Downloading from Newsgroups

For a long time now I've been using Usenet to download everything I ever need from the internet so I'm going to let you know what I use and how you can get setup using it quite quickly. I do pay money for a few of the services I'm going to describe, but it isn't much and it's totally worth it.

Ajax Delete with CakePHP and jQuery

In this post I'm going to describe how you can use Ajax using the jQuery javascript library to delete items without a refresh. This is quite an easy enhancement to achieve and will help with the usability of your applications. It isn't CakePHP specific but in this example I'm using the framework to delete items from the main index.

I'm a big fan of progressive enhancement and so the delete action will still work without Javascript enabled but this will improve the user experience a little bit by keeping the user on the same page and will display a smooth fade animation to get rid of the table row.

The Shield

As a Christmas present my wonderful girlfriend bought me the box set of the superb TV show The Shield which includes the full 7 seasons presented in a very delicious box which acts a police case folder with cool separators for each of the seasons.

Other than The Wire if I had to recommend a gritty cop drama that actually left viewers with a worthwhile conclusion The Shield would be it. Each season contains around 12 episodes with a major plot arc through each one along with a huge plot arc throughout the entire show and events that happen in the very first episode come back in the final season with devestating effects.

Happy New Year, hello 2010

Happy New Year! I hope that you had a really good time over the Christmas period and that you celebrated the new year in style. I've been quite lazy with regards to my website but I've intentions of writing more regularly, whether I can stick with it is another question but I'll have to see.

The series on creating a full CakePHP application has been successful so I may do another one of those using the latest version of Cake and include some of things I've learnt along the way. I've also struggled with writing posts so if you have any ideas or you would like anything covered in a tutorial just leave a comment and I'll see what I can do.

CakePHP - Apache has Stopped Responding

I've been developing a new application with CakePHP 1.2.5 and came across a really frustrating problem, which admittedly is entirely my own fault but took me ages to troubleshoot and find the source of the problem.

I'm using Xampp and Windows 7 and this problem was causing Apache to stop responding and completely crash. Quite strange behaviour for a simple application I've just started, so I started searching online for similar problems. A few were suggesting that Zend optimizer was the problem but I don't have it installed so I started debugging the code and seeing where the problem was.

Cutting a long and hair-pulling story short the problem was this piece of code:

$this->Session->setFlash('You have successfully logged in','flash_good');

Where did I go wrong? Well I hadn't created the "flash_good.ctp" layout file, one missing layout and the app was causing Apache to stop responding and crash. Now CakePHP is usually extremely good in letting you know any missing files, so I'm not sure if this is a problem with my setup or that if this was overlooked. Either way when this happens again this is the first place I'm looking.

Had similar problems? Let me know in the comments!