The PHP Podcast 2025.11.06
This week on the PHP Podcast, Eric and John talk about PHPTek 2026, JSTek 2026, the new PHP 8.5 Release Page, the PHP Foundation Blog is getting good, the Year 2038 problem, Craft moves to Laravel, getting interviewed by an AI, and more…
Links from the show:
- I just had a job interview… with an AI bot named Ezra.
- JS TEK 2026 – The Inaugural JavaScript Conference
- PHP Tek 2026 – The Premier PHP Conference
- Design Contest Results and Lessons Learned — The PHP Foundation — Supporting, Advancing, and Developing the PHP Language
- News — The PHP Foundation — Supporting, Advancing, and Developing the PHP Language
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Year_2038_problem
- Craft’s Going Laravel | Craft CMS
- Sign Up | LinkedIn
The PHP Podcast streams the recording of this podcast live, typically every Thursday at 3 PM PT. Come join us and subscribe to our YouTube channel.
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Host:
Eric Van Johnson
- X: @shocm
- Mastodon: @eric@phparch.social
- Bluesky: @ericvanjohnson.bsky.social
John Congdon
- X: @johncongdon
- Mastodon: @john@phparch.social
- Bluesky: @johncongdon.bsky.social
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Transcript
PHP Podcast – Latest Episode
Show: The Official PHP Architect Podcast
Show Summary
In this episode of the PHP Podcast, the hosts discuss recent updates in the PHP world, highlight exciting community projects, and share insights into modern development workflows. They explore frameworks, coding best practices, and upcoming events shaping the PHP ecosystem.
Transcript
[00:08] Join us to listen to the latest news and Tech talk from our conferences the magazine and wider PHP community, hey there I’m Eric and you are listening to the official podcast of PHP architect with me is my friend in business partner John conton we have to change that font back it’s not Halloween anymore, I got it this is episode 202511.06 and this podcast focuses on all things PHP and web development we also touch on the larger PHP community and the General Life of being a developer, and of course we’re going to talk about our company phb architect the magazine the development the books. The conferences because John’s a jerk don’t get the swag we record every Thursday at 3 pm Pacific time. And our podcast is made a little better thinks to our partners over at PHP score every project carries technical debt and too much concussion company dearly start monitoring your Tech debt today for free at php.com.
[01:19] More on PSP score a little later if you have not had the pleasure to join us live yet. On our YouTube channel at youtube.com PHP Arch sorry I guess I somebody hitting me up in slack about something serious so I had to answer that you should do so because you part of that live show if you jump into our Discord at Discord PHP arch.com and participate in the show if you’re watching just did dude I haven’t seen you in forever, I was supposed to say I haven’t talked to that guy in a minute man Cascadia was I think the last time we we saw you, yeah so uh pop on over to our Discord Channel not only are they there for the show but they’re all weak great conversations happening there some fantastic people drop in like Dave and other people from around the community so it’s a good place to hang out good peeps and with that let’s get on with the show. Distracted I am well I am distracted I’m sorry I’m back I’m here that’s okay people people asking me questions I got to answer them,
[02:35] I’m thinking about changing man you know either I’m going to go back to the Bose headsets. Because I never had the same problem I’m having with the airpods. Like when I was it was brought up again in a meeting today that, my mic starts giving out and people have pointed out you know Bluetooth is like the best for that and I I have actually been dealing with. Having the same issue on my end with everybody else talking. Like it starts gardening and I I even thought it might have been the older airpods and upgraded myself and I’m still having that issue you’re not you’re not using the mic on your airpods are you. Well not for the show but I was using it for meetings because I didn’t feel like pulling down this big mic and people get intimidated with this mic comes down man I think I have this mic out all the time yeah I don’t like the sound of the. Any other the other mics so oh I totally agree with you there this is a this is a great.
[03:41] Much better sound but I don’t listen to myself talk so I don’t care you know I don’t care about more people have to talk to exactly but yeah it’s yeah it’s just yeah yeah I I I’m fine doing it. But like I said I still have the problem on my end, I had it again today and then I start panicking like is my internet giving out like am I about to lose connection again and it hardly ever is so I’ve been having that issue with my airpods on my TV and my bedroom. Like I just put a new TV in because my wife finally agreed to put 1 out in our living room here. And I’m like well I’m going to upgrade the TV in our bedroom and then I will move that 1 out here and the 1 in what I’ve been doing is. Using the Roku app on my phone and connecting my headset through that and then I can listen without bothering my wife the new TV has it built in. But I’ve been getting that same garbled like all of a sudden it’s like cutting out and I’m like what is going on.
