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5 Handy PHP Tips and Tricks

Sun, 15 Jul 2012 23:41:52 +0100

We are delighted to post a article by Mr. Darren on the 26th January 2010 as he shares five very handy PHP tips.

Mr. Darren has set up Online Selling in January 2009 providing website design and eCommerce websites.

His article reads:

It has become one of the first choice languages of web application developers, the go-to language if your website needs something more than what HTML can give you. Over 20 million domains have PHP installed, and it is considered the most popular Apache HTTP Server module by far. Some of the most famous examples of PHP at work are Facebook, Wikipedia, Yahoo!, Digg, Joomla, WordPress, YouTube, and more. PHP has become part of the internet.

For the anniversary of PHP, I decided a “5 Useful Tips” list was in order, to help you use PHP to its full potential (and to avoid some of the problems inherent in the language!). I hope you find these useful.

1. PHP memory allocation

PHP scripts have a memory allocation attached to them by the server. To stop a PHP script taking up too much processing power, usually an arbitrary Mb usage is allocated. Sometimes this is a hinderance to web developers, so to increase the amount of memory allowed, enter the following line into the php.ini file on the root of your website. If the php.ini doesn’t exist, you can simply create it. You can increase this number if you still need more memory, but you may find an upper limit set by your host.

memory_limit=16M

2. PHP include functions

PHP can be used to great effect on websites which don’t involve any database interaction. By using the PHP include function, you can include another .php file anywhere in the current file. This can be extremely useful to include, for examples, headers, or footers, or a left menu that stays fixed. Instead of having to make changes to each file in the future, you can change the one PHP included into all the others. The syntax for including a file is as follows:

<?php include ('directory/file.php'); ?>

3. Setting variables in PHP

Another really useful PHP tip is to create variables, which can be a huge time saver later on down the line. Do you have to regularly enter a phone number or email address? By storing bits of information into variables, you can change the information and once and have it propegate site-wide instantly. No more Find and Replace, we say. To store a variable, use the following code:

$variable_name = 'variable_result';

And to call the variable, use:

<?php echo $variable_name; ?>

4. Using if statements in PHP

Using if statements in PHP can be incredibly useful for only showing information you really want to. The potential that an if statement can give you is huge, and the syntax is incredibly easy to use. For example, if the variable telephone1 is defined, then show it:

<?php if
("$telephone1" != "") {
	echo ("$telephone1");
} ?>

5. Difference between single and double quotes

In PHP there is a difference when using either single or double quotes, either ‘ or “. If you use double quotes ” then you are telling the code to check for a variable. If you are using single quotes ‘ then you are telling it to print whatever is between them. This might seem a bit trivial, but if you use the double quotes instead of the single quotes, it will still output correctly, but you will be wasting processer time.

So that’s it, 5 useful and hopefully time-saving tips for you. I’d love to hear any feedback you have on these solutions, whether they worked for you, or whether you have another useful tip to share with others.

How to Unhide Hidden Files Caused by a Virus

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 23:35:07 +0100

How to unhide files That’s been Hidden by a Virus in USB Flash Drives or hard disks

Nowadays, floppy drives are just remnants of old computers. Majority of computer users today are using USB Flash Disks as their primary storage of their files. Goodbye to the 1.4mb diskettes. You don’t have to buy lots of these diskettes just to store large files anymore.

With USB Flash drives, all you need is a computer that has USB port to plug in to which is available in every computer today. Not only they are handy because of their small sizes, USB Flash drives can also store large files!

The problem with using these flash drives, they’re easily infected with viruses. Some forms of virus infections among flash drives are the following: hides your files and folders, creates exe file extensions of your files and even corrupt your files. And later on infecting your PC.

If you have a strong antivirus, you don’t have to worry with these threats that could infect your computer when a USB flash drive has been plug to the computer because they are easily deleted upon detection.

Now, if your files have been infected even your antivirus is up-to-date and they’ve been hidden and no longer visible when you open your files, these are some tips on how to unhide hidden files caused by a virus.

1. Sometimes this infection can be solved by:

* Going to Windows Explorer
* Tools menu
* Folder Option
* View Tab
* Choose “show Hidden Files and Folders”.
* If the files will show up, simply change the properties of the files/folders. Uncheck the “hidden” checkbox and the files will show again just like before.

2. If the above doesn’t work, and your files are still hidden, do this one that will surely work.

Go To
>>folder options
    > view
    > under files and folders check all
    > under hidden files and folders check show hidden files and folders
    > uncheck hide protected operating system files

Then Click Start and type "run"
a window will pop up and then type "cmd" (without quotes)
A black window will pop up known as "Comand Promt"

> Here u type "attrib -h -s "
> Make sure you add a space after the -s.
    > Drag and drop the file you want to change(make visible), onto the command prompt window.
        > Press enter.
Repeat this process for each file.

Once this is done
>>folder options
    > view
    > under files and folders check all
    > under hidden files and folders check show hidden files and folders
    > check hide protected operating system files

3. This option is for those who do not want the long process.

Download the unhide.exe program from Bleeping Computer here, save it

Once downloaded to your computer, then double click it to run the program – it may take quite a while (e.g. 2 – 30 minutes) to run depending how many files there are on your hard drive but just leave it running until it finishes.

The unhide.exe program automatically goes through your computer and unhides all files except hidden system files – Windows files that are supposed to be (and should stay) hidden. It basically automates the attrib command above to
change the hidden attribute of all your files and folders.

Once unhide.exe has finished you should now be able to view and open your documents/pictures/music again just as before

Microsoft Outlook Load Error

Thu, 12 Apr 2012 22:52:34 +0100

Your Microsoft Outlook May at times keeps reinstalling or reconfiguring Office 2007, 2003 and/or maybe 2010

This Type of error os mostly found with MS Office 2007.

Here's why:
It means that your installation got damaged somehow and the installer is trying to fix it. but most of the time its jst keeps on repeating this process over and over again..

2 ways to solve this..

1)
    >> Click on start and type "run" (without quotes) and press enter.
    >> A small window will popup in that u type "regedit" (without quotes) and press enter.
    >> open HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT and scroll extensions down to .pip
            Here you rigth click and change permissions to full control on .pip
            Remove if need be when done just start office program say excel..

A new .pip will be created..all hassle gone

2)
>> If the above step does not sole it then, uninstall Office and then reinstall it again.
>> No data or configuration settings will be lost in this process.

Cheers!!!!!