Deployment with SVN slides - Dutch PHP Conference
Wednesday, June 18. 2008
The slides for my talk "PHP Deployment with Subversion" at the Dutch PHP Conference last weekend are now online, you can find them at http://www.slideshare.net/lornajane/php-deployment-with-svn/. If you have any questions or comments then either drop me a line or add a comment below.
Edit: I prepared a video of the nabaztag demo I did - you can find it over here on flickr - enjoy.
Edit: I prepared a video of the nabaztag demo I did - you can find it over here on flickr - enjoy.
DPC Talk Review
Monday, June 16. 2008
A couple of days ago I had the pleasure of speaking at the excellent Dutch PHP Conference in Amsterdam. I haven't done anything like this before and I did a lot of preparation - as you'll know if you read this blog regularly.
My talk was entitled "PHP Deployment with Subversion" and was a series of suggested tricks for using Subversion, both tools and structure, to help with deployment. I'm on holiday in Amsterdam for a few days (since I haven't visited the city before) so I'm currently not able to upload my slides but I will post them here in a day or two. You can get a sneak preview though as there is flickr evidence of my presentation available.
I included a demonstration in my talk which showed a nabaztag (electronic funky rabbit device) notifying of different events, such as tests failing. What I hadn't really taken into account was that I'd be speaking in such a large room - there was seating for 400 people (about half full I think) and the rabbit is only 8 inches high or so, he was a bit little! I wasn't following the chatter at the time but I was hugely amused to see this tweet from Breuls when I checked twitter the next day!!
Overall my talk was relatively successful in the sense that I said what I wanted to, I didn't talk too much or too little, and my nabaztag demo actually worked. I do feel however that my nerves got the better of me - I'm rarely intimidated but having never spoken at a conference before I found it very difficult to adapt to speaking in the main hall. This is the first time I've used a microphone, they clipped it onto me and then I started giving the presentation, that was really strange. And also having a large stage with my slides projected on a screen the size of a small house ... you can't look at them, or point at them, or anything. I thought I'd become less nervous with time but I'm afraid it never happened! On a personal level, to give a talk like that, perfectly competently, is an achievement in itself and I'm trying to forget how hard it really was and just feel proud instead :) After the talk I only got one question, which was "Where can I get one of those rabbits?", so I wasn't sure if I had put my technical content across well. However quite a few people came to pick my brain afterwards so I guess I did OK.
I owe huge thanks to everyone who provided moral support and tried to convince me I'd be fine, and even more thanks to my boyfriend Kevin who did the setup for the nabaztag (Naz the nabaztag needed his own wireless network) and helped me write the code to run the demo. I'll write more about the rabbit and the demo at a later point, looks like a lot of people will be getting them :)
Speaking aside, I had a great few days meeting old friends and new ones at the conference, and attending some really interesting sessions. Speaking was very very stressful although perhaps only because I didn't handle it as well as I might have. The definite upside though is getting to hang out with the very cool kids at the Speakers Dinner afterwards - thanks guys, I had a wonderful night. All in all I can't wait for next year!
My talk was entitled "PHP Deployment with Subversion" and was a series of suggested tricks for using Subversion, both tools and structure, to help with deployment. I'm on holiday in Amsterdam for a few days (since I haven't visited the city before) so I'm currently not able to upload my slides but I will post them here in a day or two. You can get a sneak preview though as there is flickr evidence of my presentation available.
I included a demonstration in my talk which showed a nabaztag (electronic funky rabbit device) notifying of different events, such as tests failing. What I hadn't really taken into account was that I'd be speaking in such a large room - there was seating for 400 people (about half full I think) and the rabbit is only 8 inches high or so, he was a bit little! I wasn't following the chatter at the time but I was hugely amused to see this tweet from Breuls when I checked twitter the next day!!
