Vladimir Goncharov has a tutorial posted to his Medium.com site showing how to integrate machine learning and computer vision into a PHP application using the opencv library. The php-opencv library is a C-level implementation (via an extension) making it easer to use it directly from PHP.

Now, “Machine learning” is developing very fast, it has already written a lot of articles, including the ones on the medium, and almost every developer would like to start using it in their work tasks and home projects, but where to start and what to use is not always understandable. Most articles for beginners offer a bunch of literature, on the reading of which there is not enough life, “inexpensive” courses, etc.

[...] I was considering writing a php-opencv module by myself using SWIG and spent a lot of time on it, but I did not achieve anything. [...] Then I found the library of php-opencv on the github space, it is a module for php7, which makes calls to opencv methods.

He then starts in on the code making use of the library to read in images, perform face detection, facial recognition, and locating facial marks/landmarks. He also includes a section covering the use of neural networks to improve the quality of images, classify them and the use of Tensorflow models to detect certain kinds of objects. The post ends with a look at getting the requirements installed to use the tool and links to other examples.

On the SitePoint PHP blog paul Jones has written up some of his own perspective on the PHP-FIG and the work that's currently being done by the group on restructuring to make the group more effective, learning from past issues.

In his article The Past, Present and Future of the PHP-FIG, Larry Garfield gives a whirlwind tour of his impressions of the FIG, from its founding to one of its possible futures. I encourage you to read it in its entirety before continuing.

Herein, I will attempt to address some of the errors and omissions in Larry’s article, and offer two other possible futures for the FIG.

He starts by talking about the largest change the group is working on - the PHP-FIG 3.0 proposal. He compares the vision of this effort to some of the founding goals and principles of the group as documented in various emails and posts from current (and past) members of the group. Paul also talks about the FIG 2.0 workflow, what PSRs were before/after it was introduced and some of the overall impact that these and other PSRs from the group have had on the wider community.

He wraps up the post with a look at two alternatives he's proposing for the group's consideration as a way forward and an alternative to the PHP-FIG v3: independent interop groups and disbanding the PHP-FIG all together.

The PHP Town Hall podcast has posted their fourth episode, "PHP's Vision, Beards, and Cake", with hosts Phil Sturgeon and Ben Edmunds.

We made it to episode 4, past the point of no return! In this episode we are joined by Zack Kitzmiller (owner of an awesome beard) and Jose Diaz-Gonzalez (CakePHP developer extraordinaire) as we argue about PHP’s vision and how we think the language should progress in the future.

You can listen to this latest post a few ways - either using the in-page player, by downloading the mp3 or by subscribing to their feed.