php|tropics 2005

php|tropics

php|cruise was good, and this years offering from php|arch (php|tropics 2005) looks set to exceed it. I particularly enjoy a good conference; they're not just about learning new things, but also about getting together and sharing ideas, attendee:attendee, speaker:attendee and speaker:speaker.

I'm fortunate enough to be making two presentations, on the following topics:

PHP and Databases Grown-up: PDO

PHP 5.1 features a new data access layer, PHP Data Objects (PDO), that provides a clear, simple (but powerful) unified API for working with all our favourite databases. Features include prepared statements with bound parameters (for all databases, even those that don't natively support them), transactions, cursors, LOBs and flexible error handling. Join me in this talk to learn more about the future of database access in PHP.

Speaking of grown up, following my talk is Dan Scott from IBM on using DB2 with PHP (hopefully your audience will be bigger this time Dan :-)

PHP Streams: Lucky Dip

A roundup of a bunch of handy things you can do with streams in PHP 5. We'll look at time saving functions like get and put contents, as well as multiplexing clients/servers, user space wrappers and other streamy tricks. In short, a whole bunch of Streams tid-bits for your toolbox; let's get out of the fread($fp, filesize($filename)) age.

I very warmly encourage you to attend the conference; the pricing is pretty good (and keep in mind that it's an all inclusive resort--that includes alcoholic beverages and food). If your boss isn't interested, but you really are, why not make php|tropics your vacation destination for the year?