Overall my talk was relatively successful in the sense that I said what I wanted to, I didn't talk too much or too little, and my nabaztag demo actually worked. I do feel however that my nerves got the better of me - I'm rarely intimidated but having never spoken at a conference before I found it very difficult to adapt to speaking in the main hall. This is the first time I've used a microphone, they clipped it onto me and then I started giving the presentation, that was really strange. And also having a large stage with my slides projected on a screen the size of a small house ... you can't look at them, or point at them, or anything. I thought I'd become less nervous with time but I'm afraid it never happened! On a personal level, to give a talk like that, perfectly competently, is an achievement in itself and I'm trying to forget how hard it really was and just feel proud instead :) After the talk I only got one question, which was "Where can I get one of those rabbits?", so I wasn't sure if I had put my technical content across well. However quite a few people came to pick my brain afterwards so I guess I did OK.
I owe huge thanks to everyone who provided moral support and tried to convince me I'd be fine, and even more thanks to my boyfriend Kevin who did the setup for the nabaztag (Naz the nabaztag needed his own wireless network) and helped me write the code to run the demo. I'll write more about the rabbit and the demo at a later point, looks like a lot of people will be getting them :)
Speaking aside, I had a great few days meeting old friends and new ones at the conference, and attending some really interesting sessions. Speaking was very very stressful although perhaps only because I didn't handle it as well as I might have. The definite upside though is getting to hang out with the very cool kids at the Speakers Dinner afterwards - thanks guys, I had a wonderful night. All in all I can't wait for next year!
DPC Day 1
Friday, June 13. 2008
Well, its a misleading title because the day is only half over but the Dutch PHP Conference 2008 is well and truly underway! Today I've been in the Zend Framework tutorial given by Matthew Weir O'Phinney, which is a full-day session. Its been excellent - with some concepts, some examples, and now a real working application to take a look around and learn from. I've had to work with ZF a little bit lately and I wish I'd been able to have this tutorial before I did that!
I've been able to catch up with a lot of people since arriving late last night and making the mistake of not going to bed until late because I wasn't tired (still on UK time) and then having to get up early today! Tonight we have an Ibuildings employees event which will be great, I'm excited to put faces to names for all my colleagues - the downside of the telecommute is that I mostly know people on Skype or IRC and not in real life. Later on there is a pre-conference social as well (from 8pm) - which is why my day is only half done :)
Looking forward to tomorrow, when there will be a phpwomen stand upstairs outside the main hall, we'll be giving out shirts (they're white this year) so if you want one then come and get it! Tomorrow at 2pm I'm giving my talk "PHP Deployment with Subversion" which looks like it will be well attended. Oh and its Worldwide Knit In Public Day as well so I'll be attempting to fit that in as well!
I've been able to catch up with a lot of people since arriving late last night and making the mistake of not going to bed until late because I wasn't tired (still on UK time) and then having to get up early today! Tonight we have an Ibuildings employees event which will be great, I'm excited to put faces to names for all my colleagues - the downside of the telecommute is that I mostly know people on Skype or IRC and not in real life. Later on there is a pre-conference social as well (from 8pm) - which is why my day is only half done :)
Looking forward to tomorrow, when there will be a phpwomen stand upstairs outside the main hall, we'll be giving out shirts (they're white this year) so if you want one then come and get it! Tomorrow at 2pm I'm giving my talk "PHP Deployment with Subversion" which looks like it will be well attended. Oh and its Worldwide Knit In Public Day as well so I'll be attempting to fit that in as well!
Visit To PHP London
Friday, June 6. 2008
Last night I had the opportunity to speak at the PHP London group, giving a talk entitled "PHP Deployment with Subversion". This is the talk I will be giving next week at the Dutch PHP Conference in Amsterdam, and giving the same talk last night was the last step in a whole series of preparation for next week. (The slides will be available after the Dutch conference)
As ever it was great to get to the event and meet the people there, I don't make it to the PHP London meetings very often but I always have a good time when I do. Although this talk was supposed to be a "test drive" for next week, I was actually very squeaky happy to get the invite to speak! Anyway the guys there were great as usual, helping me get set up with the projector, providing a pep talk, and buying me a beer afterwards.
