If you want an insight into the critical design issues and programming techniques required for a web oriented framework in PHP5, this book will be invaluable. Whether you want to build your own CMS style framework, want to understand how such frameworks are created, or simply want to review advanced PHP5 software development techniques, this book is for you.As a former development team leader on the renowned Mambo open-source content management system, author Martin Brampton offers unique insight and practical guidance into the problem of building an architecture for a web oriented framework or content management system, using the latest versions of popular web scripting language PHP.The scene-setting first chapter describes the evolution of PHP frameworks designed to support web sites by acting as content management systems. It reviews the critical and desirable features of such systems, followed by an overview of the technology and a review of the technical environment.Following chapters look at particular topics, with:• A concise statement of the problem • Discussion of the important design issues and problems faced • Creation of the framework solution
At every point, there is an emphasis on effectiveness, efficiency and security – all vital attributes for sound web systems. By and large these are achieved through thoughtful design and careful implementation.
Early chapters look at the best ways to handle some fundamental issues such as the automatic loading of code modules and interfaces to database systems. Digging deeper into the problems that are driven by web requirements, following chapters go deeply into session handling, caches, and access control.
New for this edition is a chapter discussing the transformation of URLs to turn ugly query strings into readable strings that are believed to be more “search engine friendly” and are certainly more user friendly. This topic is then extended into a review of ways to handle “friendly” URLs without going through query strings, and how to build RESTful interfaces.
The final chapter discusses the key issues that affect a wide range of specific content handlers and explores a practical example in detail.
Effective coding techniques, illustrated through examples of key parts of sample solutions, along with detailed explanations.
Object architectures to fully exploit PHP 5 in advanced systems
A foundation for database processing to ease further development
Technical functions such as handling user sessions and the efficient creation and use of caches
How to support add-on applications to extend the main framework
Flexible and efficient ways to deal with supporting different world languages
Reviews and practical solutions for topics including XML handling, configuration management, editing, file system interfaces, mail, spam, timed operations and parameter objects
Transforming query string URLs to be more “friendly” both for people and search engines
Alternative ways to deal with presentation services, including discussion of MVC (model-view-controller)