Timani I

Out of the many documentation tools out there, one of the easier is PHPDoctor.

Its dead-simple to get started and i think i may do a quick video but again it is another reason why as a developer you should get firmiliar with the command line, as you can generate web viewable documentation for you entire system or application with a single command.

php phpdoc.php myconfig.ini

Check out the PHPDoctor and be try get a better handle on your documentation, your developers, managements, and business development guys will thank you for it in the future.

It is undeniable that there is a laissez-faire attitude among developers when it comes to code. Coming from a Java background where everything is fairly tightly defined in terms of best practices and how things should be done, PHP is almost the opposite.

This is appealing at first, as it makes learning the language easy, as well as making PHP do what you want with relative ease when compared to a .NET or Java solution.

However, a major drawback is that it soon becomes the Wild Wild West of coding, where hired guns, who just “get the job done” seem to reign supreme. Yet this is a MAJOR short-sighted view. In the end I can almost guarantee the cowboy you got to wrangle your code did so, in a fairly inconsistent manner, so sure it works great now but if your plan is to scale your application and grow your team, you will soon feel the pain.

The number of freelance, and even web-shops who launch projects without a well-defined requirements document, a good, take time to decide on standard architecture, establish through testing or even care about a coding standards are certainly few and far between.

As a result code is usually sloppy and haphazard, and in the end new developers spend a lot of time getting to grips with the code, and unorthodox system structure.

To add to that there is little to no testing done in a documented manner. Thus if it every happens you want to extend your app or try and get some Venture Capital, what quantitative data can you show potential investors? Does it scale with the current architecture and design? What were the pitfalls and bugs, as well as were they addressed and where?

One of the best ways to get standardised is to make sure you hone your development process bit-by-bit and get the developers to gradually get into good habits like documenting their code accordingly.

1. New Programmers can easily join the development team.
2. Debugging is no longer a myth as you try and trace errors.
3. Allow for easier and more transparent re-factoring, as each aspect of the application becomes clearer.
4. Present a way for non-technical users to at least get a view of what is going on.
5. Improve the chances to grow your application as you can now offer concise documentation and deliver it fast to users who may want to extend your application.

Earlier I did write about the command line, bash shell scripting and why it was important for Web developers.

I still think that every dev, needs to get handy with it, and another reason is a lot of the automated documentation tools are command line based. Of course some have web-based interfaces but most are not as crisp, clear or smooth for me.

In future I think I will look at the list of documentation tools i think are pretty good, but for now I think, just getting into the groove of better documentation is a good thing.

After a certain point, i think every single web developer has to evolve to a point where you become well versed with the command line.

Whether you are on linux, unix, windows, android and everything in-between then it is essential to the craft.

You can sync and migrate thousands of files much faster using rsync or svn than ftp, as well as maintain better source control, migrate a large MySQL database in a few minutes vs another utility like PHPMyAdmin may take a long time or fail to do, creating and managing scheduled tasks with cron to name a few things.

There are options like Perl, which is a close relative of PHP so easier to learn. But there is also Bash Shell Scripting. So check out this tutorial from http://www.hypexr.org/ for more info getting started with bash. And if not Bash, Perl should be next on your list.

When its time to scale, its time to scale! Among other things scaling includes redundancy.

One way to achieve better results is with MySQL database replication. I think as far as “how-tos” go  in terms of detail this is a pretty good example and walk-through.

This is from http://www.howtoforge.com/

I think that with the more popularity that CSS3 gains and the more standard it becomes, one of the mysteries is what browsers support is offered for the new features in the release.

Luckily if you are looking for a pretty cool, and up-to-date compatibility listing of CSS selectors and pseudo selectors browser compatibility, then i think that this is a good link to take a look at.

They offer a pretty in-depth look at all the various css selectors, with their releases from 1 to 3, and lets you know EXACTLY if there is explicit support for that particular browser.

Anyone who has had to deal with the fabled creature that is IE6 can attest to how handy this would be