[oak perl] Some PHP Experiences

[Joshua Wait]

I read an interesting article a while back about the
relationship between Perl and PHP. The author starts
of with a code listing where it could either be Perl
or PHP. The author claims that PHP started off as a
set of Perl scripts. O'Reilly's "Programming PHP"
doesn't mention this point and instead points to its
origin as being written in C. You can find a copy of
the article here:

http://www.theperlreview.com/Issues/The_Perl_Review_0_7.pdf

I've mostly worked with PHP when using open source
utilities to accomplish some goal. I don't write PHP
from scratch except when I need to modify existing PHP
application.

In terms of coding style, it seems to me that a lot of
people who write PHP prefer their web apps to function
with the code embedded in their HTML. That doesn't
mean that plenty of people don't do it the other way
around, but I find a lot PHP written by people more
comfortable with designing a page and then embedding
code.

I use these PHP utilities on a regular basis (which
happen to not follow the style I mention above):

1. phpMyAdmin
This tool allows a user to manage MySQL databases,
tables, and data. It has a high degree of control in
the GUI tools allowing a user to create and manipulate
data without having to write SQL. I love to use the
SQL query function to test my queries against an
existing set of tables before hardwiring the query
into an Perl app. Any one who is managing MySQL
database can benefit from this cool, easy to use
utility.

http://www.phpmyadmin.net/home_page/index.php

2. phpicalendar
I set up phpicalendar at work so that staff members
could coordinate our schedules. We have an OS X
machine at a static IP with WebDAV enabled. Staff
members can publish their .ics formatted calendars to
the calendar directory. Staff members can either
subscribe to the calendar within their application or
they can view the calendar in browser by using
phpicalendar.

The Mozilla foundation has a Linux and Windows version
of Sunbird available which can publish calendars to
the .ics format. Mac OS X users can use Apple's free
iCal to publish their calendars.

http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/sunbird_download.html

3. phpwiki
I know that there are Perl options for doing a wiki,
but I prefer the nearly brain dead easiness of
phpwiki. I've used it in a couple of situations to
provide a quick, easy content management system for
clients, my office and myself.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/phpwiki/

There are other php applications that I have checked
out, but don't currently use:

1. dotproject
We thought about using dotproject at our office to
manage various projects. While it had some common
features ready-made, it was going to be more of an
obstacle to use it than to develop our own system.
Currently, we have our own Perl based project
management system/

http://www.dotproject.net/

2. SugarSuite
We considered using SugarSuite as a Customer
Relationship Management (CRM) tool. This php app
exists on a number of different levels from a paid
enterprise version to an opensource version. We were
already deeply into our own project management system
and while we learned some things from their approach
ours is radically different.

http://www.sugarcrm.com/crm/

I won't be able to make it to the meeting, but I hope
these tidbits help.

--JOSHUA


---------------------
ArcSource Consulting
"Providing Computer Support in the San Francisco Bay Area"
http://www.arcsource.net


		
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