Since we blog a lot about PHP in general and Symfony in particular https://phpc.social seems like a good choice for us as our Mastodon instance.

If you are a PHP nerd you might consider to join this instance as well.

Other fits could be:

• https://phparch.social the Mastodon instance of php[architect] Magazine
• https://fosstodon.org it is a broader community around all OpenSource Software
• https://uiuxdev.social a more frontend resp. web development focused Mastodon community

If you wonder how to find well know figures from the PHP scene on Mastodon Spatie’s Freek Van der Herten got you covered: https://freek.dev/2384-laravel-and-php-developers-to-follow-on-mastodon

Happy Tooting!

Since i am using symfony anyway i can use the String component which has a handy slugger which converts any characters into safe ascii characters.
It is very flexible and can be customized with locales, custom replacements and closures.

$umlautString = "Müller Meier";
$slugger = new Symfony\Component\String\Slugger\AsciiSlugger('de');
$slugger->slug($umlautString, $seperator = ' ')->toString();
echo $umlautString; // mueller meier

I guess this will become my go-to method resp. slugger to convert umlaute in any PHP application.

One example why the PHP native ways have their downsides is iconv.
Iconv can transliterate umlauts:

$string = iconv('UTF-8', 'ASCII//TRANSLIT', $string);

But it can not handle the locale in a convenient way but relies on the system wide locale instead.
You need to use the global method setlocale before using it and reset the locale after usage again, which can cause sideeffects and is not very convenient.

From: https://www.php.net/manual/de/function.iconv.php#105507

$utf8_sentence = 'Weiß, Göbel';
//transliterate
$trans_sentence = iconv('UTF-8', 'ASCII//TRANSLIT', $utf8_sentence);
//gives [Weiss, Gobel]
//Germany
setlocale(LC_ALL, 'de_DE');
$trans_sentence = iconv('UTF-8', 'ASCII//TRANSLIT', $utf8_sentence);
//gives [Weiss, Goebel]

Thanks to this StackOverflow answer for the tip with the symfony String component. https://stackoverflow.com/a/68742023/541949

(If there is more extensive documentation available concerning assetic + CompassFilter, please stop reading on and let me know!)

If you take a look at the filter class itself (it is CompassFilter in the generic Assetic\Filter namespace), you should recognise several option values that you can use in your application wide config.yml file.

But first you have to install the framework plugin following these instructions.

After adding the framework plugin by ruby’s own package manager “gem” (hopefully replaced by composer in the near future ;-)) by typing something like

$ gem install zurb-foundation

the only thing remaining to do is to load the framework plugin by assetic. To do so, put the folloging lines to your config.yml assetic section (as you would do it when using the compass command line interface, refer to the output of

$ compass help compile

.)

The yaml file should look like this:

assetic:
    read_from: %kernel.root_dir%/web
    debug: %kernel.debug%
    use_controller: %kernel.debug%
    filters:
        compass:
            plugins: ['zurb-foundation'] 
            # load foundation                                     
            # framework as you would do by typing
            # $ compass compile --require 
            # zurb-foundation [...]
            # [ ... ]

Now you should be able to import the foundation library files by using the @import statement in your *.sass/*.scss files:

@import "foundation";

Have fun!

I still did not get the point regarding dependency resolution, so i simply “composed” the composer file by writing down my own requirements (“i want only the hottest, newest stuff!!”, then tracked down the error messages, removing them by explicetly writing down the missing dependencies by using the latest “dev-*” versions. After that i tried to run the project, which actually did not work, but selective downgrade of some of the bundles (framework, security-extra blahblah) finally did the job.

Feel free to use it in your own projects:

{
	"require" : {
              "symfony/symfony" : "v2.0.12",
              "doctrine/common" : "2.1.4",
              "doctrine/orm" : "2.1.6",
              "symfony/finder" : "v2.0.12",

              "symfony/assetic-bundle" : "2.0-dev",
              "twig/extensions" : "dev-master",
              "jms/security-extra-bundle" : "1.1.0",
              "sensio/framework-extra-bundle" : "2.0-dev",
              "sensio/distribution-bundle" : "2.0-dev",
              "sensio/generator-bundle" : "2.0-dev"

 	},
        "autoload" : {
            "psr-0" : {
                "Acme" : "src/",
            }
        }
}

Create a file named “composer.json” in your project’s root directory, then paste the above code into it and save it.