[04:44] Doesn’t make sense yeah it seemed like Bluetooth is getting worse and I don’t know why so and that’s like. You know we we’ve had this conversation all right I mean this is not a new conversation but the deeper you dive into the apple apple ecosphere, in theory you know the more convenient your life gets and I have had an issue speaking of sound where I didn’t have external speakers on my laptop anymore, I haven’t had them for a while I got tired of plugging them in and out and all this so I I just I had bitched them but I can’t stand, listening to music I don’t wear my. Earpods all day how do you not I got mine in all day house you know I have a fairly quiet life so but I can’t stand the sound from my laptop and and the speakers aren’t terrible I just don’t like it and it’s not positioned correctly and all that so I decided to splurge and I got myself 1 of the homepods the Apple homepods now I have every other
[06:00] device here I have the Google 1 I have the Amazon 1 I’m not going to say their names because they get all antsy you want to talk to me but. So I could have used any of them as like a Bluetooth speaker but I’m like let me go ahead and get this home pod and you know I’m going to use that as my external speaker and when it works it works really well but it doesn’t. I learned I didn’t know this it actually doesn’t work over Bluetooth it works over the Apple proprietary what’s it called. The uh I didn’t know that apple proprietary AirPlay thing that they that they they have and it actually works over Wi-Fi so they have to kind of be on the same network and all these like conditions. But like I said when it works I got this small 1 and it sounds great I it’s right here in front of me it’s perfect and I like it. But I’ve discovered that like when I jump in meetings I put my airpods in or or you know if something else happens and I’m jumping on my phone.
[07:06] The homepod will lose cancel and let me touch you I’m sorry I touched you she’s very sensitive. The homepod will stop working but it will think it’s connected to the laptop, and so when I tell to connect it won’t it it says hey I’m already connected I’m like yeah but you’re not putting those sound through the you’re still, laptop like do the sound of the other thing I I have that issue with my airpods too like if I pick my phone up for 1 second and I happen to have a video or something playing. My airpods switched to the phone but getting it back to my computer doesn’t seem to kick over right away yeah I feel like I have to do a couple extra steps. It’s not as convenient as you think it would be. Yeah right right I mean I think it does do a fairly good job at jumping from my laptop to my phone well I need to take a call but like you said it doesn’t go into the phone it works great jump back yeah it’s like the phone is this priority and then everything else is just kind of an afterthought so.
[08:14] But yeah AirPlay is the name I don’t know if I said that okay yeah. But yeah so I don’t know man all sorts of issues going on all right I gotta tease something. I read let’s do it I I’ve read as long as it’s not another conference I read most of Eric man’s article for next month for December not the we’re still working on the November issue right now. The article coming out December oh my God you yeah it’s crazy it’s crazy scary. Like it should have been it should have been a uh Halloween issue or yeah article yeah it’s that scary okay if you’re not subscribed subscribe now I’ll throw a subscribe what is wrong with you seriously I need to know what is wrong with you what do we have to do to get you to subscribe $1.99 a month, podcast 3 is your promo code. We’re still doing that huh we’re going to do that cool here I’m going to do I’m going to do it this way cool put it down there for now hey look see look at you is it the right code I don’t know.
[09:27] Webcast 3-3 cool -3 because I screwed up the podcast 31 so don’t try that this podcast -3 you’ll either get it for a penny for the next 60 years oh you’ll have to pay thousand dollars it’s your call all right so let’s talk scary for a second we’re gonna get into our our week in development a little quickly here and I’m going to hog it because an issue has arisen on a project we’re working on that. Like has me terrified oh really so yeah and I don’t think we talk about it enough and I need somebody in our community in Discord or whatever to explain to me why did weaton shouldn’t be all be losing our shit right now and be terrified at what’s coming down the road but. What are the the the big client we work on where we’ve been working on this mobile app it creates unique documents and it gives the document a very important, number in the number is just the timestamp down to the I forget what millisecond but it’s a very long so in theory like,
[10:48] it’s never going to repeat itself right this this has been in place for a very long time way before uuids and snowflakes and all those other things so that’s what we we’ve been using, and we’ve had to make some concessions for a particular clients because some clients have limitations based on their local government. Politics where they can’t have numbers so long and this so we’ve done all this weird stuff right. And in rewriting this application this is the 1 that we’ve been working on for way too long and we’re trying to like get it out in the world and you know it’s just we’re there like they’re they’re beta testing and there’s a lot of back and forth on it not not my issue. But the issue came up where they’re like hey we still have this problem because this ID. We never shortened it back down like we we have the long 17 character id. And some clients need like 4 or 5 characters or 7 characters whatever some of these some needs there’s prefixed you know there’s all these conditions.
