This is the what I was doing and the resulting error (note I’m using the default bash shell):

$ hg clone ssh://example@192.168.1.100/Sites/example-project
remote: bash: hg: command not found
abort: no suitable response from remote hg!

So, first of all find out where your hg command is located by running the following command while logged into the remote box:

$ which hg
/usr/local/bin/hg

That gives us the path to the hg command so now we need to see what paths are available when logging into that remote box via SSH. To do so run the following command from the machine you are trying to access the remote box from (my MacBook in this case):

$ ssh example@192.168.1.100 echo $PATH
/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin

We can see that the “/usr/local/bin/” path to hg is not in there so moving back to the remote box create and/or open ~/.bashrc and add the following line:

export PATH="$PATH:/usr/local/bin"

Now back to my MacBook and run the previous command again:

$ ssh example@192.168.1.100 echo $PATH
/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/bin

Great! Now we can see that “/usr/local/bin” is available and our original hg command now runs.

That said, I do quite like the characters on the Manning books even if the accompanying font choice seems a little dated. I imagine that having to choose book covers for tech books must be a painful experience if you don’t have something like the O’Reilly single-tone prints or these Manning characters. This old post on Manning’s forum really made me laugh though:

“As a frequent purchaser of computer books however, I feel that I would be remiss if I did not tell you how thoroughly the cover of the book sucks. It’s major league weirdo shit – and I mean that in the most constructively critical way possible.

Luckily, he wasn’t specifically talking about our cover which could be seen as representing the grace that Zend Framework brings to PHP, that, or it was the best one of the three they showed us. I do like the brown though!

So if you’re really missing what I have to say or need to tell me what you have to say, you can catch me in any of those places. Once the book comes out I’m sure I’ll have more time for this blog.

“Zend Framework already has a set of conventions. In my opinion it’s a good thing to improve these conventions even further and make them apply not only for Zend Framework, but for PHP as a whole.”

I suspect that Zend Framework will introduce an interesting dilemma for Zend and PHP where by improving more users experience and understanding of so called advanced programming concepts like OOP, design patterns, etc, they will also increase their expectations of the underlying language.

What onus that puts on the development of PHP itself is really the question. It may be a positive one, with PHP developers and those from other frameworks/languages able to move between their framework and Zend Framework more comfortably. The negative may be that Zend Framework is working on a layer above PHP to the extent that it begins to feel like a language within a language (something that Lukas Smith has been referring to in his Kiss my … post) and the nagging question then creeps in as to how much we are duplicating the functionality of a web development focussed language in a web development focussed framework? I’ve already started kicking myself for getting a bit carried away and unnecessarily using Zend Framework components when the same can be achieved with PHP.

An even bigger question that I’m dealing with right now is what to train new programmers in? The argument is almost endless, but the answer is rarely PHP for any other reason than ease of entry. If developers are going to be working at the higher level that Zend Framework has moved development to, then the question is why start new programmers with a programming language that is rarely recommended as being at that level?

Zend Framework is actually a good way to get someone into PHP and also make sure they keep away from so many of the bad habits that have plagued PHP development. But that is partly a case of keeping them away from PHP itself. Wouldn’t they then be better learning a language that is often used to teach programming, like Python, and once they’ve developed good habits introduce them to a framework for development? In other words I would prefer to have someone learn PHP via Zend Framework whereas with Python I’d be content to have someone learn Python and then a framework.

The question I know that only time will answer is what the cross-pollination will be between Zend Framework and PHP. Targetting that at the core developers I’m interested to know what future plans there are for removing and/or adapting Zend Framework features that become native to PHP itself and/or become more widely hosted such as 5.3′s namespaces against Zend Framework’s pseudo-namespaces.

Of course I’m not naive enough to think that Zend hasn’t thought about any of this, but then I’m not looking at it from that high up. From my perspective the disciplines that Zend Framework introduce actually open possibilities that are as lateral as they are upwardly PHP. Once you climb the Zend Framework mountain you begin to see it has neighbouring mountains that it has a lot in common with and that’s actually a good thing.

