Here’s an example of validating first, then executing:

	/* The good... */
	public function insertNewInvoiceItem($item, $quantity)
	{
		if(!$item instanceof Shop_Item) {
			throw new InvalidArgumentException ('Expecting an item to be an instance of Shop_Item.');
		}

		if(!is_numeric($quantity)) {
			throw new InvalidArgumentException('Quantity is not numeric.');
		}

		// We're good to go. Continue with the function...
	}

The method above is also much cleaner than if... else... statements and limits the extra (perhaps useless) work required by your code:

	/* The bad... */
	public function insertNewInvoiceItem($item, $quantity)
	{
		if($item instanceof Shop_Item) {
			// Do some $item stuff...

			if(is_numeric($quantity)) {
				// Do some $quantity calculations
			} else {
				// Uh oh, $quantity was bad but we've
				// run some Shop_Item logic already.
			}
		}
		else
		{
			// $item is not part of Shop_Item
		}
	}

I used a simple example to demonstrate my point but when this technique is used on more complex logic, it’s benefits are much more obvious.

Happy coding!

All of the following PHP classes are “works in progress”, but hopefully each is mature enough to find its way into your code. Continue reading to view, download, and use each class.

Cache – Output & Object Caching

Though this class is old (three years), it does the trick, and quickly. Dragon Bosnjak wrote this gem, allowing for easy caching of webpage content into a directory (and filename) of your choosing.

Using Cache Class

Caching your web content is a breeze! Create a new Cache class by specifying a directory to store the cache file, and surround your webpage content in a while loop, like so:

$cache = new Cache("../cache/");

while ($cache->save("filename.cache", 30)) {
	// "30" is the number of seconds the content should remain cached.
	// Your cached content goes here...
 }

Download Cache

You can download and use this golden-nugget of love by visiting PHP Classes – perhaps the most poorly styled/organized website on the internet, but that’s another post entirely.

Last.fm API

If you have yet to discover the hotness of using “Magic Methods” in PHP, I suggest you read up on how to serve up a magic teapot of greatness using PHP5. These Magic Methods are exactly what I used to create this simple Last.fm API class. The result is the ability to quickly make almost any API call without having to continuously fiddle with API key variables, etc.

Using Last.fm API Class

After including the LastFm class file, you need to create a new instance of the LastFm() class.

// include class file
include_once('../inc/class.lastfm.php');

// initate LastFm class
$lastfm = new LastFm();
$lastfm->key = "1234567890"; // your LastFm API key

Then you can call your LastFm API action using the following conversion:

Let’s say we want to call User.getTopAlbums with the user argument set to bob and the period argument set to 3month:

$lastfm->user_getTopAlbums("user=iamkoa","period=3month");

The above PHP code will generate the following API call:

http://ws.audioscrobbler.com/2.0/?method=user.getTopAlbums&user=bob&period=3month&api_key=1234567890

Let The Class Parse Things For You…

The API call will return, for example, the following XML to Array:

Array
(
    [lfm] => Array
        (
            [attr] => Array
                (
                    [status] => ok
                )

            [recenttracks] => Array
                (
                    [attr] => Array
                        (
                            [user] => iamkoa
                            [page] => 1
                            [perPage] => 8
                            [totalPages] => 2777
                        )

                    [track] => Array
                        (
                            [0] => Array
                                (
                                    [artist] => Array
                                        (
                                            [value] => Black Eyed Peas
                                            [attr] => Array
                                                (
                                                    [mbid] => d5be5333-4171-427e-8e12-732087c6b78e
                                                )

                                        )
// etc...

To make any Last.fm API call, simply replace the . symbol with an _ symbol and include any arguments with a "var=bar" pattern. For example, here’s how to make a couple calls:

// call user.getWeeklyTrackChart
$lastfm->user_getWeeklyTrackChart("user=iamkoa");

// call group.getMembers
$lastfm->group_getMembers("group=groupName");

// etc...

Download Last.fm

Download and use the Last.fm PHP class. Please post any enhancements to the class here for others to use.

Time

Time is a bitch. It’s always against us. In the case of parsing a date string into a human-friendly string, it’s even more apparent that time sucks. Hopefully this Time class, though not entirely finished, will help with parsing dates.

Use it

It’s really, really simple to use:

$time = new Time();
echo $time->timeAgoInWords($date_string);

Depending upon when $date_string is relative to the current time, the above code might print one of the following:

"26 July, 2:45 PM", "Yesterday morning", "Today", "Last night", or "28 minutes ago", etc...

Editing the class is pretty simple, so I’ll let all you hackers dig into it for details.

Download Time

Download and use the Time PHP class. Please post any enhancements to the class here for others to use.

//If you're finding that executing this:
formTag('/' . $params['url']['url'], 'post', array('enctype' => 'multipart/form-data')); ?>
	input('Test/title'); ?>
	file('Test/file'); ?>
	submit('Save'); ?>


//... returns something like this:
$this->data:Array
(
    [Test] => Array
        (
            [title] => Foo
            [file] => 4tmp/phpHGSjDA
        )
)

//... instead of something like this:
$this->data:Array
(
    [Test] => Array
        (
            [title] => Foo
            [file] => Array
                (
                    [name] => aeo.jpg
                    [type] => image/jpeg
                    [tmp_name] => /tmp/phppM8tfc
                    [error] => 0
                    [size] => 45471
                )
        )
)

//... then you must be as annoyed as I am.

