online aspect
a blog about building stuff on the webHow to use variable variables in PHP
by Josh Fraser on May 31, 2009
One of the biggest time-savers in PHP is the ability to use variable variables. While often intimidating for newcomers to PHP, variable variables are extremely powerful once you get the hang of them.
Variable variables are just variables whose names ...
How to use curl_multi() without blocking
by Josh Fraser on January 26, 2009
Update 9/30/09: This project has been moved to Google Code.
Please visit http://code.google.com/p/rolling-curl/ for the latest version.
A more efficient implementation of curl_multi()
curl_multi is a great way to process multiple HTTP requests in ...
How to start MAMP on port 80 without a password
by Josh Fraser on December 2, 2008
I'm a big fan of MAMP. It's the fastest way for anyone to get set up with a local PHP/MySQL development environment on a mac. One of the small annoyances with MAMP is that it requires you to enter your password all the time if you want to run it on ...
How to make OpenDNS shortcuts work in Safari
by Josh Fraser on January 30, 2008
As I've written here before, I am a huge fan of OpenDNS shortcuts. I've always hated switching over to Safari for the simple reason that my shortcuts didn't work. You might laugh, but it's hard to go back to typing full urls once you've gotten used ...
Tutorial: Sending email through Gmail
by Josh Fraser on November 8, 2007
An introduction to using Gmail as your Email Service Provider
There are many reasons to consider outsourcing your email. Getting an email into someone's inbox is not a simple matter these days. There are a million things you need to know to make sure ...
Auto detect a time zone with JavaScript
by Josh Fraser on June 8, 2007
This blog post will attempt to explain how to automatically detect your user's time zone using JavaScript. If you're in a hurry, you can skip directly to the demo or just grab the files
index.html
detect_timezone.js
Previous attempts to solve ...
How to build great forms
by Josh Fraser on May 18, 2007
Aristotle said, "We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit". What many people don't realize is that excellence isn't achieved at the macro level. You don't reach excellence by making one great decision. Instead, you ...
