PHP Web Framework

Here we are going to explore some PHP web frameworks.

PHP development environment setup

Install PHP 5.6.x

  • Please find the instruction from home page

  • Composer

Linux

  • Use curl -s https://getcomposer.org/installer | php -- to install composer on Linux
  • use ‘composer -v ’ to verify.

Windows

  • Download the composer and install php on your PC
  • Use composer -v to verify the composer is ready.

Zend Framework

Zend Framework 2.x is a collection of 60+ packages for professional PHP development. It can be used to develop web applications and services using PHP 5.6+, and provides 100% object-oriented code using a broad spectrum of language features.

Create Zend Framework 2 project

* Clone Zend Framework skeleton project as new project. 

* Install zend framework with composer

    cd  /path/to/newproject
    git clone git://github.com/zend framework/ZendSkeletonApplication.git
    cd ZendSkeletonApplication
    php composer.phar self-update
    php composer.phar install

Start app with php built-in server

Linux

php -S 0.0.0.0:8080 -t public/ public/index.php

Windows

php -S 0.0.0.0:8080 -t public public/index.php

Use apache server

  • Apache configuration
 <VirtualHost *:80>
     ServerName zf2-tutorial.localhost
     DocumentRoot /path/to/newproject/ZendSkeletonApplication/public
     SetEnv APPLICATION_ENV "development"
     <Directory /path/to/newproject/ZendSkeletonApplication/public>
         DirectoryIndex index.php
         AllowOverride All
         Require all granted
     </Directory>
 </VirtualHost>

  • Zf2-MVC-Starter project

    • Please find the project introduction here.

Laravel

Laravel is a free, open-source PHP web framework, created by Taylor Otwell and intended for the development of web applications following the model–view–controller (MVC) architectural pattern. Some of the features of Laravel are a modular packaging system with a dedicated dependency manager, different ways for accessing relational databases, utilities that aid in application deployment and maintenance, and its orientation toward syntactic sugar.

Install laravel global

* Use `composer global laravel/installer`

* Enable the `mbs-string` extension

* update `php.ini` config 

* Open `php.ini` with notepad

* Change `;extension=php_mbstring.dll` to `extension=php_mbstring.dll`

Create new project from scratch

Migrate database and seed dummy data

  • Create data model
  • Following is the sample code
<?php

namespace App;
use Illuminate\Database\Eloquent\Model;

class Article extends Model
{
    protected $fillable = ['title', 'content'];

    public function getTitleAttribute($value) {
        return strtoupper($value);
    }
}
  • Use artisan to create the table

php artisan migrate -VVV 

## Use following command to seek dump or initial data
php artisan db:seed

Troubleshooting

Fix the error of Specified key was too long

namespace App\Providers;

use Illuminate\Support\ServiceProvider;
use Illuminate\Support\Facades\Schema;

class AppServiceProvider extends ServiceProvider
{
    /**
     * Bootstrap any application services.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function boot()
    {
        //
        Schema::defaultStringLength(191);
    }

    /**
     * Register any application services.
     *
     * @return void
     */
    public function register()
    {
        //
    }
}

Lavarel MVC Starter project

* Please find the project introduction [here](/projects/lara-mvc-starter/).

Use Laravel Rest Starter project

PrestaShop

PrestaShop is a free, open source e-commerce solution. The software is published under the Open Software License (OSL). It is written in the PHP programming language with support for the MySQL database management system.

Download the zip file from download page

Install Prestashop

There is a instruction page inside the zip file. You can follow the instructions to complete the installation. There is no EasyPHP, Wamp, XAMPP, or any similar AMP (Apache+MySQL+PHP) package installed on my PC, but I have PHP, Apache, MySQL installed. Actually EasyPHP, Wamp are just the bundle of PHP development tools, which include PHP, Apache, MySQL. I don’t want to install too many duplicate softwares and packages on my PC, so I prefer to install Prestashop with what I have on my PC. Which strategy is up to you.

Install Prestashop with AMP package

  • Follow the instruction page within zip file.

