PHP | hmp.is.it

December 3, 2015

How to upgrade/update PHP on a windows dev server

This article is about how to update your PHP version on Windows, specifically when using EasyPHP dev server. For the average developer, this can be a daunting process, but it’s really not that hard.

My reason for posting this article is that EasyPHP server has stuck any upgrade components behind a paywall, or ‘warehouse’ as they call it, which costs $10/year, which seems crazy when it’s so easy to do yourself.

This guide should work for other servers running on windows as well, you’ll just need to modify certain steps depending on how your specific set up is configured.

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November 1, 2015

How to dump CSV files to MySQL (the easy way)

Sometimes, the only option for dumping data into a database is using CSV files – they’re easy to use for non-technical people, they are a fairly efficient way of storing data and can be easily exported from Excel files.

There’s one huge problem with them, though…they’re a real pain in the arse to work with.

So, I decided to create a reliable, easy to use way for dumping CSV files, no matter how big or small, to a MySQL database. I will, however, show some alternatives along the way.

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May 7, 2015May 8, 2015

How to deploy a Magento site using GIT

There are many ways to deploy a Magento site to your server. Many would argue that a simple FTP upload is fine, while others swear by version control.

The problem with the version control + Magento combo is that, necessarily, Magento stores a lot of information about its state in the filesystem – this can lead to a lot of trouble if care isn’t taken when creating the staging and deployment mechanisms.

I’ll walk you through with a tried and tested method I use for the deploying a Magento site using GIT.

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January 23, 2015

How to add a product in Magento

Getting started with Magento can be tricky, and one of the first things every new user wants to do is add a product – but that in itself can be confusing for the newbie, so here’s a definitive guide to adding your first product in Magento.

This guide will tell you how to add a simple product in Magento and explain all the terms along the way.

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January 19, 2015

How to update the browser on the status of an AJAX process

Websites with AJAX elements are a defacto standard on the web and have been for quite some time. AJAX allows you to run a request on the server without actually leaving the page the user is on, executing it asynchronously while the browser waits for a response.

One big problem with this is that if the process takes more than a few seconds, there’s no built in methods in the AJAX standards to receive content before the entire request is complete, so how do we let the browser know the status of the process on the server, if we can’t stream information to the browser using AJAX? We’ll be addressing this problem in this post.

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January 13, 2015

How to Echo an Array in PHP

If you’re just starting PHP, it may not be immediately obvious how to print the contents of an array, but rest assured there are several very simple methods for displaying the contents of an array.

We’ll go through simple methods such as print_r($array) and var_dump($array) but also show some other more unique methods.

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October 27, 2014October 27, 2014

Timing and Benchmarking in PHP

I recently wrote a timing class for PHP for use with benchmarking and timing applications.

You can find the class on GitHub here: PHP Timing and Benchmarking

Here’s an example of the ‘bottom bar’ that expands on hover:

And that’s all there is to it!

Check the GitHub repo for more information.

September 7, 2013

‘AND’ and why you should avoid it in programming and in life.

This is one of the most useful tips about programming I’ve seen. It has deep roots in programming philosophy and in philosophy in general. I find I can apply it not only to programming but in other areas such as data management, time management and just life in general. What is this magical paradigm? Let me explain.

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August 21, 2013August 21, 2013

Using jQuery BBQ to create an instant bookmarkable search with AJAX

jQuery BBQ creates a nice interface for manipulating your url without having to reload the page. This means that you can create bookmarkable content without having to reload the page every time you want to change a url parameter. This is great for creating AJAX based forms that can display results instantly while still being bookmarkable.

A lot of sites use this sort of functionality already. A good example of this is grooveshark, which uses the hash part of a url to store parameters. Drupal also includes jQuery BBQ in its base package. Page reloads take a long time, so in today’s world of responsive web pages and impatient users, putting url parameters in the hash part of a url makes a lot of sense.

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August 17, 2013August 17, 2013

Scraping a site using PHP

If you’ve ever wanted to include content from another site on something you’re working on, then this is probably one of the simplest ways to do it using PHP. I’ll show you how to scrape a site for specific content using a simple to use PHP library.

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