November, 2004

Posted on November 20, 2004 by Dan

This month we discussed the next round of changes for the website, lots of new topics for the next year and gave away items from Apress. Helen took plenty of pictures and introduced our first Roaming Book: Google Hacks, from O’Reilly.

Read on for more!

Now that the website migration is complete, we set our sites on the future this month.

Website Changes

Many of us agree that the categories that group the content on the site are in need of some…updating. The Forums are going to get slimmed down a bit. None of the content will be lost, but just consolidated under fewer categories. Add some comments here if you have some recommendations.

Updated Topics
Affiliates
–Apress
–O’reilly
–phpcon, etc.
Book Reviews
Tutorials and News
–Linux
–Apache
–MySql
–PHP
–etc. (XML, comp-sci theory, etc)
KCPug Events (Meeting Notes)

I’m thinking the Events would just be used for Event news, etc. If a tutorial, presentation, etc happens…then it could go into the appropriate Tutorial slot. Again, any ideas would be appreciated.
One thing I forgot to mention, was I’m thinking about adding a member links section. A place where you can all brag…er, link to all of those sites, resumes, etc that you are associated with.

Future Topics

I’ve been thinking up topics again. While PHP 5 is still a lot of fun to talk about, most of our attending members still can’t use it “at work.” Either not enough hosts have moved to it, or we have far too much php 4 code to test before we can move. So, this has influenced out presentation schedule a bit:

December, 2004

Savant – Using PHP as a templating engine

January, 2004

Introduction to PHP
I’ve also been receiving quite a few requests for us to start over. In other words, I have heard from many developers in Kansas City who would like to have a nice introduction to PHP. This will be their chance.
To start off the new year, I’ll put on a special 2hr Introduction class. Because of the length of time, and the concentration of the material, I’d like to look into hosting it in more of a classroom type setting. I’ll check into having this one at the college, JoCo Library, etc. Once I get the place set, I’d like to really push to get the word out…really start our year off with something special.

February, 2004

XML Serializer/Unserializer

March, 2004

DB DataObjects
An OO approach to database queries

April, 2004

HTML_Quickform

Additional Topics

Then, starting in May, maybe it will be a more appropriate time to get back to our Series on PHP 5.

New Content on the way

We have received a request for an article or presentation on the following:

Building Modular Systems: The Design and Implementation of a CMS

Concepts of modularity
Adding Modules Dynamically (Uploading, unpacking, installing)
Designing for PHP 4 vs PHP 5

Book Reviews

Pleanty of book reviews are on the way as well:

Advanced PHP Programming (O’reilly)

Web Database Applications with PHP and MySql 2nd edition (O’reilly)

Upgrading to PHP 5 (O’reilly)

Pro Apache (Apress)

Essential PHP Tools (Apress)

The Apress Giveaway

Thanks again to Apress for hooking us up with some new books and T-Shirts.

Check out the happy winners! Well, actually they turned out to be more like volunteers. Thanks for your help everyone!!

[img]http://www.kcpug.org/site/uploads/img41a00aaf726b7.jpg[/img]
[size=x-small][color=000033]Click to enlarge[/color][/size]
Look forward to their book reviews in the coming months.

BIG Apress Giveaway!!

Posted on November 18, 2004 by Dan

Our new friend at Apress has sent us a little care package for this month’s Meeting. Stop on by for you chance to win one of four Shiny new books, as well as every coder’s favorite: [b][color=3366FF]FREE T-SHIRTS[/color][/b]!

Come on by, have a drink, win a book, chat about PHP. What better could you do on a Saturday!!

Thanks Apress!

KC Pug 3.0 Hits the Streets

Posted on November 15, 2004 by Dan

The PUG is Reborn!!

Welcome home, Kansas City! Your new KC PUG website was released today to the masses. All of the users, stories, comments, topics and links were brought over from the GeekLog and PHPbb systems that we used to run, so your logins should still work. Let me know if you are having problems.

Much more thought went into this release of our site, and we hope you like it. Read the article for a look at what’s new!

A little KC Pug History

[size=x-small][color=333333]This is as I remember it. It seems pretty fuzzy though, so if I don’t have something right, please email me.[/color][/size] 🙂

When we first started the user group, I used a re-themed and very initial version of the CMS I develop for my day job. At the time, it handled just articles and comments. Very simple, and not too conducive to conversation.

To try and spark the creativity, we added an installation of phpbb….one of the best forum software collections around. It helped, and people were asking and answering questions.

KC Pug v2

If eventually came time to use something more portal oriented for the new site. I selected GeekLog, mainly because it was VERY simple to set up. It had the basics and seemed to be pretty easy to customize.