[12:00] I’m like oh I’m like shoot like why do we why didn’t we I thought we talked about this and it was the previous developer so the current developer Brooks. We hadn’t really gotten into a deep dive about it before right, and it came up it came up like okay why isn’t this fixed and the owner of the company happened to be on the call he’s like I’ll fix the problem you explained to me why it’s not fixed and I’ll fix it I’m like okay I’m like I’m pretty sure if it was, easily fix I I would have had it fixed by now but sure we’ll we’ll do that but I couldn’t recall exactly what the issues were so I told their staff hey the customers you have that have these restrictions on this number. Go get them and find out what those are and then I’ll we’ll look at our codebase and see why we’re doing this differently than we did, previously, and in doing that the issue had resurfaced so what it was and I’m being long-winded but what it was is the developer who’s working on it previous to the current developer had,
[13:13] meet a very good observation he’s like hey this number is placed on timestamp. That number is going to run out like we’re running out of that number space I’m like oh yeah the year. 20 38 issue was it 38 38 yeah yeah I actually have it up here the 2038 Pro which is, Y2K V2 on steroids like this is absolutely terrifying that the the the the the the space for the time stamp, is expired like on on what was it January something January 19th 2038 it’s going to run out of space. And nobody seems to be panicked about this because it’s still 13 years away dude. That’s not that far away now for me I I’m hoping to be done working at that time but I’m still going to be living in this world that’s completely shutting down because systems can’t use timestamps anymore. I just man it’s like this is absolutely terrifying I mean I feel like it’s different than white okay like I feel like Y2K was an overreaction to a small issue that both systems had fixed and yeah they were outliers that needed to be addressed and it was a it was a good,
[14:37] practice run for 2038 the problem is is we have as far as I know no solution for this and nobody seems to care enough about it to be working on it please somebody tell me why I should not be terrified right now because I am. Because by then we’re going to have a different database or my skill is going to introduce a new. Structure it’ll be 64-bit and you’ll be fine that’s it right that’s all we need is 64. But I don’t know man it’s not that far off. We think it’s far off and that’s what we thought about Y2K is like a year 2000 who’s going to be alive for that. And then we were people freaked out well the the world was supposed to end in 2000 so. Yeah we we don’t worry about it so yeah I told everybody I’m like everything I have like crypto cash on hand everything I’m just like. December of 2037 and trading it all in for gold bars and then seeing what happens and then we’ll isn’t that whatever systems are still a lot of people didn’t want 2K too they’re like.
[15:55] Of the thing I remember bicycles everybody was everybody was uh buying bicycles because apparently all the cars were going to shut down I’m like what are you talk that this was before electric cars it’s like, their engines like they’re not go engines are going to just stop working you know and they’re like no the gas stations and this and that whatever we’ll we’ll fix that I can’t figure out how to get spacing in this thing it’s driving me crazy. Sorry you’re just not paying attention to my anxiety John I’m trying to cause a panic you’re doing a good job of it not really it’s 12 years away don’t worry about it we’re not going to be working, I hope just kidding or will be this old people they call back in because you know, nobody knows how the old systems work anymore we’re gonna be we’re gonna be the COBOL developer in the 2038. Holy smokes so yeah that’s that’s my thing besides that I mean.
[16:57] Only thing I’ve been working on the the little coding I have been doing is been to the new conference website which is what new conference. What new conference Js tech.io Js Tech I put that into Discord and somebody has said you’re joking right. We were that’s kind of what I said when he said I’m like yeah right whatever could you see me doing a JavaScript conference come on. Sounds like no just hear me out. It’s a good idea I think I think it’s a valid idea because like here’s the sneaky part of it because the more I thought about it the more I thought yeah yeah this could work. And it occurred to me I I jumped on the call so the the organizers emerge PHP which I am actually 1 of them although I have a hard time participating because the the conference are there talks are typically right after this 1 but that’s. Probably changing in the near future but anyways I jumped on the organization called because I do like to you know help out where I can,
[18:06] I came to the realization I’m like this is actually a fantastic idea because so many people in the community like. Yeah how do I want to word this like people who care about the community like 1 of the big things that that are on our mind is how do we bring new developers in like, it’s very easy for developers to get lowered away from PHP and we’ve identified what some of those are like all these boot camps that, promise you jobs they’re all JavaScript boot camps and you know colleges either either doing python or JavaScript very few of them you know, allow PHP or or have any course for PHP so we understand right it’s like these young developers are are being exposed to this stuff, you know if this language you learn and you’re getting stuff done with it why learn another language right problem is they can get more done with BHB so the idea here at least my idea I haven’t run this by John but the idea here is we’re having PHP Tech and JS Tech,
[19:12] same place same time matter of fact if you buy a ticket to 1, there’s nothing stopping you from going to talk so I was going to put up a wall between them like no no no Crossing streams you’re stuck so so the thing I’m thinking here is lunchtime. Yeah we’re not we’re definitely not going to have as many JS people as we have PHP people there so GS young developers are gonna come out they’re gonna be scared they’re gonna be timid. And then they’re going to learn about the PHP Community they’re going to learn the word of PSP John, and they’re going to embrace we’re going to espouse it we’re going to preach the word so yeah I’m hoping I’m hoping to to convert a few JavaScript developers and you know I have some ideas like. If I keep looking so we’re doing our call for paper reviews which is. So much fun look forward to this every year we get how bad it is every year hurts so much and then I feel so bad for the people that are helping us out I mean.