Install Prestashop without AMP package

  • Unzip file to path\to\prestashop_workspace. Your folder structure will look like this.
path\to\prestashop_workspace
\---prestashop
    +---admin 
    +---cache 
    +---classes  
    +---config 
    +---controllers 
    +---css
    +---docs
    +---download
    +---img 
    +---install    
    +---js   
    +---localization
    +---log
    +---mails
    +---modules  
    +---override
    +---pdf
    +---themes
    +---tools 
    +---translations
    +---upload
    \---webservice

  • Start your MySQL or check the status of MySQL

    • Use your MySQL client tool to connect to your MySQL server.

  • Launch installer page with php server

  • Start a command prompt

cd /path/to/prestashop_workspace
php -S 0.0.0.0:1234 -t prestashop

  • Open the link http://localhost:1234/install/index.php with browser, then you can start installation process.

  • Choose language and click Next, and then select the checkbox “I agree bah lah bah lah …. ” and click Next

  • If there is an error GD Library is not installed prompt, you just need to enable the library on php.ini

    • DO NOT close your browser.
    • Stop the php server by Ctrl + C in the command prompt.
    • Use notepad to open the file php.ini under the \path\to\php
    • Uncomment the config ;extension=php_gd2.dll => extension=php_gd2.dll
    • Start the php server again

  • Click the Refresh this settings, and click Next

  • Fill the login user and password. If your MySQL port is not 3306, please attach your port to the server address input field. Click Test your database connection.

  • If you got error prestashop database not found, you need to create a database on mysql server.

    • I simply create a new database immediately with one command line
    CREATE DATABASE prestashop CHAR SET utf8 COLLATE 'utf8_unicode_ci';
    • Test the connection again. You will get the green light

  • Click Next and you can start to setup your store informaiton, such as, store name, admin account, etc. Then click Next

  • Setup your sample store. Click Next. Then the installer will help you finish the initialization.

  • After the store setup, you can access the website by clicking Font site, but you can not access back office, as known as admin panel.

  • Don’t panic. It is easy to fix. Stop the php server by clicking Ctrl+C, and delete the folder install under the root, and then start the server again. Open the folder with prestashop, you will find something interesting. The original folder admin under prestashop has been renamed to adminXXXX. X is a number. It is Prestashop special trick to secure your admin folder. Now you need to use this new name as path to acces back office. Your new back office link will be http://localhost:1234/adminXXXX.

  • Open the new link in browser and type in your admin id and password. Now you can start managing your Prestashop site. Enjoy it.

Forgot admin’s password

  • Forgot admin’s password or somehow you have to reset password and you cannot get admin’s password from previous adminstrator. For such case, there is a simple way to update admin’s password from database.

  • Tailor the SQL below. Then you should be able to use new password to login.

UPDATE ps_employee SET passwd = MD5('<_COOKIE_KEY_>password') 
WHERE ps_employee.id_employee = <ID_EMPLOYEE>;

Troubleshooting

InnoDB error

  • Error : InnoDB is not supported by your MySQL server

You got error because Prestashop 1.5 is not working properly with MySQL 5.4 and later.

  • Update files DbPDO.php , MySQL.php and DbMySQLi.php as follow.
    // $sql = 'SHOW VARIABLES WHERE Variable_name = \'have_innodb\'';
    $sql = "SELECT SUPPORT FROM INFORMATION_SCHEMA.ENGINES WHERE ENGINE LIKE 'INNO%'";

    ...
    
    // if (!$row || strtolower($row['Value']) != 'yes')
    if (!$row || strtolower($row['Value']) === 'no')
  • Restart the server and the proble will be fixed.

CORS

  • Enable module header in httpd.conf

  • Add header settings

Header always set Access-Control-Max-Age "1000"

#  "X-Requested-With, Content-Type, Origin, Authorization, Accept, Client-Security-Token, Accept-Encoding"
Header always set Access-Control-Allow-Headers  "USE ABOVE COMMENT AS DEFAULT VALUE"
Header always set Access-Control-Allow-Methods "POST, GET, OPTIONS, DELETE, PUT"

Too big header file

  • Add this to your http {} of the nginx.conf file normally located at /etc/nginx/nginx.conf:

    proxy_buffer_size 128k; proxy_buffers 4 256k; proxy_busy_buffers_size 256k;

  • Then add this to your php location block, this will be located in your vhost file look for the block that begins with location ~ .php$ {

    fastcgi_buffer_size 128k; fastcgi_buffers 4 256k; fastcgi_busy_buffers_size 256k;