The second edition of Programming PHP was recently published. The O'Reilly press release said:
Rasmus Lerdorf and Kevin Tatroe provided the guidelines for this book. The newest author is Peter MacIntyre, a Zend Certified Engineer with more than five years experience in PHP. Wez Furlong and Chris Shiflett also contributed. Furlong modernized the "Extending PHP" chapter, and Shiflett brought his renowned expertise in updating the "Security" chapter.
Wez Furlong in
Books PHP Publications.
I've had a couple of longish flights recently, and opportunity for reading.
Life Expectancy is a Dean Koontz novel. I find that his books tend to be a bit cliche and predictable (but still enjoyable), but this one is different. It's not his typical horror novel; you're led through the story from the perspective of Jimmy Tock, born on the night his grandfather died. Before his death, he made 10 predictions about Jimmy, 5 of which are proven in short order and the remaining 5 are billed as terrible dates between his 20th and 30th birthdays. This is a humourous and thrilling story of a baker trying to figure out how best to tackle his fate in the face of some pretty heavy goings-on. While some parts are predictable (but again still enjoyable) there is some chain-yanking, in good humour.
Wez Furlong in
Books.
In addition to some leisure reading, I've also read a couple of tech books in recent months. I was given a copy of Ilia Alshanetsky's book php|architect's Guide to PHP Security (signed by Ilia himself :) and also a copy of Chris Shiflett's book Essential PHP Security.
I like both books, and I'm not just saying that because the authors are friends of mine. Both books are short, with Ilia's book weighing in the heavier of the two. They're written in different styles; Chris very clearly presents the most common styles of web application attacks and explains how they work and what you should look out for, and how to defend against them. Ilia's book is more of a whirlwind exploration of a lot of different attacks coupled with (fairly specific) examples of how to counter them, while at the same time considering application usability based on his experiences with FUDForum. He also talks about the use of honeypots to draw attackers away from important or sensitive areas of your site.
Wez Furlong in
Books PHP.
I was asked to review this book recently (with an eye on how it equates to PHP), and having just gone through it, I'm quite impressed. It is well written, well structured (taking you from no knowledge and going from there) and teaches you good design principles, without beating you over the head with them.
Having completed my review, it is apparent that PHP 5 has most of the good parts from java, without bogging you down in syntax. I view this as a good thing, making it easier for programmers to drift between the two languages more easily.
Wez Furlong in
Books PHP.
The other day I received a couple of goodies from my wishlist (thanks to David Costa) in return for fixing an SQLite bug. One of the items was I Am Legend.
Wez Furlong in
Books.
During one of my hops through AMS on the conference run at the end of last year, I had a couple of hours to kill and picked up a copy of Michael Crichton's "Prey". I loved the story, having recently become a father and very recently just been in/around Silicon Valley. I even got Juliette to read it, and now she's gone Crichton mad.
Currently, I'm reading his book "Eaters of the Dead", which purports to be a translation of a story written by an Arabian scholar who gets caught up in an adventure with a group of Viking warriors. It's a well written story, and I'm enjoying it a great deal.
Wez Furlong in
Books.
Wez Furlong is Director of Engineering at Message Systems where he works on the fastest MTA on Earth.
Wez is a PHP Core developer and active OpenSource contributor. He currently resides in Sykesville, Maryland with his wife, son, and dog. (read more)
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