[20:19] I’m trying to make it worth it with a cash incentive to PHP Tech but it’s a lot of work, PHP Tech the the the real conference that everybody actually cares about I noticed I noticed a Woods in a step up to volunteer to rate talks this year, because I think he did last year he knows he’s he’s not stupid and for the people who have volunteered who this is your first year volunteering. You guys need to understand, how bad John feels about it like he was messaging me last night he goes I can’t believe like we need to clear up these talks before we ask people to volunteer what I what I realized is I went through and I declined a bunch of talks that really I was like no we’re not doing these for various reasons don’t want to get into the whys but. I declined them thinking it would pull it out of the review. Or the they call it an evaluation but because I had already opened the evaluation they are stuck in there and I’m like yeah no I don’t want them in there but I can’t close it because everyone’s started already.
[21:28] Well you know what else. I I I I I’m not 100% sure of this 100% sure this because like a lot of talks will sound very similar especially if you’re just looking at the title, but I’ve been very liberal about using the this talk does not belong option thinking I don’t have to worry about seeing that talk to you, I’m not confident that is true I am pretty sure be I am pretty sure I am seeing the same talk that I’ve already. Marked as this is not acceptable or not not valid or whatever that’s not good, no I I I can’t be definite but I I feel like, like I it’s happened to me twice where I’m like I thought I already marked this 1 as you know this this is how you know out of topic or whatever it is the 1 I keep forgetting to do, because you get excited if you haven’t done this before I I should pull it up so you can see what it looks like but if you haven’t done this before you have 3 talks to pick from,
[22:39] and you typically ideally you pick 1 2 3 the first 1 you’d go to the second 1 you’d go to if the first 1 was wasn’t there and the third 1 you go to there’s all sorts of combinations you can do like you say you can say certain props don’t belong at this conference or you can actually pick. You know 32s if you want I don’t know what that does but, it doesn’t stop you from doing that the problem I have is just like you have the this talk doesn’t belong at this conference you had you have another setting where you say yes this is a shoe in don’t ask me again this I want this talk and. The problem I have is when I see those talks I rate it 1 and then figure out my 2 and 3 then I hit next and I always forget to say stop asking me about this talk I’m always going to rate it number 1 and I need to start doing that more. And again another 1 where. There’s that’s another 1 where I think if you do it it should take it out of your list like it’s going to rate it at the top I don’t think you’re going to see it again.
[23:43] Yeah I think so too but yeah I don’t know fun stuff what’s your what’s your development week look like. It was I I sent you the invite first of all I’m pissed off at you bastard must be doing something right. Yesterday was probably 1 of the worst days I’ve had in a long time and it’s all your fault, no I already know who this is going I told Beck and she started bawling at this so. Couple weeks ago I, my wife bought a new vanity for a bathroom and to get it in to get the vanity into my bathroom I had to play Tetris sliding the vanity all the way into the bathroom and then sliding it into the wall and it’s like. I had to shave down the the size of the countertop to the base and it fit perfectly in that spot like if it were. Half an inch longer or a millimeter longer at 1 or with it in doing so I had to remove the toilet from my bathroom. Told my wife let’s take the opportunity to buy a new toilet and I put a new toilet in.
[24:54] Which was a pain in the butt because I screwed it up water leaked everywhere. Replace it again it was fine so so hold on hold on that happened the night before we were leaving for Longhorn oh yeah that’s right John was in this Panic of having to fix his toilet before we left like just trying to get the get it back up and working so that while I was gone the kids had their own bathroom anyway yeah all that was fine until Tuesday night and my wife’s like she’s seeing the tiniest bit of water behind the toilet. And I’m like what some like feel around and it’s just a small like leak from the tank I’m like I just need to tighten the tank not a big deal I’ll do it later because I was middle of my workday. I put a towel there just to catch any little bit of water forgot about it yesterday morning I’m like oh yeah I meant to go tighten that down. And like a dumbass I just I tighten and I tighten and I tighten and I tighten and I tighten and so I crack the tank water everywhere,
[25:56] completely everywhere flooded the bathroom, now if if you’re wondering why that’s so funny to me if you haven’t listened to the show over the last 6 months I’ve had 3 bathrooms flood from Bad toilets not anything I’ve done just call. Malfunctioning and breaking and so and 1 of them happened at Longhorn where I pulled John into my room I’m like dude I’m a what I don’t know what to do anymore I don’t know what what you have what you like what communicable disease you have you’re spreading but stop it. Oh my God it gets even funnier because I go and I get the replacement stuff I get it installed actually before I got it installed I. Wanted to turn the water back on so that. Other things could happen in the house and I had the water off at the behind the toilet or so I thought until I turn the water back on and I’m watching that that meter at the street I’m like. Okay it’s still spinning but that’s just because it’s refilling the house it’s copper so I sat there for like 10 seconds like okay it’s filling up the lines it’s almost done watching it.
