Easy Application Configuration With patConfiguration (
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Tired of handcrafting configuration file manipulation tools for your Web application?
Save yourself some time with patConfiguration, a PHP class designed to assist
developers with reading, writing and maintaining application configuration files.The nice thing about the open-source community is that no matter how arcane your
requirement, there's usually someone out there who's got a tool to help you meet
it. It might not be the best tool in the world, it might be a little rough around
the edges, it might not even look very pretty, but it'll usually get the job done.
And you won't pay a cent for it.
Take, for example, the task of manipulating application configuration data. You
know what I mean - asking the user for configuration values at install time, saving
this data to a file, and using it when required at run time. It's a pretty simple
exercise, and one that's fairly standard across every application - and, like
me, you've probably done it a few hundred times over the last couple years without
even thinking about it.
Unlike me, though, you probably had the good sense to create a library of reusable
functions to help you accomplish this task quickly, and with minimal effort. If
you did, you probably don't need to read any further; you can log off and catch
some zzzzs instead, since you're obviously a Real Programmer, and everyone knows
that Real Programmers need their beauty sleep...
If, on the other hand, you still handcraft the code to manage your configuration
data every time you build an application, you're definitely going to want to read
this article - it's your first step on the road to Real Programmer-hood. Flip
the page, and let me tell you all about patConfiguration.
