---

In late September, the people behind PHP Architect Magazine and the php|tek conferences are bringing their latest venture to Dallas. Dallas will host the southern regional stop of the CodeWorks '09 PHP Roadshow. Conference info and pricing is available at the official CodeWorks '09 website . At this point, it appears that DallasPHP Members will be eligible for a discouted attendance rate. Details will be forwarded to you as I learn them.

In order to support local PHP development, CodeWorks is holding one (possibly two) speaking positions open for regional PHP Developers, and DallasPHP has been asked to solicit topics and determine who will fill that/those spots. By late July, we will decide upon a primary and alternate speaker who will appear in the Roadshow. A Call for Topics will be issued shortly by various means, and any PHP developer whose residence or place of employment is within the Texas/New Mexico/ Oklahoma/Arkansas/Louisiana region will be eligible. Conference presentations will be 1 hour long and must involve some aspect of software development with PHP. DallasPHP membership is not required. If you are interested in learning more, or in helping to determine how our selection will be made, please join us at the June meeting.

For months, now, DallasPHP members have been approaching me about launching a community project. Given that the average length of PHP development experience of meeting attendees is around five years, we obviously have a lot of experience and talent to draw upon. The challenge is execution. That starts with planning.

At the June meeting, we will discuss options for an Official DallasPHP Development Project. The slate is clear, there are no established goals except:

BENEFICIAL:

The resulting code will be made available to all members and visitors to our website, so it should be useful under a broad spectrum of circumstances -- not so specialized that it requires massive customization in order to be of help to most moderately experienced developers. If the project should ultimately be executed using a specific PHP framework, it is vitally important that the structure and logic behind the application remain flexible enough that it could be implemented using other frameworks with minimal alteration and effort. Remember, the goal is creating a successful toolset or application design, not necessarily a specific, inflexible set of PHP code.

SECURE:

All code should be secure and safe for members of limited experience to implement, with every necessary precaution taken to protect the required web server and data resources from malicious mischief.

TEACHABLE:

I CONSIDER THIS TO BE THE PRIMARY GOAL OF THIS PROJECT. There are dozens of open-source PHP projects out there which accomplish practically any procedural function a developer could desire. Most of them, however, are extremely bad examples of PHP. Trying to learn application design from some of the popular PHP projects could teach a developer very inefficient (and even dangerous) practices. The scattershot nature of the code often demonstrates very little about its origins and development. A primary goal of this project should be to demonstrate the development process, including thorough planning, methodical execution and enduring documentation. I believe that the resulting documentation of this project could ultimately be of more value to the broader PHP community than the code itself.

PHP is a very simple language to learn. Project planning, good development practices, and working in a team environment are not simple, and there are not many good PHP resources or examples to be found. It should be a key goal of a User Group project to not only deliver good code, but to explain that code to less experienced developers: why key decisions about its operation were made, how and why changes evolved through the development process, and a complete and thorough explanation of how the final code operates (and can be customized).

DallasPHP's goal is to serve and educate the PHP community. This project should be a landmark step towards that goal.

At this point, there are no concrete plans, no hosting arrangements, and no personnel decisions have been made. Bring to this meetings your ideas, experience, needs, suggestions and enthusiasm.

We will discuss:

• goals and purposes
• necessary tools
• ground rules and requirements
• methods of communication/documentation among all developers who choose to participate
• whatever else comes up

This is the very beginning of the process, and by no means will participation in The DallasPHP Development Project require your attendance at this or other specific DallasPHP meetings, but if you are interested in the project -- as a participant or as a spectator -- we would welcome your help.

This month's Presentation will be held in our favorite location on June 9, 2009:

The Riverwalk Conference Room in the Offices at Yahoo! (7-9 pm)
1680 Glenville Drive
Richardson Texas
(Just east of Central, not far from NerdBooks.)
Please use the North Entrance.

---

More is never enough! Once again, the Organizers of DallasPHP would like you to join us at the Fox and Hound following the Official presentation! Everyone is invited for great company with available food, drinks, and games!

The party starts just up the street, at 9:00pm (following the DallasPHP Monthly Presentation) at
The Fox & Hound
112 W Campbell Road
Richardson, TX 75080

This is official website of the Dallas PHP/MySQL User Group (DallasPHP). DallasPHP is a growing user group in the Dallas/Ft. Worth area that supports the use of PHP, MySQL, and other related technologies. Our objectives:

• to provide an open community for discussion, knowledge and skill sharing
• to encourage the use of PHP both in personal and corporate environments
• to create a crossroads for those who need and those who can provide professional PHP development skills within Texas

PHP users of all experience levels are invited to our monthly presentations (where specific programming topics are discussed on the second Tuesday of each month) and to a general Q&A session which happens on the Saturday that follows the Tuesday night meeting. Meeting details can be found here.

DallasPHP currently maintains an Announcement List at Meetup.com. This list will be soon replaced by an Official DallasPHP Announcement List, maintained locally. Look for a form on this page as soon as we get the kinks worked out.