The talk itself went fine, nothing more and nothing less. It was perfect for time, which is excellent as I had absolutely no idea how long I would talk for. I was greatly helped by using Powerpoint (yes, I had to boot into windows, scary!) with its Presenter View which has a timer. This view also shows you your current slide, the notes for this slide, and the upcoming slides which is all good (so long as you can read very tiny writing from standing 4 feet away from your laptop - happily I'm long-sighted!). The content I think is OK - lots of questions came out after the talk which was really interesting, and I certainly realised there were a few points that I need to mention when I give the talk again. The slides perhaps leave something to be desired, colours look different projected and there was a particularly horrible shade of yellow which appears on quite a few slides - oops!
I had a great night and although I wouldn't say I'm feeling confident for next week, I feel like there are fewer unknowns. I also came to terms with the idea that feeling terrible about a talk is just not something I'm going to get over until I have done the talk - its all part of the preparation I guess.
As ever it was great to get to the event and meet the people there, I don't make it to the PHP London meetings very often but I always have a good time when I do. Although this talk was supposed to be a "test drive" for next week, I was actually very squeaky happy to get the invite to speak! Anyway the guys there were great as usual, helping me get set up with the projector, providing a pep talk, and buying me a beer afterwards.
The talk itself went fine, nothing more and nothing less. It was perfect for time, which is excellent as I had absolutely no idea how long I would talk for. I was greatly helped by using Powerpoint (yes, I had to boot into windows, scary!) with its Presenter View which has a timer. This view also shows you your current slide, the notes for this slide, and the upcoming slides which is all good (so long as you can read very tiny writing from standing 4 feet away from your laptop - happily I'm long-sighted!). The content I think is OK - lots of questions came out after the talk which was really interesting, and I certainly realised there were a few points that I need to mention when I give the talk again. The slides perhaps leave something to be desired, colours look different projected and there was a particularly horrible shade of yellow which appears on quite a few slides - oops!
I had a great night and although I wouldn't say I'm feeling confident for next week, I feel like there are fewer unknowns. I also came to terms with the idea that feeling terrible about a talk is just not something I'm going to get over until I have done the talk - its all part of the preparation I guess.
SugarCRM SOAP Data Types
Thursday, April 24. 2008
Since SugarCRM only works with PHP5 in non-WSDL mode, I had to create all my calls from scratch. The SugarCRM documentation is somewhat minimal, as I may have mentioned, and I found I was mostly reading the WSDL to figure out how to format my SOAP calls. I've put together a post with working examples but I've also assembled a list of the data types needed. Click through to read more.
Continue reading "SugarCRM SOAP Data Types"
SugarCRM SOAP API Examples
Thursday, April 24. 2008
By popular request, here are some examples that worked for me when using the SOAP API offered by SugarCRM. Its nice that there is an interface, but it isn't brilliantly documented or nearly as widely used as it should be!
SugarCRM can't talk to PHP 5 native SOAP libraries in WSDL mode, so connect without it. Find below a series of queries that each worked for me, all just dumped here in succession, don't try to run this whole piece of code - it is intended as a series of examples. Use each line and then var_dump($response) to see what's happening.
// set up options array
$options = array(
"location" => 'http://192.168.1.129/aeat/spm/crm/soap.php',
"uri" => 'http://www.sugarcrm.com/sugarcrm',
"trace" => 1
);
// connect to soap server
$client = new SoapClient(NULL, $options);
// look what modules sugar exposes
$response = $client->get_available_modules($session_id);
// look in more detail at the fields in the Accounts module
$response = $client->get_module_fields($session_id, 'Accounts');
// look for a particular account name and then get its ID
$response = $client->get_entry_list($session_id, 'Accounts', 'name like "%LornaJane%"');
$account_id = $response->entry_list[0]->id;
// create a new account record and grab its ID
$response = $client->set_entry($session_id, 'Accounts', array(
array("name" => 'name', "value" => 'New Company')
));
$account_id = $response->id;
// create a new contact record, assigned to this account, and grab the contact ID
$response = $client->set_entry($session_id, 'Contacts', array(
array("name" => 'first_name',"value" => 'Geek'),
array("name" => 'last_name',"value" => 'Smith'),
array("name" => 'email1',"value" => 'a@b.com'),
array("name" => 'account_id',"value" => $account_id)
));
$contact_id = $response->id;
I hope this helps - if you have anything to add, or would like to post some examples, please do :)
SugarCRM can't talk to PHP 5 native SOAP libraries in WSDL mode, so connect without it. Find below a series of queries that each worked for me, all just dumped here in succession, don't try to run this whole piece of code - it is intended as a series of examples. Use each line and then var_dump($response) to see what's happening.
