PHP Programming with PEAR

XML, Data, Dates, Web Services, and Web APIs

About This Book

• Maximize your productivity through the use of proven, powerful, reusable PHP components
• In-depth coverage of a range of important PEAR packages
• Many code examples provide a clear and practical guidance

Who This Book Is For

This book is for PHP developers who want to maximize their productivity through the use of proven, high-quality, reusable PEAR components. Some experience of working with PEAR classes will prove helpful, and developers who've used PEAR before can find something new to delight them.

What You Will Learn

Chapter 1 shows you how to access databases with the MDB2 package. You will learn:

Connecting to the database, and instantiate objects

Executing queries and fetching data

MDB2 SQL abstraction; sequences, replace queries, sub-select support, prepared statements

Using MDB2 modules

Extending MDB2 to provide custom fetch and result classes, iterators, and modules

Chapter 2 explains how to use PEAR packages to display data . It teaches you:

Creating powerful tables of data easily with the HTML_Table package

Advanced table formatting with HTML_Table_Matrix

Creating Excel spreadsheets dynamically with Spreadsheet_Excel_Writer

Adding formatting to these spreadsheets including colors, patterns, formulae and number formatting

Creating flexible, sortable grids of data with Structures_DataGrid

Adding columns to the grid, control paging, select data sources, and renderers

Using File_PDF to create PDF documents on the fly

Chapter 3 covers the usage of PEAR packages to work with XML and stresses on:

Creating XML documents with XML_Util, XML_Fastcreate

Transforming PHP objects to XML format with XML_Serializer

Creating Mozilla applications with XML_XUL

Parsing XML with XML_Parser

Processing XML documents to PHP objects with XML_Unserializer

Parsing RSS with XML_RSS

Chapter 4 is an extensive tutorial on working with web services and Web API's using PEAR packages. We cover the following topics:

Consuming web services

Consuming XML-RPC-based web services

Accessing the Google API

Searching blog entries with Services_Technorati

Accessing the Amazon web service

Accessing the Yahoo API

Offering XML-RPC-based web services

Offering SOAP-based web services

Offering REST-based services using XML_Serializer

Chapter 5 covers PEAR's date and time functions using the PEAR::Calendar and PEAR::Date packages such as:

Creating, manipulating, and comparing Date objects

Data_Span arithmetic

Handling timezones with Date_Timezone

Keeping track of public holidays with Date_Holiday

Using the Calendar class to display an HTML calendar

In Detail

PEAR is the PHP Extension and Application Repository, and is a framework and distribution system for reusable, high-quality PHP components, available in the form of "packages".

In this book, you will learn how to use a number of the most powerful PEAR packages available to boost your PHP development productivity. By focusing on these packages for key development activities, this book is an in-depth guide to getting the most from these powerful coding resources.

Style and approach

Packed with code examples, every topic is explained in a clear, practical way.