your input filter via configuration, then you can override validation messages using a format along the lines of: <validators> <notEmpty> <messages> <isEmpty>Please provide your telephone number</isEmpty> </messages> </notEmpty> </validators> Setting the message is easy enough, once you have the correct key name. This is a list of all the keys for the standard validators: Validator Key name Default message Alnum alnumInvalid Invalid type given. String, integer or float… continue reading.

Posted on 28 April 2015 in Zend Framework, Zend Framework 2

Using Zend\Config with a Slim app

Sometimes you need more configuration flexibility for your application than a single array. In these situations, I use the Zend\Config component which I install via composer: composer require "zendframework/zend-config" This will install the Zend\Config component, along with its dependency Zend\Stdlib. Let's look at a couple of common situations. Multiple files It can be useful to to split your settings files out for administrative or environment-specific reasons. To set up within a Slim application, you do… continue reading.

Posted on 21 April 2015 in Slim Framework, Slim Framework 3

installing XHGui via Ansible

I'm still using Ansible to provision Vagrant VMs. This is how I added the XHGui profiler to my standard setup. Theres a number steps we need to do: Install Composer Install the uprofiler PHP extension Install XHGui Set up for profiling Set up host for XHGui website Install Composer Installing Composer requires these tasks: – name: Install Composer shell: curl -sS https://getcomposer.org/installer | php — –install-dir=/usr/local/bin creates=/usr/local/bin/composer – name: Rename composer.phar to composer shell: mv… continue reading.

Posted on 14 April 2015 in Software

Logging errors in Slim 3

Slim Framework 3 is being actively developed at the moment and has a number of changes in it, including the use of the Pimple DI container and an overhaul of pretty much everything else! In this post, I'm going to look at error handling. The default error handler in Slim 3 is Slim\Handlers\Error. It's fairly simple and renders the error quite nicely, setting the HTTP status to 500. I want to log these errors via… continue reading.

Posted on 7 April 2015 in Slim Framework, Slim Framework 3

Building and testing the upcoming PHP7

The GoPHP7-ext project aims to ensure that all the known PHP extensions out there work with the upcoming PHP 7. This is non-trivial as some significant changes have occurred in the core PHP engine (related to performance) that mean that extensions need to be updated. In order to help out (and prepare my own PHP code for PHP 7!), I needed the latest version of PHP7 working in a vagrant VM. Fortunately Rasmus has created… continue reading.

Posted on 30 March 2015 in PHP