* News (with Comments)
* Polls
* Links to other sites

We kept phpbb for our forum software, as there really wasn’t anything comparable built into geeklog. It worked, but it wasn’t perfect.

But, we wanted more. And we would need to make some big changes to get there.

KC Pug v3

So, now we have the new site. In our move to Xoops, we addressed several “issues” right off the bat.

Automated notifications for meeting reminders, new content, etc
Solid integration between the forums and the website
User’s now just need one account!!!
A fresh, new, customized look (not just the default theme this time)
Change of hosting providers (No longer hosted at jccc.net)
Content is much easier to add, so I should be able to add more!

But what we have, is just the groundwork!! Just take a peek at what’s on the way!!

Meeting Times

Posted on November 15, 2004 by Dan

Currently we meet on the Third Saturday of each month at the Daily Dose Bar and Coffee House at 135th and Quivera at 2:30pm.

Anyone with an interest in PHP or Web Development is welcome. Bring your questions, suggestions or announcements.

Daily Dose Bar & Coffee House
(Northwest corner of 135th and Quivera, facing Quivera)
12056 W 135th St
Overland Park, KS 66221

[img]http://www.kcpug.org/site/uploads/img419965daa38c0.jpg[/img]

You can also check the [url=http://local.google.com/maps?q=Daily+Dose&near=Overland+Park,+KS&radius=0&cid=38982222,-94670555,17205253413678642912&li=lmd&t=h&ie=UTF8&om=1&ll=38.884364,-94.724389&spn=0.006372,0.008208&z=17]information on local.google[/url] for maps, directions, etc. Careful though, google puts the pin on 135th, it’s really up against Quivera!

Event Photos

November 2004

[img]http://www.kcpug.org/site/uploads/img41a009c88fb79.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.kcpug.org/site/uploads/img41a009da3080f.jpg[/img]

[img]http://www.kcpug.org/site/uploads/img41a009ecc08cb.jpg[/img]
[size=x-small][color=666666]All Photos by Helen[/color][/size]

Maguma Workbench 2.1

Posted on November 4, 2004 by maguma

Maguma Workbench version 2.1 is now available!

Version 2.1.0 represents the latest in the Workbench series offered by Maguma GmbH. This PHP IDE gives the user features like: debugging support via Xdebug, modular plugin architecture for easy extensibility, remote file handling and editing through both FTP and SFTP.

New features added to this enhanced release include PHP5 support, improved remote file support, localized support for the languages english and german (additional languages will be added in future versions), as well as overall increases in stability and compatibility.

With the user community’s active participation through promptly reporting any problems occurring, we have been able to aggressively remove roadblocks to the efficient development of PHP applications with Workbench. This version also includes several long awaited features requested by our users.

Current members can login to download this latest version here.

If you are not a member you can register here to allow you to try out Maguma Workbench for 30 days free of charge.

If you would like to know all the changes included in version 2.1 you may view the changelog here.

What good is Accessibility

Posted on October 19, 2004 by Dan

I have always been a HUGE fan of web development for accessibility (not with this site, unfortunately). If I can help just a handful of people read my site, or allow search engines a better chance of finding my content…I’ll do it!

Recently, one of the best articles on the “other” benefits of Accessibility has appeared on sitepoint.

Be sure to check out Part 1: Increased Usability and Part 2: Better Search Ranking. This is required reading! 😉

October Meeting

Posted on October 19, 2004 by Dan

This month we discussed the future of the KC PUG. Don’t worry, we aren’t going anywhere…just about to get a whole lot better.

I’m going to be addressing MANY of the issues we have been having with the website, etc. I’m also going to be adding Content again!!! You like content, right? 😉 Check back soon for more info!!

And if you havn’t already, please cast your opinion to our poll. Click or Comment….it’s your choice!

THE place to be!

Posted on October 16, 2004 by Helen Budinger

At the meeting today Dan helped me insure that the search engine bots would find all the pages of my company’s web site. There’s nothing strange about that other than it didn’t involve PHP at all. What a wonderful resource for those of us that don’t know what we are doing!

Simple CSV Loading

Posted on October 16, 2004 by Dan

At today’s meeting, Ben pointed out a great way of parsing CSV files: and it is built into PHP itself.

If you are doing any cvs parsing, be sure to check out the fgetcsv function document on php.net. Sure, you can always load it yourself and use split, or use PEAR’s File_CSV, but this is a great little alternative.

Thanks Ben!!

Forum Login Repaired

Posted on October 11, 2004 by Dan

If you haven’t been using the forums because the log in stuff wasn’t really working right, please give it another try. I still don’t like that you have to have separate logins, but at least you can actually log in now (without using the private message hackery). 😉 Enjoy!!