Development

Defaults may be wrong...

Just a word of warning when using PHP and Mysql - if you’re trying to make efficient code and not utilizing all sort of frameworks and abstractions, you might be in for a small surprise in a default setting. Usually is slightly lazy and often use the mysql_fetch_assoc function. It provides each row as an associative array, and is quite convenient to work with. Recently however while optimizing some code, I figured I’d switch to using mysql_fetch_array assuming it should be more efficient.

Function names as signaling

In most web applications there’s a host of functions (or methods if speaking in the object-oriented world). It’s widely recognized, that it’s probably a good idea to name them something, which may suggest the purpose or functionality of what the function is doing, but often developers seem to fail at making a stringent naming convention. Before starting on your next big development adventure, here are a three suggested rules for naming functions.

Bread crumbs in version control

I’m sorry but sometimes I really don’t get why even seasoned developers doesn’t learn the art of the commit message in version control system. All too often I’ve come across check-ins where the entire commit message just reads “bugfix”, “change”, “oops” or something just as mindless. The effort of writing a useful message compared to the potential benefit seems to be one the best ratios - but of course the pay-back is usually some time away - too bad.

PHP best practice: Function Parameters

I’ve been developing web applications for some years now, and while I make no claims to being the world greatest developer, I do figure, that I do have some solid experience which may help others or at least encourage thoughts and discussion. This is the first in a series of posts, and while it may be from a PHP developers point of view, it may applicable to other programming languages, and maybe even beyond web applications.

Build-in time bombs

I’ve been refactoring and refactoring some old code, and it’s kind of odd what short-cuts (or even time bombs), you’ll find in code, which apparently wasn’t supposed to live on for years. In a now retired CMS system, we had an issue every new year, when some kind of bug would reset all “schedules” for upcoming stories and content. No-one ever got around to fix it, as the system was soon to be decommissioned - but sadly the bug did survive a few years anyway.