Five Things I Wish They'd Told Me

5 Things I wish they had told me before I started programming in PHP is a raucous romp through PHP, covering not only mistakes that programmers make, but skills theyneed to make sure they master.5: Learn a framework. I don't care if you didn't write it, you're not (insert demigod programmer here) so quit thinking you've got it figured out. Frameworks exist fora reason and that reason it to give you the tools you need to do your job. If you are a carpenter, you don't go out and build your own circular saw before you start aproject, you use one already built. We will review the 5 most popular PHP frameworks.4: Learn that PHP is not (insert the language you last worked in). More importantly, we don't want it to be either. PHP is what it is, the best solution forweb project. The faster you learn that, the faster you will get things done. PHP is unique and proud of it.3: Learn where to get help. Help sites for PHP abound on the web. Anyone with a copy of Wordpress can start sharing the things that they've learned. Unfortunately,not all sites are created equally. If you are new to PHP, look to sites like phpdeveloper.org and DevZone as pointers to other good content. If you are an oldhand, here are a few sites you may not know about that will help you get going.2: Learn your stack. LAMP, WAMP, SAMP MAMP, or WIMP know the stack you are using inside and out. We'll cover the basics you have to know, from setting up a virtualdomain, directory structure stratigies to url re-writing and logging. We will look at a few offerings including Zend Server.1: Get Involved! (Dammit!) Getting involved in the community is not somethng you do because you are bored on a friday night. it's something you do because you wantto know more than the guy sitting in the cube next to you. You can either spend every night reading and memorizing the PHP manual, or you can get involved in thecommunity and start talking with the people white the language. Theya re out there, they don't usually bite and they will help you as long as you don't expect themto do your job for you. The next time you boss asks you about the new Date() features in PHP 5.3, you can reply "Let me ask Derick real quick."Take heed: Profanity may be present in this talk.