DevShed has posted the fifth part of their "handling files in PHP" tutorial series today (excerpted from the book "Beginning PHP and PostgreSQL 8: From Novice to Professional") with a focus on read from multiple places in a file to get to different data.

In this fifth part of an eight-part series on working with file and operating systems with PHP, you'll learn how to read data from a file and move the file pointer.

Example code is included showing how to use the file, file_get_contents, fgetc, fgetcsv, readfile and fscanf (among several others). Also included is code showing how to use the fseek method to move around in a file.

Recently the PHP project announced a move to git as the primary version control system for the language's development. In a new post to SitePoint's PHPMaster.com site, Davey Shafik explains what that means to the average developer and what you can expect of the future.

Just over two years since its move from the antiquated CVS to Subversion (SVN), PHP is once again on the move: this time, to Git. Well, eventually. The migration from CVS to SVN was a huge one and took many months. The need for the PHP project to support its user base, hook scripts (commit mailing list, etc.) means that any change of revision control software means quite a large commitment. This is why even though the voting is over, and the dust has settled, we won't be seeing PHP on Git until the end of this year.

Davey shares his vote - pro-git - and explains what his choice (and many others') means for the language, including a modified patch acceptance policy and a convenience for developers to be able to work anywhere.

All in all, I feel migrating from Subversion to Git can only be a good thing for the PHP project and the community as a whole. [...] it is pretty clear that the PHP development community is in favor of the decision.

A little while back, the PHP development group posted a survey of developers asking them which version control system they'd like to see the PHP project use. By an overwhelming margin, git has won and things are already in motion to move parts of the project away from subversion.

In his mailing list post, David Soria Parra explains:

After 2 weeks of voting and discussion, I closed the votes today. The results are fairly straightforward. Most of the users want to move to a decentralized version control system. [...] I don't want to make a difference of who voted for what. I think the results are overwhelming in favor of Git.

He'll be working on the spec to make the move for the PHP source over to git and is planning a cut over some time in December. Stay tuned to the php.internals mailing list for more details about the move as they come up.

As Derick Rethans notes in his latest post, the Xdebug project is now on github and can be found under his account.

I've just opened my Xdebug repository on github. Importing my old SVN repository was a bit of a task. With the help of Ole Marius Smestad I managed to cook up a bash script to import and fix-up the repository. In the meanwhile I've learned more about git than I ever wanted to know, but still not enough.

Besides the source for Xdebug itself, you'll also notice repositories for the Xdebug website, the GtkDBGp client and the DBGp protocol definition.

Setting up and using the Magento e-commerce application can be a difficult process in itself, but when you start moving things around from server to server, things can get even more complex. In this new post from the Godaddyhostingreview blog they talk about moving a Magento instance from your local install out to a live site.

This is the method I used to move my local copy of magento store from WAMP on windows to a shared hosting account. In my case am using magento1.3.x.

The instructions are detailed right down to which configuration values to change, how to update your database for the move, what will need to be removed before you and push everything over. There's even a bit of instruction on what to change if your database structure is slightly different.

Just a quick note today from the CodeIgniter project - if you've been using their Subversion server to pull your latest copies of the framework down, they've made a change.

Our Subversion repositories have moved. Please update your repositories or check out new ones from the new location: http://svn.ellislab.com/CodeIgniter/trunk

The normal downloads (and archive files) are still available on the CodeIgniter download page.

On Till's blog today, there's a checklist of sorts to help make moving a Magento-based online store over to another server.

Frequently, you do client work and if you are fortunate enough, you can setup a development environment on your own server or your laptop (or whatever), tinker with the files, and templates, and so on '" until it's all done. And whenever you are done, it's time to move files. Sounds easy? It sort of is!

His small checklist only contains three main steps - change the configuration file if need be, check the permissions on certain directories to make sure they can be accessed/written to by the web server, and updating the base URLs for the new domain name/location.

After having moved servers just recently, Manuel Lemos has a few helpful hints for anyone out there considering a web site/web server move in the near future:

Despite the benefits of migrating to a better server, the actual migration is a complicated process that can fail in so many ways that I thought it would be a good idea to share what you need to be concerned if you need to migrate your servers too. You need to go through several steps that need to be done in the right order to prevent major headaches.

Here's his ten steps/recommendations of things to keep an eye on during the move:

• Prepare your DNS
• Setup the new server
• Tune the server file system for performance and integrity
• Install the base applications
• Initial data migration
• Put the old server in migration mode
• Bring your new server to life
• Double check your server security
• Epilogue (the final miscellaneous startup/setup items)
• The forgotten step that you remembered

If you've a blogger and you've been thinking about moving platforms (say from MovableType to WordPress) you mightwant to check out this new blog post from Maggie Nelson about her experience switching between the two.

It's been a while [since I last tried WordPress] and things seem to have improved - some within WordPress itself, but others due to the help of the community which has provided tons of plugins that can help WordPress get around some of its problems. The move from MovableType to WordPress was easy. WordPress has import functionality that plays very nicely with MovableType's exported files. Yay!

Her only problem was making sure that references to the site weren't broken. She made the move away from her old domain to a new one (maggienelson.com) and needed to set up some redirects to bridge the gap. The mod_rewrite module of Apache made things relatively simple. All of her rules (including the ones in the path she took to get to the file result) are included in the post.

The PHPWomen have posted some updates about them and their organization, including their new incorporation status.

Updates include:

• A server move for the site (temporary until a more permanent home is set up)
• They are now a not-for-profit incorporation organization in the state of Florida (including a try at becoming a tax-exempt entity)
• The voting process for the elePHPant World Tour contest has started.

You can find out more about the group on their website including their mentoring programs, a history of the group and their mission.