PHP Tools

1
PHP Tools

• JQ Johnson, Academic Education Coordinator
• University of Oregon Libraries
• 2 December 2002

2
Editing PHP code

• Text editors, e.g. BBedit (Mac), Notepad (PC), vi
  (Linux), emacs
• HomeSite
• Dreamweaver, Ultradev (with PHAkt 1.5), or MX
  (optionally with PHAkt)
• PHP-specific editing environments
• Maguma Studio (95), Lite (freeware)
• Zend Studio (195)
• NuSphere PHPed (299)

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Exercise

• There is a copy of a short PHP program in your My
  Documents directory, called oops.php. Open it in
  Dreamweaver
• Modify the PHP code so that instead of using
  HTTP_SERVER_VARS it uses the more modern (PHP
  4.1) _SERVER
• Modify the HTML code to add a RESET button on the
  form

4
PHP is embedded in HTML Validation

• Always validate your PHP output
  http//validator.w3.org(but note you need to
  test multiple code paths)
• Validate your HTMLPHP source? Consider
• lth1gtHilt?php echo empty(user)?"lt/h1gt""userlt/h
  1gt"?gt
• I restrict my PHP code so that the source will
  also validate.

5
Exercise

• Visit a .php page that youve written, and view
  its output using view source
• Now validate it at http//validator.w3.org
• Download your .php source to your hard disk, and
  validate that as well.
• Time permitting fix bugs youve found.

6
PHP and HTML Tidy

• Tidy recognizes (and skips) lt?php?gt and ASP
  ltgt. lt??gt short tags are sometimes confused
  with XML
• Tidy does not reformat any html generated within
  php tags
• Tidy can get confused by PHP scripts that
  generate
• Portions of containers
• Empty attributes values. Use bgcolor"lt?color?gt
  " instead of bgcolorlt?color?gt
• Required elements

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A code fragment that mostly works

• lt?phpq"SELECT name,age FROM people WHERE
  class'class'"datamysql_query(q) or
  die(Oops! \"q\" . mysql_error())?gtlttablegt
  lttrgt ltthgtNamelt/thgt ltthgtAgelt/thgt
  lt/trgtlt?phpwhile (row mysql_fetch_row(data))
  ?gt lttr bgcolor"lt?(wh!wh)?'FFFFFF"''CCC
  CCC'?gt"gt lttdgtlt?row'name'?gtlt/tdgt
  lttdgtlt?row'age'?gtlt/tdgt lt/trgtlt?php
  mysql_free_result(data)?gtlt/tablegt

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Exercise

• Run HTML Tidy, and reformat the code from the PHP
  file you downloaded in the previous exercise

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Other important tools

• Run PHP from command linedarkwing php s
  foo.php gtfoo.htm (also a for interactive, -l
  for syntax check)
• PHP 3 had a built-in debugger (r.i.p.)
• For any mysql development phpMyAdmin

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References

• PHP http//www.php.net
• Commercial editing environments
• http//www.macromedia.com/desdev/topics/php.html
• http//www.zend.com
• http//www.maguma.com
• http//www.nusphere.com
• http//www.interakt.ro
• W3C validator http//validator.w3.org
• HTML Tidy http//www.w3.org/People/Raggett/tidy/
• phpMyAdmin http//www.phpmyadmin.net