The story is that the book that we are co-authoring on the Zend Framework has now been released through Manning’s early access program. This means you can read it as we’re writing it, basically.

It’s certainly hard work, in particular trying to find the time alongside the “day job”, but nonetheless rewarding and I do have to say thanks to Rob for asking me to be part of the process. When he originally asked I was quite taken aback in a “why me?!” way.

Anyway, I’ll chat more about it now that it’s more official and if you’re interested please feel free to let us know any thoughts/comments/ideas through either of our blogs or the author’s forum. The point of this early access program is to get as much feedback as possible and therefore improve the quality of the final publication.

It will likely be preaching to the converted for many of you but having had the odd “why use Zend Framework” discussion I felt it would be good to write it down in some form. Feel free to brutalise it as you see fit!

We’ve been working with Tim and Wandy, the owners of Planula Bed and Breakfast/Divers Retreat, for over three years now on their site underwater.com.au and for almost the same amount of time have been saying that we need to update the Planula site.

Well of course we’re happy to say it’s now done and was released a few days ago.

Having successfully maintained their own website for years, Tim and Wandy were, and still are, understandably hesitant about moving from a static HTML site they knew, to a new database-driven solution. I’d like to run through a few of the reasons we encouraged (bullied?) them into using WordPress.

I’ve mentioned some general reasons to use a solution like WordPress in a previous post. Here are a few more specific ones which, while referring to Planula, are equally relevant to many sites.

Speed and relative simplicity of publishing.

They were already doing a lot of copying and pasting to add new content which works fine for consistent content but is a more work if, for example, new pages need to be added.

Consistency.

It’s very easy on a static html site for small inconsistencies to build up over time and become harder to change, e.g. with navigational elements. Altering the left navigation in the new site is now as simple as adding new pages and/or shuffling current ones in admin.

Syndicated content

Their latest content can now be consumed by anyone who subscribes to it via the automatically generated newsfeeds. This is an effortless form of marketing and can be used in a variety of ways such as their “Latest News” on the Planula listing page on underwater.com.au.

More freedom to change their minds

There are always sections in websites that aren’t immediately clear and need time and use to get a better idea on how they should be approached. This is much easier if things can be moved around quickly to respond to changing needs or circumstances.

But what if…

It would be naive to pretend that this solution is the be-all, end-all and I’ve already mentioned Tim and Wandy having some hesitation. Their primary concern was how much they would be tied to this solution and what if they needed to change to another or back to a static HTML site?

Thankfully this is also a common concern for developers and therefore there are several solutions or “exit strategies”:

Changing to another system

Methods exist to import WordPress data into other solutions, such as Textpattern and Drupal. As a sidenote; It’s quite notable just how many more there seem to be for [importing into WordPress](http://codex.wordpress.org/Importing_Content “Importing content into WordPress).

Converting back to static HTML

It would be possible to do this via WordPress itself but there already exist other solutions like Blue Crab which “is a program that you use to copy the contents of a website to your computer, in whole or in part”. This is a Mac desktop application but of course Windows equivalents exist

Some other things

Another point worth mentioning; the site has now moved from a tables-based layout to one based on CSS stylesheets which on the whole (apart from the markup introduced by a few plugins) means somewhat smaller pages sizes and more content dense HTML. The separation of the page styling also means future changes to the look of the site can be introduced across the whole site much more quickly.

Final words

We’re waiting to see how these changes affect the visits and search engine behaviour of what is already a popular website. Of course we’re hoping they improve even more.

So go visit the site and even better visit Byron Bay and stay at Planula!

I’m really interested to see it get a bit of a kicking from those who really know their design patterns, so if you’re one of those people please let me know of anything I should or should not do in the comments here or at DevZone.