php[architect]

by Carl Welch

Although best known for its use in the medical records industry, the Entity-Attribute-Value (EAV) model can be a useful technique for designing any database that needs to store a large and/or frequently-changing set of data fields.

by Sharon Levy

A user submits an email address through a contact page. Next, your PHP script takes over and validates it. You may conclude that you can now move on. But have you really exercised due diligence? If that email address were a fake, how would you know? More importantly, how would your script know? In this article, Sharon will explore some techniques that should prove useful.

by Stefan Priebsch

As PHP 4 support will be discontinued on August 8th, 2008, now is the time to migrate your legacy PHP applications to PHP 5. In last month's issue, Stefan covered some important aspects of the server environment that you should keep in mind when preparing a PHP migration. In this article, he will show you code that is likely to cause problems when migrating and provide you with solutions to make your application work on the target system.

by Bart McLeod

This is the final part of Bart's diary recording the attempt to refactor his old legacy CMS, which I would like to replace with a rock solid, framework-based Internet application. He started adapting his CMS to use the Zend Framework last month, and will now conclude the journal. Enjoy!

by Steph Fox

PHP extension developers have a new challenge to look forward to: compatibility with the upcoming version 6 of the language.

by Stuart Herbert

We've all heard the rumours about the end of safe_mode, and now it's getting scarily close to becoming a reality. In this column, Stuart talks about some of the alternative approaches to shared server security.

by Matt Zandstra

Testing as you go can be crucial to a project's success, especially when you really don't think you have enough time to do it—and besides, actual development is so much more interesting... If this sounds like you, automated builds and tests are the way to go. In this month's Test Pattern, Matt introduces you to the joy of scripting the mundane.

by Marco Tabini

Tired of "mashups" that combine Google Maps, the White Pages, Twitter and Flickr to build the least useful application since Microsoft Bob? Marco looks at one mashup that actually—gasp!—serves a purpose.