[27:13] That’s weird what’s going on so I walk in and as I’m walking in I hear this loud noise I’m like I start running and I’m like oh wait I have a fan on in the bathroom trying to dry it out so it’s the fan and then I open the door it’s just spewing water so I flooded the bathroom a second time in the same day you didn’t tell me that dude he didn’t tell me that 1 no no from the this thing is just pointed up just spray and that’s fantastic I almost like. Initially I almost was like oh crap to run back to the street, well like wait there’s a turn it off right there yeah that was awesome it was not awesome it was, a miserable day and I did again that hole oh oh I know what that noise is that that’s how my first 1 happened it’s like oh yeah somebody’s washing dishes or something I don’t know it’s not me. As far as coding week goes. Got major progress on the the project I’ve been working on they demoed it today for the CEO of our client and it went well.
[28:32] I had the transcriptions it was working fine and then we made a bunch of changes over the past month or so where instead of. Sending the audio for both sides like if I call you instead of sending. Both of our audio off to the transcription service I want to send just mine and just yours so I know who’s talking and we don’t have to deal with the the service trying to figure out who’s talking because that’s not always accurate. And all of a sudden like I didn’t realize it was because of this but the transcription was just terrible, and we’re using a recorded call for a testing right so I call in and I’m hearing a recording and that’s the just an easy way to test that way I don’t have to talk to myself because I do that too often already. And the words were just nothing accurate it was just really bad I’m like what the hell happened and it turns out, when I was sending both sides of the conversation 16 khz.
[29:35] Was the right rate the sample rate of a call but when I switched to doing just 1 side I had to cut that in half and I didn’t know that so they were basically on their side hearing Chipmunks because it’s. After you convert it it’s like sped up. Yeah and so they just weren’t getting it at all yeah as soon as I brought it back I was like oh this makes so much more sense. Yeah that that that seemed like. You were tell you were telling me about that project that seemed like a really fun project to code you know it’s just we’re so we’re using all sorts of new technology that I haven’t done a whole lot with a lot of Lambda whoops sorry a lot of Lambda functions which really cool yeah we talked about the prior where we’re using Lambda functions for the stupidest things but there’s also other reasons for using it. Using server sent events instead of websockets. And then with that we’re using an open source project called push pin.
[30:41] So it’s basically just a server that’s sitting out there that a service can push to and then somebody else another device browser. Connect and then listen for those events that are happening so we’re doing some really interesting things with that where all of the. Phone signaling you know dialing answered hang up that’s going over the server sent events through push pin our transcriptions all go throughout that and then they come down into the browser so the browser can display the transcription in real time and we doing like a handful of other things with it it’s really been interesting. Is that pushpin org is that yeah it sounds like sounds right yeah that’s interesting I I love finding new open source so things out there yeah, push pin is a proxy server that pins claim connect oh that is kind of cool I have to check that out I love I love open source stuff like that. Cool hold on I’ve been a good week outside of outside of the toilet woes.
[31:51] Oh man well we have some we have some news in the community but before we get to news what do you say we listen think are people over at a PHP score I’m gonna have to I’m gonna give these shots here we go. Every app builds up technical debt over time it’s the unfortunate price that we pay for shipping new features and moving fast when we build up too much of it though it can start to impact how we work, team velocity suffers bugs become more frequent and take longer to fix and everyone starts to get a little bit frustrated the key to managing debt is to measure it, a credit score can help you understand how well you’re managing your debt and now there’s a credit score for technical debt go to phpcs cam to get a free technical debt score and monitoring for all of your PHP applications today, head over to phpcs calm and you can control over your technical debt. Thanks PHP score that’s a hard word to say at the same time that is that is from,
[32:51] I don’t know if we can use names but that that was created from somebody in the PHP Community who’s been around for a long time good person actually enjoy talking with them yep so I got some interesting news let’s talk about, let’s do fun first Let’s do let’s do fun first let me open up this we, shared 1 example last week but the design contest for. PHP the new PHP release is done yeah and what’s add that to the to our Trello board and saw you already had it there. Yeah and and we actually have have a winner Nuno. I don’t know if that’s good well see do you say G I’m not sure but yeah well anyways their handle is war maybe maybe you don’t say it. Yeah I don’t know but anyways another Nuno and not not that that that Nuno you’re thinking of and not the other 1 you’re thinking this is yet another Nuno in the PHP world came in with this design so with that he is a thousand dollar prize and a AI ultimate license from jetbrains,
[34:04] oh and a thousand dollars from Rector and yeah a thousand dollars from Rector I don’t think I knew about that second thousand dollars I did not so the funny thing is when you first brought it up. I almost I thought about talking to you about should we jump on that and be like take part and helping. Yeah we probably should have I should have said something but even if it’s a a free year subscription or something a lifetime subscription hell I’d give them a lifetime subscription second place or not second, runner up I guess Hannah which I I like I like the lighter colors like I’m getting tired of dark mode I think on websites and I know I’m just guilty with it I because it’s easy to hide stuff and things seem to pop a little bit more that’s like let’s let’s jump back over here again the JS Tech 1 obviously you know we just ripped off what we had for Tech PHP Tech and started from there right so but like if I go to light mode it just looks like.