// set up options array
$options = array(
"location" => 'http://192.168.1.129/aeat/spm/crm/soap.php',
"uri" => 'http://www.sugarcrm.com/sugarcrm',
"trace" => 1
);
// connect to soap server
$client = new SoapClient(NULL, $options);
// look what modules sugar exposes
$response = $client->get_available_modules($session_id);
// look in more detail at the fields in the Accounts module
$response = $client->get_module_fields($session_id, 'Accounts');
// look for a particular account name and then get its ID
$response = $client->get_entry_list($session_id, 'Accounts', 'name like "%LornaJane%"');
$account_id = $response->entry_list[0]->id;
// create a new account record and grab its ID
$response = $client->set_entry($session_id, 'Accounts', array(
array("name" => 'name', "value" => 'New Company')
));
$account_id = $response->id;
// create a new contact record, assigned to this account, and grab the contact ID
$response = $client->set_entry($session_id, 'Contacts', array(
array("name" => 'first_name',"value" => 'Geek'),
array("name" => 'last_name',"value" => 'Smith'),
array("name" => 'email1',"value" => 'a@b.com'),
array("name" => 'account_id',"value" => $account_id)
));
$contact_id = $response->id;
I hope this helps - if you have anything to add, or would like to post some examples, please do :)
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Comments
Wed, 27.08.2008 10:19
If it’s anything like the Asus that I have, then it should b e relatively easy to put Ubuntu on it, like I’ve done with m ine. Put installer on to a bootable USB stick…
Wed, 27.08.2008 08:50
It should be possible to automatically close down the wifi c onnection and unload the kernel module on hibernate. Look a t the scripts in /etc/apm/suspend.d for example. /etc/de fault/acpi-support might also have some options to get you s omewhere. I put my normal ethernet driver module (e100 [...]
Tue, 26.08.2008 14:56
Vid: Thanks for dropping by, I’m very pleased to hear you fo und this useful.
Tue, 26.08.2008 14:54
dotjay: Shared offices are OK, but I do like the peace and quiet of not sharing I must say. I get a bit loopy though i f I stay home for too long! The offline time trick is a goo d one – I like to at least turn off the monitor and use a pe n sometimes.
Mon, 25.08.2008 20:00
I’m so glad that you settled into telecommuting so well. As you know, I’ve been working for myself and/or telecommuting for the last five years. I’ve never really had the experienc e of a shared office, but I do use Skype a lot, sometimes ta lking with work mates for hours at a time. The trick i [...]
Sun, 24.08.2008 23:25
Lorna, Great post, found this via Chris’s blog, more tool s in my toolset now :). Thanks
Sat, 23.08.2008 20:46
shaun: I didn’t anticipate problems, I just didn’t think it worked in that way – but I’m completely happy to be told oth erwise :) Don’t be surprised that curl lets you do weird an d wonderful things, lots of tools are like that and it allow s you to use them in ways that the original author had [...]
Sat, 23.08.2008 10:21
ok, I’ve been experimenting with this, ‘switch’ing on the RE QUEST_METHOD to implement post, get, put, delete for a db r esource; so far I’ve not had problems using $SERVER[‘QUERY STRING’] and parse_str()... what problems do you anticipate? (I’m not sending files, everything fits in the string [...]
Fri, 22.08.2008 09:20
The main conference site is now live, and the call for paper s is open – see http://conference.phpnw.org.uk/phpnw08/