Now run

$ curl -s http://getcomposer.org/installer | php

After that, download all dependencies by typing

$ php composer.phar install

The easiest way to create a full project including AcmeDemoBundle, AppKernel and the whole stuff is to download the symfony 2 standard distribution without vendors and calling the script from there. The only thing to do is to modify the path to autoload.php, which should point to vendor/.composer/autoload.php.

Now you are able to upgrade your project’s dependencies to the newest versions by simply modifying the composer.json file. Have fun!.

Dynamic “responsive” Texts:
http://worrydream.com/Tangle/guide.html
via (codediesel)

When to use Silex or not!?  …incl. some nice discussions in the comments:
http://test.ical.ly/2011/10/11/is-there-a-specific-situation-when-to-use-a-php-micro-framework-like-silex/

Flickrs Push API speech:
http://code.flickr.com/blog/2011/10/11/talk-real-time-updates-on-the-cheap-for-fun-and-profit/

The World is my touchscreen
http://www.gizmodo.de/2011/10/18/omnitouch-macht-die-welt-zum-touchscreen.html

Can I Use… Compatibility tables for support of HTML5, CSS3, SVG and more in desktop and mobile browsers
http://www.gizmodo.de/2011/10/18/omnitouch-macht-die-welt-zum-touchscreen.html

The Googlher
http://fffff.at/the-googlher/

JS – jwerty – Awesome handling of keyboard events
http://keithcirkel.co.uk/jwerty/

The twig-extension repository is usually fetched by calling

$ bin/vendor install

into your project´s ./vendor directory (because it is part of the ./deps file of each symfony 2 standard edition).

After installing the required vendor files, register the namespace fallback in your autoload.php (if you use the one delivered with Symfony 2 Standard, this should already have been done for you):

use Symfony\Component\ClassLoader\UniversalClassLoader;
use Doctrine\Common\Annotations\AnnotationRegistry;

$loader = new UniversalClassLoader();
$loader->registerNamespaces(array(
    'Symfony'          => array(__DIR__.'/../vendor/symfony/src', __DIR__.'/../vendor/bundles'),
    // ...
));

$loader->registerPrefixes(array(
    'Twig_Extensions_' => __DIR__.'/../vendor/twig-extensions/lib',
    'Twig_'            => __DIR__.'/../vendor/twig/lib',
));

Remember that twig extensions are always registered as tagged services, but it is not always desirable to register a twig extension like e.g. the Debug-Extension as a regular service globally. We could do so by adding the service definition to the services.xml-file in one of our bundles. But due to the special purpose of the debug extension, we will choose a different, more “project-wide-configuration”-way.

Luckily, Symfony provides means to dynamically load services “on demand” and depending on the current environment.

Add the following lines to your app/config/config_dev.yml:

services:
    debug.twig.extension:
        class: Twig_Extensions_Extension_Debug
        tags: [{ name: 'twig.extension' }]

The “services”-configuration option may be utilized to register any class as a DIC managed service, for each project and independent from your bundle configuration (But remember that “regular” service definition configuration should usually happen in your bundle´s configuration files, otherwise you will not able to distribute your bundles because of missing or broken dependencies).

For twig extensions that should only be loaded for special purposes (like our DEBUG-function which is only needed in development environments), config_dev.yml is the perfect place to register them.

Note the “tags”-configuration which marks the service as a twig extension. Now, let´s create a demo twig-template and try the {% debug %} function:

{% extends "NerdpressDemoBundle::layout.html.twig" %}
{% debug %}

That will do. Open the page in your favorite webbrower (after defining a route, a controller and other stuff i won´t mention here) and admire the debug output. Note that the output will be much more nicer if you have had installed a native php debug extension like e.g. XDebug.

