Configure PhpStorm for local PHP Web Application Debugging
In a previous article I talked about getting php, xdebug and PhpStorm all working together. That left me with the ability to debug php files right in the IDE. While helpful, debugging an individual php file has limited value. This article will cover the steps I had to go through to get PHP Web Application debugging to work
Setup php, xdebug and PhpStorm on Mac OS 10.7 + Xcode 4.3.2
I've been trying out JetBrains PhpStorm to see how well I'm able to use it for JavaScript and PHP Development work (PhpStorm is a Super set of WebStorm, their JavaScript IDE). The JavaScript pieces work flawlessly out of the box- I'm able to debug in Firefox or Chrome on either my Mac or Windows Development box.
It took a bit more effort to get PHP Debugging setup on my Mac dev box and I want to call out the step-by-step process I went through to it working. Most of the effort involved setting things up on the Mac OS X side of things. Once the tools were in place PhpStorm integrated nicely.
Edit: See Article 2 for information on how to debug PHP Web Applications
Broadcom BCM4306 Wireless card + Linux Mint 13
Next month I will be in New York for a few days (Vacation). While I want to take a laptop with me I'd rather not take either of my development machines in case something 'bad' happens (either on the flight or while sightseeing).
My Brother in Law had an old Dell Latitude D600 he wasn't using so I bought it and set about installing linux on it. After some issue with various editions of Ubuntu (12.04 32-bit edition doesn't even install) I settled on Linux Mint 13. Unfortunately the wireless card wasn't supported right out of the box... Here's what I had to do to get it working.
Addendum 24-July-2013:
ndiswrapper didn't seem to work when I tried to get wireless running on another D600. Fortunately for me installing the firmware-b43-installer package from within the Software Manager tool solved the problem. Go figure. :/
Javascript Development with Visual Studio 2011 Beta
Developing applications in JavaScript can be difficult. While it is a high-level language I often times feel like I'm working something very primitive. When I set out to develop a program in a high level language I expect that most of my time will be spent coding a solution to the problem that is at hand rather than deal with my development environment.
My biggest issue with Javascript development is the lack of a decent IDE + Debugger. While there are thousands of ways you can hack text editors to give them IDE like functions, it is disappointing to find that there is no painless development environment for JavaScript.
Since I like Visual Studio a LOT I decided to try out Visual Studio 2011 (Beta) and see if it has any features that are conducive to HTML5 and JavaScript development
Edit 30-May-2012: While I Enjoy Visual Studio, I have found JetBrains WebStorm and PhpStorm to be more usable for my JavaScript development/debugging needs. I find that I need to switch between Mac, Windows and Linux on a regular basis which makes Visual Studio a tough sell.
I have an article about setting up Debugging in PhpStorm here
How to Update OpenSSH on an HPUX 11.11 PA-Risc box
We made a few tweaks to our QA Automation system to improve test case execution speed. A side effect of the changes made support for OpenSSH Versions lower than 4.4 a real trial to support. As only one machine in our test lab was running an out-dated version of OpenSSH (The HPPA 11.11 machine) it was decided that it should be updated to a more recent edition of OpenSSH.
I was expecting it to take an hour (tops), but my shortcut method didn't work. I ended up using a multi-step process (including compiling OpenSSL) to get the box up to date.
Follow Up: VPS Providers (Alien VPS versus Chicago VPS)
Back in December 2011 I wrote a high level article comparing a few VPS Providers. After settling on AlienVPS, I decided to pick up a VPS instance from a competitor (Chicago VPS) and track their uptime and performance over time.
It has been over 150,000 minutes since I started tracking uptime and performance on these servers (14-January-2012). I've sifted the data and have a few things to say about each provider.
Configure OpenSSH for SSH1 & RSA1 (Not Suitable For Production!)
Today we had need of a very specific SSH Configuration: SSH1 with an RSA1 key. After looking online and at books (APress's OpenSSH, specifically) I was able to get a server configured.
This server is used for a very specific, limited & intermittent use. I definitely DO NOT advocate the use of SSH1 / RSA1 for public facing or secure infrastructures.
Troubleshoot PHP mail function (Centos 6, VPS)
I just spent about 4 hours troubleshooting an issue I had implementing the PHP mail() function. On the surface it looks fairly straight-forward. You call the method, pass the parameters and email gets sent.
If the stars are aligned, everything will work great for you the first time. If, however, you don't have the dependencies installed things won't go quite as smoothly.
Generate SSH Keypairs (Windows / NIX)
Brain dump: I recently generated some SSH Keypairs and wanted to document the process. While there are more than 10,000 pages out there that list this, I like knowing I can search my site for the steps that worked for me. :)
This covers how to use PuTTYGen and OpenSSH to generate keypairs
Installation Failed message when installing PhoneGap 1.4.1 for iOS
I ran into an issue installing PhoneGap this evening. Here are the symptoms:
- Installer never prompts for my User credentials
- Install fails with the message:
The installation failed.
The installer encountered an error that caused the installation to fail. Contact the software manufacturer for assistance.
Note: While I love how spacious Apple Trackpads are, I HATE the new gesture system. I just lost 20 minutes work writing this article because Safari thought I wanted to go back a page by swiping... wow, that was annoying.
Update: Apparently another root cause is if you have cocos2d installed. See this thread for details.