[35:08] Bad like I don’t like it so well I think it’s that it’s a like that yellow. We change it to like some other color it’s just yeah that that yellow that yellow just isn’t doesn’t really work so so I do like I like the different colors here looks good I mean had they gone with this I I don’t think this is, a big enough difference from what the site currently looks like to be like oh yeah this is worth you know 2 Grand but I wouldn’t have been, disappointed in this this looks nice and then our our the 1 we pointed out last week who I thought would run away with it actually got it mentioned on here which I thought was great so yeah congratulations to everybody who participated in this even if you did not win, you help make the community stronger for participating so thanks for all that oh kind of along these same lines I didn’t so, this this is in from the PHP Foundation right.
[36:16] PHP topics to interesting PHP things that are going on I would hit their blog fairly does that oh you, me uh and I stopped looking at their blog because they were they were only posting like once a month and it it most times it just was basic stuff in really wasn’t interesting but I checked again today and I noticed that they they’ve actually up, they’re posting game which is really good to see so October they posted a few times September they posted a few times and then I think August July you know they’re back to once a month back them so if you’re somebody like me who enjoys PHP news. Might want to add this to your rotation and you can sub subscribe to a newsletter as well if you want but yeah good good little. Blog post here I haven’t I what actually brought me here was this 1 evolving PHP streams for ASC Security and performance excuse me. And I actually didn’t end up reading it because I saw the other 1 who Joe Ferguson had actually posted in our Discord I’m like oh that’s perfect so yeah check it out.
[37:26] PHP Foundation doing good work and well they’re they’re continuing continuously improving how they do things too like. All their meetings that they’re having I know Sarah’s been talking about trying to make more of that. Publicly accessible that’s true yeah but but they do seem to be actively trying to make a positive impact on the PHP. Community ecosystem the whole thing yeah yep. Good stuff good stuff yeah you need to you need to change Avatar to this. I’m looking at I’m like I did not write that in our chat and I’m remembering oh yeah John doesn’t know he needs to change his Avatar okay. So some oh in the the private chat and restream yeah so some kind of. Cool news as. Somebody who makes a living off PHP professionally I always kind of take notice of things and back in the day I noticed. 1 of the ways a lot of people made money with PHP was through a framework called craft craft PHP or whatever so yeah craft CMS yeah and they would develop these plugins for crafts
[38:48] actually we had a couple of developers who attended our user group who made money that way okay I don’t think they made a living that way but they made some extra scratch was which is cool so I always kind of kept an eye on Craft CMS now craft cmss was built with the ye framework. And they they did a big migration from year to year too and how to do a bunch of stuff and you know whatever, I’m like okay that’s cool and all that well they announced not let me make this bigger. They are going to migrate once again. But this time they’re going to go from ye to laravel so they announced this September 29th. And this is the reason you decouple your code from the framework you’re on so it’s interesting you should say that because that’s what that interesting thing I found I. I’m curious about with this effort so if you read this article they talk they talked about how when they did do their ye to migration for craft 3 they rewrote a bunch of their code.
[40:00] And there was a lot of stuff that you know there was a lot of. Breaking changes and all this other stuff they’re saying that they’re not anticipating a lot of breaking changes or even a lot of code rewrite for their migration to laravel laravel, which is fantastic like this is if you are if you architect your code well enough when you’re using a piece of the the. Framework you’re using if you can abstract that into a separate place like you’re sending an email. Instead of just calling male all over the place you call your service and its 1 to the framework so when you switch Frameworks you have very little things. Very few things you have to change the problem is we get so used to. This is the framework of our choice and we’re going to be here forever and that doesn’t always work and we’ve seen it from, Zen framework back in the day Zen framework 1 the Zen framework 2 was a pain in the ass so if you hard code yourself to the framework.
[41:07] Changing becomes a problematic in times right and that’s the thing I mean you can even. Pledge allegiance to a framework it’s still not going to protect you if you don’t architect well protect you from upgrades to that framework we saw we like John said we saw it was they saw it with Yee we’ve seen it many times with laravel especially in the early days yeah yeah so you really need to think about your architecture and how much you let the framework, dig into you they’re both making that very hard they’re both I mean part of it they want to they want you to be hooked into their. The framework their ecosystem of the way they do things but all of like all the facade calls calling male everywhere. That’s just an example but they’re venting just all the things that you use in the framework that you don’t even think about that the reason you love the framework. Is also tying all of your code so that if you ever do want to change it it’s going to be tricky yeah I mean I know I’m.
[42:14] At the end of it so yeah but in in this is how thoughtful the team at craft CMS are. You know I I don’t have a lot of Hands-On with this product but I’m already becoming a fan just reading this article so like I said a lot of people make money. By developing plugins for crafts and they thought about this they’re actually going to write. An adapter so that, plugins existing plugins they don’t need to ideally most of them won’t need to make any changes to their code or won’t need to make drastic changes to the code to continue to work not only that. But they’ve also let me see if I can find it here real fast here it is Real Fast Craft 5 which I assume is the 1 they’re on now because we’re talking about craft 6. Dave LTS so long-term supported it. Meaning if you’re on Craft 5 you don’t have to sweat this right away they’re going to continue to support this for 5 years which should be enough time for you to Pivot to craft 6 if you need to or work out any kinks you have moving to craft stick so this.