The reason why the file form field is returning the tmp name is because CakePHP expects register_globals is OFF.

Solution One

Turn off register_globals via .htaccess:

#/app/webroot/.htaccess
php_flag register_globals off

Solution Two

Manually write your HTML form fields without using an input array:

// do this

// not this
file('Test/file'); ?> // will output:

Solution two is a slight pain in the ass, because now that you’ve eliminated the array within the form input field, you need to do a little extra work in your CakePHP controller. (If there’s a demand, I’ll give some examples.)

Hopefully this’ll clear up Cake’s messhole.

The method most spammers use is called a “mail injection”, in that the spammer manipulats the PHP mail() function via a custom form post, etc. I won’t go into details, as a quick search on Google came up with over 225,000 pages describing this technique – here are a few.

Getting around these hacks requires detailed validation of your data.Thankfully I’ve done everything for you using the best PHP email class around, PHPMailer. My class is called SendMail and it’s an extension of the PHPMailer class. The result is a powerful script capable of sending email via SMTP or POP3, all without handing over your server to a toothless spammer.

The SendMail class has been updated. Please view the updates before commenting.

Download The SendMail Class

Click the link to download the SendMail class and continue reading to learn how to use it.
Download the SendMail class

Setup

Setting up the SendMail class is easy-peezie. Simply include the required SendMail variables and call the send() function to send emails:

$mail->authHosts = array("domain.com");

    $mail->addEmail("name@person.com","Name",);
    $mail->addEmail("name2@person.com","Name2");

    $mail->subject($_POST['subject']);
    $mail->body($_POST['body']);

    $mail->fromName($_POST['from_name']);
    $mail->fromEmail($_POST['from_email']);

    $result = $mail->send();

    if (!$result){
        if(!empty($mail->errors)) {
            $mail->displayErrors($mail->errors,'ol');
        }
    exit();
    }
}

echo "Message was sent successfully";
?>

For further security, you may implement the authHosts variable as highlighted above. The authHosts array specifies what domains are allowed to send $_POST data. Any domains not listed that attempted to contact the script via $_POST will get a 403 (permission denied) error.

Further Configuration

If you need to specify an SMTP host, username, and password, include each variable before calling the send() function. You may also specify the charset and select whether or not HTML should be used in the email by using the respective code below:

// ...
$mail = new SendMail;

if($_POST) {

    $mail = new SendMail;

    $mail->authHosts = array("domain.com");

    $mail->host = 'mail.domain.com';
    $mail->username = 'root';
    $mail->password = 'pass123';

    $mail->charset = 'utf-8';
    $mail->bodyHtml = "HTML goes in here";

    $mail->addEmail("name@person.com","Name");
    $mail->addEmail("name2@person.com","Name2");

    $mail->subject($_POST['subject']);
    $mail->body($_POST['body']);

    $mail->fromName($_POST['from_name']);
    $mail->fromEmail($_POST['from_email']);

    $mail->Mailer = 'mail';

    $result = $mail->send();

    if (!$result){
        if(!empty($mail->errors)) {
            $mail->displayErrors($mail->errors,'ol');
        }
    exit();
    }
}
// ...

When displaying errors via the displayErrors() function, you may choose to use <ul> or <ol> HTML. If you’d rather receive errors as an array, use $mail->errors only.

Fini, Cowboy

If you need further explanation or would like a better understanding of the code, dig into the inc/class.sendmail.php file. The code is well-commented and should guide you nicely. If it doesn’t, comment and I’ll help you myself. For further information on PHPMailer, go to the official website.

Updates

Nov 27, 2007: The entire SendMail class has been rewritten to better perform as OOP should. The domain security is now optional. All files have been updated for downloading.

Dec 21, 2007: Select between sending with PHP mail(), SMTP, or POP using Mailer as shown above. All files have been updated for downloading. Eat it up.

Jan 15, 2008: When sending HTML mail, alternative text sends accordingly.

This article covers how to use Visión. To learn more about Visión, check this out.

Setup Vision

If you haven’t already done so, download a copy of Visión and unzip it to any location that’s able to parse PHP files, like localhost.

For a basic install of Visión, the only file you need to edit is index.php:

/**  setup  **/
$imgDir	= "img"; 		// image directory
$imgSub	= false;		// include sub directories when gathering images?
$imgId	= "lgImage"; 	// id tag for images

To successfully pull images from your images folder, edit $imgDir accordingly. The above example would be looking for images in a folder called “img”, located in the same directory as the index.php file you are editing.

If you would also like to include images located in folders within the images folder you’ve specified, set the $imgSub variable to true. If $imgSub remains set to false, all sub folders within the specified images folder will be ignored.

Lastly, you may choose to specify the id used for your image on display. Under most circumstances, you won’t have to change this value.

Integrate Vision

Once you’ve got the index.php edited to your liking, integrating Visión into a web application of your choice is a matter of copying and pasting a few lines of code.

Make sure all the PHP code (lines 1-11) is copied, along with the javascript code (lines 25-37), and content within the id="content" div.

Easy, Huh?

That wasn’t too hard, right? If you’ve hacked/tweaked/etc Visión for your website, let me know.