Great Example of passion about programming

Who is a great example of a very passionate software engineer?

I’m sure a lot of you already know what this Dutch legend is famous for.

In case you don’t - he is the creator of Python.

He now works at Dropbox. He started working there under the condition that he would work simply as a software engineer, not a lead or even a manager.

In his own words:

“I think it was because I enjoy doing actual engineering work, and I don’t enjoy as much the formal aspect of management. In the past, I was thrown into such a role for a small team, and it never really worked out. I never really felt comfortable in that type of role. I was always much more comfortable just writing code. Over time, that has included technical leadership, but I like to be part of the work and not just tell people what to do or how to do it.”

Reference: a Quora Answer 

Few must link visits to prove that humanity still exists

1) Link 1

Useful links for Software Developers/Database Administrators

Following are some must read tutorials for software developers.

SQL Server:

1) Top 50 SQL Blogs & Websites for Microsoft SQL Server Administrators2) What is the difference between Clustered and Non-Clustered Indexes in SQL Server?

More links will be added soon...

PHP: array_key_exists() vs isset()

Hello All,

We are talking about an issue which comes to PHP developers almost every day.

Say, we have an array:

$students = [

111 => ['id' => 111, 'name' = 'Philip'],

112 => ['id' => 112, 'name' = 'James'],

113 => ['id' => 113, 'name' = 'Stephen'],

....

];

Say this array has 100000 (one lack) rows.

And we are asked to loop over them and display names or other information.

What we will do it, we will loop over the array and print the records.

Fine up to here.

Second situation:

We need to check whether id 9989 is present in array.

How will you find it?

Way 1:

Through array_key_exists()

$studentId = 9899;

if (array_key_exists($studentId, $students)) {

 // Code here

}

Way 2:

Set each student's array's key to its id like: 

111 => ['id' => 111, 'name' = 'Philip'],

Now find it with isset()

$studentId = 9899;

if (isset($students[$studentId])) {

 // Code here

}

Way 2 is much faster than way 1 as it is using in built language construct.

And through Way 1, we are traversing through whole array, where as through Way 2, we are just checking if an index is set.

PHP Tips and Tricks

Use short cut operators for adding/subtracting values from variables.
1) += operator.
Consider following:

$a = 10;
$a = $a + 3;
// $a is 13 now.

We can replace the second statement by:

$a += 3; // Add 3 to $a

2) -= operator.
Consider following:

$a = 10;
$a = $a - 3;
// $a is 7 now.

We can replace the second statement by:

$a -= 3; // Subtract 3 to $a

3) Say if you are assigning a variable to some value if some condition is met. Also, the if condition has another variable set.

Just look at the following example:

if ($condition == TRUE) {
  $a = 7;
  $b = 9;
}
else {
  $a = 11;
}

We can skip the else structure like following:

$a = 11;
if ($condition == TRUE) {
  $a = 7;
  $b = 9;
}

In above code, we have reduced 2 lines of code.

Ternary Operator in PHP

Ternary operator is a shrtcut operator for if else statement.

Syntax:

$var = (condition) ? if yes, value : if no, value;

For example:
If you have an if else statement like this:

if ($b>5) {
 $a = 3;
}
else {
 $a = 5;
}

The same thing can be wrote with ternary operator in a single line like:

$a = ($b>5) ? 3 : 5;

Thus, we have seen how much lines of codes is reduced.

How to change Apache port in Windows

This problem may occur due to apache not getting required port (default is 80).
The port may be being used by other services.
For example: Skype also has default port 80.
Installing Skype and Apache both on same machine will cause conflict and hence Apache will not start.
Either, you change Skype port or change Apache port as described in following steps:
Change the ports of Apache and it will work for you. Go to httpd.conf
How to change port for Apache:
Search for:

ServerName localhost:80

Change it to:

ServerName localhost:81

Also Search For:

Listen 80

Change it to:

Listen 81

If you have created any virtual hosts, change the ports there also. Then restart your apache.

Reference: https://stackoverflow.com/a/18306621/1841760