A few weeks ago i described how to hook into the form login process in order to change the user session´s locale.

In the meantime a non backwards compatible code modification has been introduced that outdated this article. From now on (Symfony 2.0.4) the locale and default locale settings are maintained within the request object (and not as used to be in the session).

So, here is a little update – under reserve – because the locale setting´s logic will probably change again in the future.

At first, the new locale maintenance code by using a LocaleListener is still buggy. Specially this issue breaks the whole thing atm: https://github.com/symfony/symfony/issues/2386

A quick workaround is to change the priority of the listener from 255 to let´s say 127. That forces the SessionListener to initialize the session right BEFORE the locale listener, so that $request->hasPreviousSession() has actually the chance to return TRUE.

Change Symfony\Component\HttpKernel\EventListener\LocaleListener, L. 69

KernelEvents::REQUEST => array(array('onEarlyKernelRequest', 255), array('onKernelRequest', -1)),

to

KernelEvents::REQUEST => array(array('onEarlyKernelRequest', 127), array('onKernelRequest', -1)),

Hopefully a patch will be available soon to fix the problem – source code modifications in this way are things YOU MUST NOT DO!

For now and demonstration purposes only, this will fit. After that, it´s easy to modify our previously elaborated source code to fit the new circumstances:

Change our listener from:

class EventListener
{
    public function onSecurityInteractiveLogin(InteractiveLoginEvent $event)
    {
        $token = $event->getAuthenticationToken();
        $session = $event->getRequest()->getSession();
        $session->setLocale($token->getUser()->getLocale());
    }
}

into:

class EventListener
{
    public function onSecurityInteractiveLogin(InteractiveLoginEvent $event)
    {
        $token = $event->getAuthenticationToken();
         
        $request = $event->getRequest();
        $session = $request->getSession();

        $locale = $token->getUser()->getLocale();
        $session->set('_locale', $locale);
        $request->setLocale($locale);
    }
}

I am still not sure if this is the best solution to the problem – hopefully the new implementation will be well documented in the future or changed in a way the produces less WTFs …

Any comments appreciated.

today some node.js resources:

node, jquery and more
http://dailyjs.com

some cool tutorials
http://howtonode.org/

two pro-firms thatwork with node and blog about it, great!
http://blog.nodejitsu.com/
http://www.debuggable.com/blog

and furthermore …

Javascript text2speech (!)
http://syntensity.com/static/espeak.html

this weeks css3 generator looks shopped
http://layerstyles.org/

HTML5 insertAdjacentHTML
http://updates.html5rocks.com/2011/08/insertAdjacentHTML-Everywhere

yet another CSS3 generator
http://www.css3.me/

yet another CMS
http://www.fork-cms.com/

article about PHP 5.4’s traits
http://www.phpgangsta.de/der-klasse-neue-kleider-traits

40 SEO Strategies for Ecommerce Websites | Kaiserthesage
http://kaiserthesage.com/seo-strategies-for-ecommerce-websites-2/

Deploy your Silex and Twig powered Facebook App using Git onto free Heroku Cloud Hosting
http://test.ical.ly/2011/09/29/deploy-your-silex-and-twig-powered-facebook-app-using-git-onto-free-heroku-cloud-hosting/

Locks in Javascript?
http://scriptstoprograms.wordpress.com/2011/09/27/javascript-shared-state/

simple but powerful DRY Plugin/Effect Framework aimed to simplify your jQuery development such that you no longer have to repeat yourself.
http://balupton.github.com/jquery-sparkle/demo/

order pizza via command line
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUQzcqBxZJk

…have a nice weekend!
http://failblog.org/2011/09/27/epic-fail-photos-fail-blog-best-of-september-fails/

kthxbye
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lolcode

Hope some of you might find it easier that way to figure out what the heck we’re talking about…

Although our english is not quite perfect, we hope to beat google translator in that job ;)