PHP has a feature to change the include_path programatically. The problem is that the path separator is : on unix and ; on windows. Luckily there is a constant PATH_SEPARATOR to overcome this issue. Here is how i would do it:

<?php
ini_set('error_reporting', E_ALL);
ini_set('display_errors', TRUE);

$include_paths = array(
  '.',
  '/home/users/timvw/phpincs',
  '/home/users/timvw/pear',
  ini_get('include_path')
);

ini_set('include_path', implode(PATH_SEPARATOR, $include_paths));

?>

Most websites have the same layout and an area with dynamic content. So most people choose for the following solution: generate a couple of template files for the static content and then write the code for the dynamic content and include the static templates. Here is how the code for a contact and an aboutme page would look like:

contact.php

<?php
include('header.php');
include('leftpanel.php');
// code for contact page
include('rightpanel.php');
include('footer.php');
?>

aboutme.php

<?php
include('header.php');
include('leftpanel.php');
//something about me
include('rightpanel.php');
include('footer.php');
?>

This code is pretty flexible. But what happens if you want to change your layout to something without a rightpanel? Right, you have to edit each page and remove the include call. A couple of weeks ago i discovered the concept of tiles and immediately realised this is useful for php too. Here is an example implementation:

contact.php

<?php
require_once('init.php');
$tiles = array();
$tiles['main'] = PAGE_CONTENT . '/contact.html';
include('masterpage.php');
?>

aboutme.php

<?php
require_once('init.php');
$tiles = array();
$tiles['main'] = PAGE_CONTENT . '/aboutme.html';
include('masterpage.php');
?>

masterpage.php

<?php
if (!isset($tiles)) $tiles = array();
if (!isset($tiles['header']) $tiles['headers'] = PAGE_CONTENT . '/default-header.html';
if (!isset($tiles['leftpanel']) $tiles['headers'] = PAGE_CONTENT . '/default-leftpanel.html';
if (!isset($tiles['main']) $tiles['headers'] = PAGE_CONTENT . '/default-main.html';
if (!isset($tiles['footer']) $tiles['headers'] = PAGE_CONTENT . '/default-footer.html';
include($tiles['header']);
include($tiles['leftpanel']);
include($tiles['main']);
include($tiles['footer.php']);
?>

As you can see, this allows the programmer to change the layout in a single file, the masterpage. If a programmer wants to change the content of a specific area of a page all he has to do is change the $tiles array.

A while ago i was really stumbled by the behaviour of a server. This problem solved itself after the sysadmin noticed that he forgot to upgrade ionCube after a php upgrade.Here is the code that i ran:

$array = array();
$array[] = array('name' => 'row1', 'value' => '1');
$array[] = array('name' => 'row2', 'value' => '3');
$array[] = array('name' => 'row3', 'value' => '2');

foreach($array as $row)
{
  print_r($row);
  echo "<br />";
}

The expected output is:

Array ( [name] => row1 [value] => 1 )
Array ( [name] => row2 [value] => 3 )
Array ( [name] => row3 [value] => 2 )

For some odd reason this is the output i got:

Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => row1 [value] => 1 ) [1] => 0 )
Array ( [0] => Array ( [name] => row2 [value] => 3 ) [1] => 1 )

I discovered that the European Central Bank (ECB) has a page with Euro foreign exchange rates. I thought it would be a nice exercise to write a little script that works with the XML data source. Get currencyconvertor.txt now!