What I've Learned From PHP Meet Up 3.0 (Part 1)

Last Saturday, I attended PHP Meet Up 3.0 at FTMSK UiTM Shah Alam. It was my first time I went to that faculty eventhough I've actually passed by the faculty everytime I went to my classes during my university years. The meet up has 9 presentations altogether with various interesting topics.

The talk is done in my mother's tongue which is in Malay but only one speaker who is much more comfortable presenting in English. So, let the showcase begin:

PHP Meet Up 3.0 Location

PHP Meet Up 3.0 Audience

Drag & Drop Demo Using script.aculo.us by zam3858

The first presentation was done by zam3858. He made some introduction on what's under the hood of script.aculo.us, what it can do and some demo of how it is implemented.

Other stuff that was shown is he used PHP with Scriptaculous and how to style the published page using some CSS.

Basically, javascript isn't a bad thing. It's getting more and more useful plus the big boys are using it extensively with the rising popularity of AJAX.

Want to see some script.aculo.us action, script.aculo.us demo page provide interesting demos for you to appreciate.

PHP vs Ruby On Rails by Aizatto

I've mentioned previously that only one speaker doesn't made his presentation in Malay. Aizatto is 21 years old, still studying in Monash University Sunway and he just wowed the crowd with his English speaking accent ;-)

Although he speaks English, he can actually understand Malay language so don't simply say some nasty things in Malay to him unless you speak really fast to him. I wonder what shampoo he is using since his hair looks like a male hair model.

His presentation was really interesting. He compared PHP with Ruby on Rails and made out some really interesting points. His slideshows were simple yet interesting and he really knows what he was talking about. He then showed some of his current projects to the audience and it was really cool. I now have a better understanding of what and how Rails is compared to just reading what it is all about on Rails website.

Basically Rails web programming in Malaysia is still small but I can see the benefit of learning about it. If you have programming language background, you have a better chance of learning Rails more quickly than I do. I wish I had learned computer programming before this rather than having an engineering background. Still, some people say that if you have engineering background, your chances of going into technical stuff is half-way there. I'm starting to think that might be true.

Anyway, Aizatto showed the audience some demonstration on how Rails is utilize. He also talked about meta programming, the pros and cons of Rails vs PHP and why Rails is the future of of web programming. His fingers just dances on the keyboard while writing the command lines. It's just mind boggling, simply because I don't know the language yet.

Aizatto maintains a domain with 3 sub-domains which is relatively his Aizatto Personal blog, his Rails blog and his Developer blog. You can download one of his slideshow here.

ACL in PHP by Crynobone

He is the owner of Chronosight, one of the blog that I've subscribed using my Google Reader. He is the only person that I know off before I attended the meet up so it was good to finally meet face to face with him. Apparently, his former colleague was a friend of mine and correct me if I'm wrong, I think he is a friend LadyAzurt.

I have never heard of ACL before. I then learned that it stands for Access Control List. Basically it's a function that allow certain level of users access to certain functions. It seems like a simple thing but it is really not. In my previous job, I had to really study about user level access for the software that the company is deploying for a client. A lot of documentation were involved and it was really pain in the a**.

I just want to say kudos to Crynobone for revealing his work. It's not that often a person who developed a system from scratch and took like years to build it and share it with other people. BTW, Crynobone is a Javascript expert. His presentation can be viewed on his blog.

Baking Cake Using CakePHP by Sumardi

Sumardi just graduated from UiTM recently and now works as a freelance web developer. He is a big fan of Open Source with his proud Debian powered laptop.

Sumardi talks about CakePHP and showed the audience how to develop a web application using CakePHP framework. I must say after I've seen how it is done, I think I can understand how the process works. He then showed some of his projects that is done and a project of his that is still on going.

Sumardi also shared some tips on how to beautify your developed website built using CakePHP by using CSS and why it is easy to use CakePHP. At the moment, I think I'll just stick with Wordpress and make my way up from there.

Check out Sumardi's blog.

Having Lunch With The Speakers

Because of the overwhelming attendance, the food that were served cannot accomodate the numbers of people who came. We decided to head over and look for outside food. I managed to squeeze in and had lunch with the speakers and the organizing committee. I had a nice chat with Aizatto where he shared some interesting stuff about himself and also some web industry scenario in Malaysia. The rest of the people were friendly and shared a lot of information with me.

Proceed to part 2 of PHP Meet Up 3.0 coverage.