There is still no public "development preview" or alpha release, but that doesn't mean we can't play around with it, report bugs, ensuring our apps still properly work with it etc etc etc. It is however a bit annoying needing to "go old-school" and fetch a snapshot and build it yourself though.

If you'd like to try it out for yourself (the generated Ubuntu packages), you can get more information over on the Launchpad page for the project. As always, feedback is welcome on the PHP internals list about your experiences.

As you are a regular reader, you will no doubt, have noticed the CodeWorks speaker badge to the left of this post. It is my goal (not promise) to journal these final days of hectic preparation and the entire wild journey of what will undoubtedly be one of the more interesting things I ever do.

Here's the list of his posts:

• CWJ: Day -7
• CWJ: Day -6
• CWJ: Day -5
• CWJ: Day -4
• CWJ: Day -3
• CWJ: Day -2
• CWJ: Day -1
  
  
• CWJ: Day 0
• CWJ: Day 1-2
• CWJ: Day 3-4
• CWJ: Day 5-6
• CWJ: Day 7-8
• CWJ: Day 9-10
• CWJ: Day 11-12
• CWJ: Day 13-14

Keep coming back - this list will get updated as he makes new posts to his blog!

While reading through news and blog entries, I came across a post on Zend's Developer Zone about Paul Reinheimer's new PHP Function a Day website. The Function a Day site functions in much the same way as those nifty tear-off-a-page-per-day desktop calendars we all buy for those on our Christmas shopping lists for whom we can't quite figure out what to get.

TO help out the lazy out there, he's created this widget to grab the latest image from the funcaday website and pull it right into your Dashboard.

I am proud to announce the launch of the funcaday project with my graphic design buddy Courtney Wilson. The goal of the project is to showcase a new PHP function each weekday, then a new concept, term, or technique each weekend.

There's even a feed you can subscribe to to get your daily fix of function-ness. Today (the inaugural day of the site), the function is pathinfo.

• Sara Golemon - "php|works, Session Day 1 (aka Conf day 2)"
• Maggie Nelson - "php|works 2007: Thursday"
• Christopher Jones - "php|works Atlanta 2007 Thursday Wrap Up"
• Ben Ramsey - "php|works 2007: Day 2"

Keep an eye out tomorrow for more great summaries of the final day of the conference and be sure to check out our Talks page for links to the presentations the speakers have shared.

The month of PHP function aims at introducing PHP developers to a new PHP function every day : one that gets too little usage and spotlight, though is highly useful. [...] During this month, we'll present one or several function every day : they all deserve more attention. You don't have to search for it : most of the time, it will be available in your PHP installation, especially if you're using PHP 5.

So far, six functions have already been posted:

• export PHP variables
• listing folders
• validating dates
• localization
• HTTP headers
• SQL stats

While it is true that many PHP applications are written by people with no clue about security it is absolutely not true that PHP is a secure programming language. I think it is necessary to make ALL people aware of this.

No word yet on when this month will start, but we will keep you posted as soon as it's out. If you'd like to check out the community's response to this effort, check out some of the comments already posted to this announcement on the PHP Security Blog.