Secure Communications with PHP and SSH

Communication across public networks like the Internet posesserious problems to widespread applications. This article by SaraGolemon demonstrates the use of the SSH2 protocol within PHP forauthentication, remote command execution, file transfer, and sockettunnelling.—by Sara Golemon

The PRADO Framework: .Net for the PHP Developer

PRADO is a component-based and event-driven framework for Webprogramming written in PHP 5. It was developed in the hope offacilitating code-reuse and having developers think in terms ofreusable and configurable components instead of repetitive andtedious details. In this article, PRADO principal author Qiang Xuwuses a form validation example to illustrate the new programmingparadigm advocated by PRADO. He also shows how to create reusablecomponents.—by Qiang Xue

Enterprise Development with the iConnect Architecture

If you’ve been looking for a way to create rock-solid,extendable enterprise applications with PHP, look no further! Thisarticle by Alex Pagnoni describes the PHP 5 iConnect architectureand the reasons it has been designed. It also provides a completeexample of a simple distributed web application that uses the wholearchitecture.—by Alex Pagnoni

HTML_QuickForm and Smarty: A Winning Combination

Had it with redundant form validation? Does separatingapplication and presentation code have you all mixed up? Check outDavid Perrin’s article in this issue of php|a for an overview ofthe Smarty templating engine, the PEAR HTML_QuickForm form buildingmodule and a complete mini application that cleanly dividesapplication and presentation as well as handling comprehensive formvalidation.—by David Perrin

PHP under Fire: Using the Firebird database from your web apps

When praising the vast database support that PHP provides,the products that are mentioned most often are the likes of MySQL,SQLite, PostgreSQL and MSSQL, but there are several others. Onedatabase that has been rather neglected for a long time isFirebird. As author Christian Wenz illustrates in this greatarticle, it’s time for a closer look. —by Christian Wenz

Test Pattern: The Myth of Reusable

“Is our code reusable?” Achieving“reusable” is often viewed as a holy grail for a pieceof object oriented code. The code is going to be so flexible thatyou can do anything with it that you would ever want to do. In thismonth’s Test Pattern column, author Marcus Baker is ready to betthat somebody can think of a use you haven’t thought of yet,so the answer is “no.” Perhaps, he says, we shouldrephrase the question…—by Marcus Baker

Security Corner: PHP Security Consortium

The topic of this month’s Security Corner column,written by security expert Chris Shiflett, is the PHP SecurityConsortium, which just had its official launch. In this article, hedescribes the group’s history, purpose, and futureplans.—by Chris Shiflett