by Alan Knowles(alan_k@php.net)
While the mailing list was slightly quieter, if only because everybody
was busy packaging and releasing. This week saw 6 stable, 2 beta and 1 development
release, MDB's first stable release, Some discussions on how to use PEAR if
you are in a hosted enviroment and some exciting new packages proposed like
Christian Stocker Webdav Server Class.
New Releases
Stable
- Console_Getopt - A PHP implementation of getopt (reads command
line options)
- HTML_Crypt - Provides methods to encrypt text, that can later
be decrypted by javascript
- HTML_Template_IT - A joint package including a simpler API
version (IT) and HTML_Template_ITX, which provides a PHPLib compatible template
engine (ITX).
- Pager - Creates Paging data similar to Googles, prev 1 2 3
.. 10 next toolbar
- MDB - First Stable Release of the PEAR MDB, Metabase Merger
Database Abstraction Layer.
- XML_Transformer - A simple way to transform XML tags into PHP
code or text. (similar concept to XSLT)
Beta
- Image_Transform - Providing a single simple API to manipulate
images using GD, ImageMagick, imagick or NetPBM.
- DB_DataObject - A SQL Builder and Data Modeling package
Development
- DBA - a wrapper for the php DBA functions (and a optional file
based emulator) and an implementation of an SQL driver for DBA database
PEAR-DEV traffic
PEAR Licence FAQ
Rasmus Lerdof announced that he was adding a more comprehensive list of
licences for PEAR packages, based on a request by Richard Stallman. These
are OSI (Open Source Institute) and FSF (Free Software Foundation) approved
licenses. They should appear in the manual soon.
PEAR Config new Parsers
Bertrand Mansion announced he had revamped the Config class, added a number
of new backend parsers and changed the current ones. This does break backwards
compatibility, so if you rely on the old version you will have to make sure
you tell the pear installer which version you require.
MDB manager abstract
Lukas posted a summary
of the MDB manager layer, which helps explain some of the differences and
advantages of moving to MDB, the Metabase PEAR merger project, he has also
been working on some documentation that will help anyone wishing to write
a backend driver for MDB.
Tomas V. Cox away for the next few weeks
Tomas Cox, one of the core developers behind PEAR, announced he will a
little busy in the next few weeks. A few jokes followed about slipping stuff
in while he's away..
Phpdoc2peardoc
Alexander Merz announced
the first version of a tool to convert phpdoc comments in the source into
peardoc (for the pear manual), it involves a small amount of changes to
phpdoc, but is a great step forward to improving the usablility of PEAR
packages.
Getting PEAR to work outside the PEAR tree.
Peter Schoenster, while attempting to install DB_DataObjects, brought up
the issue of how to install pear packages outside of the default pear tree,
quite a common requirement when working on hosted servers. a number of options
are available for this.
pear config-set php_dir /where/i/want/pear
will change the installation target directory for the current user,
Download the needed packages and untar the files in a folder available in
your include_path.
To set up your include path, you can use ini_set('include_path','/where/i/put/pear');
,
this command should be added by an auto_prepend script, or simply in a common
config file you include in each pages (require_once 'config.inc.php', by
example)
Use a .htaccess file with php_value include_path /where/i/put/pear
Bugs and Fixes
Thanks to these people for spotting bugs and sending fixes: Paweł Gołaszewski,
Michael Dransfield, Jeremy Pointer, Alexy Borzov.
New and Proposed Packages
DB_DOM, or DB_XML
Sandro Zic announced a class that enables you to store an xml document
model (DOM), in a database using PEAR::DB, it's API is similar to php's domxml
extension, and should enable faster access to large xml documents.
HTTP_Webdav_Server
Christian Stocker announced his webdav server package, which enables php4.3
(currently CVS version), to act as a Webdav server, the package includes an
example file based Webdav Server.
Tree_Manager
Björn Schotte announce his intention to PEARify the tree_manager,
there was some discussion on whether it may be better to merge this into
the current existing Tree Classes.
Development
Active on CVS this week has been Cache_Lite, DB_DataObject, DB_ldap,
DBA, HTML_QuickForm, HTML_Template_Flexy, HTML_Template_IT, Image_Transform,
Log, Mail_Mime, MDB, Pager, PECL::bcompiler, PECL::mailpars, PECL::threads,
PECL::vpopmail, Perm_LiveUserTree, XML_Transformer and PEAR core packages
New and updated documentation
Changes and additions to xml_transformer, contributing and the faq should
show up this week.