Looking for a quick and relatively painless way to set up Apache, MySQL, and PHP (as well as additional mods like Perl) on your windows XP box? If you’re stuck running Windows XP Home, resentful that only XP Pro offers Internet Information Server, or IIS, then XAMPP may be just what you’re looking for. XAMPP offers a nice solution that will have you running a webserver/database combo capable of serving up dynamic PHP content in just a few minutes. (more…)
Google logo transformed into Pac-Man game
There are tons of add-ons (aka plugins or extensions) for the Firefox browser which are easy to install and provide economical (i.e., free) tools to help you with your everyday development tasks. In this article I’ll introduce you to the two add-ons I use most regularly – Web Developer and Firebug. I use only a fraction of their capabilities, but this should give you a sense of their power, and whether these add-ons are right for you. (more…)
There was a time not so long ago that I considered keyboard shortcuts, or hotkeys, to be the sole domain of I.T. folks – used only by the System Administrators of this world. With increased exposure to these nifty time-savers, I’ve grown quite fond of hotkeys, and they really do come in handy. When you’re using software which requires heavy typing (programming, documentation, authoring, etc.), grabbing for that mouse just to click a menu item becomes bothersome. There are three types of shortcut combinations I commonly use, Ctrl+ (control), Alt+ (alternate) and Win+ (Windows) shortcuts. Sorry Mac users, I’m currently using Windows exclusively, so some topics may be specific to the Windows environment. (more…)