[43:33] This project I don’t know if this is a I assume it’s a company I’m not sure but they they very thoughtful to their developers which is great to see so yeah that’s a long time to to maintain 2 versions maintaining 5 and 6 right and they didn’t say they didn’t say security only fixes. So it’s almost like they plan on any new features they have also back porting it to 5. Yeah and and 6 doesn’t come out until next year so it’s not like they’re releasing 6 right so it’s 5 years a year that’s gonna be, yeah yeah so yeah don’t quote me on that they’re they’re keeping new features backwards compatible to I don’t know for sure right. Yeah good good work man that that’s a very uplifting and positive Story coming out of the PHP world yeah I thought this this story on my board for a few weeks now I just never talked about it. A friend of mine she was actually 1 of the people that hired me at phone burner 13 years ago.
[44:40] Moved on from phone burner and I’ve been following what she’s been doing on LinkedIn. Still talk with her once in a while and email by email too but she actually did a job interview with an AI. But like that’s the world we live in now where your initial interview is with AI you’re not talking to a real person. Really okay and talk to her afterwards about it and she got called she got a call back so she’s. Then she was able to talk to an actual human but this just seemed like a very interesting. Take like screening people via AI seems like I mean annoying thing. When you first set it I’m like why would anybody do that like that seems like a terrible idea but then I think about, the few times we’ve tried to code hire somebody like hire somebody we didn’t have a relationship with or know from the community and. The pain of like you know getting through that initial. Kind of interview and and resumes and all that so I mean I I guess anything to help weed down that field.
[46:02] I’m just curious I’m really curious did did she talk to you at all about like. Where they just questions or were they exercises or no I mean I think she said in their. Actually she didn’t I don’t remember how she just said it went. But I mean she pointed out a positive if it lets the company screen far more people which which I agree. But the first comment was I would refuse that. Full stop if the employer will not invest in a human to interview me they see this role in applicant as interchangeable. Right and that’s valid right so I come from the mindset and I tell my kids this today that. You shouldn’t just randomly be applying to places like you need to do some research and understand why you want to work for them the same thing, goes to the other side like they shouldn’t just be interviewing everybody that submits a resume they should be doing some research and understand what about, a person.
[47:08] Make some worthy of an interview and that’s what I told my kid I’m like you know when you go into an interview your first question should be to them and you should ask them what about my resume interested you what problems in your company. Do you have that you think I could help with oh that’s interesting and just kind of establish the fact that they’re not interviewing you as much as you’re interviewing them but it needs to be go both ways because like if I find out. That you haven’t done the research like if you’re interviewing me and you haven’t done any research on me or know who I am especially you know people who live on social media although I’m definitely not on there as much as I am. Anymore it was used to be but like I do the podcast and stuff yeah so if if if I if I go in, in your interviewing me I’m like well Have you listened to my podcast and they say well I didn’t realize you had a podcast I’m like okay well then you don’t know who I am like you’ve done you’ve if you’ve done any Googling on me you would have known,
[48:10] so you know it’s it’s I mean. Brother’s got to get paid so I mean if if you’re if you need money and you’ve got to live live you know I’m not going to judge you but if you got a good job or if you’re in a position where you don’t need to take the first job that’s offered to you. Make it hard for them you know make them work for you so that’s how I feel about it yeah. Unless we hire you don’t give me shit if we hire you okay if we hire you you just listen and answer, don’t speak unless spoken to damn it, but if I forget everything I just said none of that makes sense when you interview with us while you have a person we’re kind of like AI we don’t really listen to you we just, talk. We even do weird movements every now and then just so you know we want you looking at it’s like wait are you are you really a person we ask you the same question 3 times because we’re not listening. And when you say several times and then when you say you just asked me that you’re absolutely right.
[49:23] Yeah you passed that test good job, oh that’s all yeah I I hate I hate interviews I’m just I’m not I’m not good at giving them or or doing them I I interview terribly like I would never hire me I talk I say this all the time so I have we have a start a company because I couldn’t get hired yeah I cannot so. I can’t can’t imagine having to interview I’m very lucky and thankful for the position I’m in currently I feel bad every time I see people getting laid off their pros and cons, running a business is stressful we don’t make as much money as we probably could if we were working on our own in all honesty yeah and it’s if I went and got hired by a company. I would get. Vacation days Health Care and honestly probably make more money so it it’s not all it’s cracked up to be but at the same time mentioned the stress yeah but at the same time, I don’t have the stress of looking for a job every couple of years or whatever that Cadence is,
[50:25] I have a friend right now not necessarily a developer but he’s about to leave his job of 14 years. And 1 of the biggest reasons wasn’t money as much as he’s worried that the company he works for might be sold and if it is his role may be deemed unnecessary by the next. The the next owners and because he’s been there for 14 years he thinks that thinks that looks bad on his resume. So if he did get let go and he had to go find another job he thinks because he was there for so long. They may view him as stale or out of touch or whatever the case may be what what hurt his chances which shocked me because I’ve never been a person that jumped job to job. Yeah my first. Like real job out out of college I was there for 8 years my next job I was there for 8 years I moved to California I’ve been with excuse me. Been with phone burner for 13 years even though you and I have started this business it’s I’m not a jumparound type of person.
