If you’re not careful, sending email via PHP is about as safe as cookies at Fat Camp. BKWLD was recently tagged by a spammer who noticed one such insecurity on one of our websites and ended up using our server to send hundreds of emails. It wasn’t until MediaTemple informed us of this breach that we realized what had happened.

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.

Read more »

Taking advantage of custom error documents usually requires tapping on an .htaccess file, as discussed in my previous custom error article. However CakePHP makes for easy custom error handling thanks to a pre-defined Cake system.

I’ll walk you through creating custom error pages, both simple and complex.

Read more »

The simplest image viewer known to man has been created. Visión uses a light touch of PHP, Javascript and CSS to create a straightforward, stylish image viewer. It can be incorporated into any website in under three minutes and takes up less than 20kb of space. Stop reading this and download Visión.

Read more »

You now have a chance to support Iamkoa Labs via buttons and badges. If you feel that Labs has helped you in any form, support the cause by downloading a small collection of Labs buttons and placing one on your website.

Read more »

Making sure a CakePHP application is secure is a total snap thanks to “sessions” - the rock animal of websites. Put on your All-Stars and boot up your MacBook - I’m about to go Discovery Channel on your ass.

Read more »

The impossible has been done - uploading multiple images in CakePHP. Find out how easy it is, and why it was never really impossible to begin with.

Read more »

It’s been scrubbed, polished, and given some serious lovin’. Iamkoa Labs takes advantage of Shaun Inman’s sIFR (the third version to be exact) to display wicked fonts via Flash. Labs theme is based off of Stephen Reinhardt’s minimalistic Wordpress theme, Elite and has some Coca-Cola-like colors to go along with it. If you use Photoshop, feel free to download the Labs Photoshop swatch set.

Happy trails.

CakePHP’s fattie /cake/lib folder holds many hidden treasures, that although documented in Cake’s API, lacks examples of use and simple noobie terms like “howto”. I’m here to help, so settle down.

Read more »