[51:32] Yeah but he has a valid point if if if I don’t know this person’s age but 14 years is a long time to be at a company so, to go into an interview and say well you were there for 14 years why are you here today if your answer is well I got laid off and it’s like oh yeah that’s a red flag whereas if your answer is you know I’m just looking for another challenge I’ve been there for 14 years yeah you can be as your way out of it at that point yeah yeah yeah it’s something I want to do and you’re you’re not as, again what I was just saying you’re not as pressured to take the first thing that’s offered to you as well so true exactly yep 1 more thing that I’ve had on for a long time, or a couple weeks now we haven’t talked about it yet been Marx was hired on at the PHP Foundation. And is their first director of fundraising well we have to pull our money out now because I’m not happy with that I’m just kidding congratulations Ben.
[52:35] Yeah that was cool all right so Ben’s been in the community for a while for a minute. So he’s he’s a what what has been been up to he’s got a puppy. I’m sorry I was way too excited to say that that’s a cute puppy yeah. Yeah so I thought that was awesome we need a director of fundraising for PHP Tech and JS Tech,
[53:09] yeah yeah like the conference is yeah I I I got a moment to get on stage Longhorn at lunchtime and you kind of do our pitch and I talked about the company a little bit but you know I just felt I want to take the opportunity to really, give we we try to do this at Tech too like let people know who are there for the first year like this is a fantastic opportunity to meet people this and putting on a conference is not easy like no seeing person will do this so the fact that you know make sure you appreciate your organizers make sure you appreciate the sponsors who give the organizers money to have these conferences because it’s a stupid thing to do like there’s no Roi and it’s not worth all the stress but yet. Certain people in our community find it you know beneficial and it is and that’s the thing this is a very much a 1 sided effort like the people attending although might not feel like it because they paid to be there this is an OP this is just the opportunity is incredible you make friends you make you meet
[54:19] future colleagues you know it’s I can’t tell you how many people I’ve helped get jobs by introducing, 2 people at Tech over the over the years yeah it’s it’s definitely if you attend any I I assume All Conference I mean I’m sure the big corporate conferences are different but any of these smaller conferences even your local user group. Bizarre thing to do like who wants to be an organizer of a user group there’s no upside to it so make sure you you let them know how much you appreciate them if you can do a talk do a talk you know it’s it’s work, we speak we got somebody in our Meetup Group to give a talk next month excited about that, this month oh this month that’s a couple weeks couple of weeks dude and then next the next meet up how about that. Yeah 3 or 4 where we’re just back and forth yeah. Yeah and like the last meet up we had we had. Norm who was a member of the St PHP user group from way back in the days just show up and it was like it was great to see him again it was like,
[55:37] you know a friend that you hadn’t seen in years because he was it you do me you make good friends there I’m not somebody who makes a lot of friends. Yeah I mean I think the friends that you have made have all been neither from the user group or from the conference that’s pretty much my entire life now. So pity me feel sorry for me John I’m not like you I’m not cool like you and I people asked me to go bowling or come up to their, present sweet and drink beer I’m not that type of person again. I’m done with that I keep practicing though we can work on.
[56:27] Format of just give me a little runchey yeah okay I just a reminder good the call for papers for JS Tech is still open. We’re still don’t know if we’re going to have 1 or 2 tracks TBD it might be determined based on the number of tickets sold to JS Tech specifically. Yeah pricing is going to be the same because it is the same conference we’re just not going to have more tracks more information you can learn. Not sure what we’re going to do video wise yet if we’re going to record if we’re going to stream if we’re going to, oh I was going to ask you I don’t know for you’re talking about PHP we’re we’re definitely do streaming PHP Tech you’re talking about J yeah we don’t don’t know what we’re doing jste wise yet I don’t know if we’re going to have a separate place for videos I have ideas I want to talk with you about Eric after the show, I’m I’m just going to cross the board say no to you that’s fine that’s good it’s also again you got a question for you it would be determined on number of tickets we saw.
[57:26] I got a question for you for JS tag because this is this is like 1 of the like once I had the realization of hey this is an opportunity to bring people into the world of PHP if somebody were to suggest a talk and I, I don’t remember seeing 1 in the current PHP Tech lineup although they may be 1 there if somebody were to suggest to talk for you the PHP Tech. Or JS Tech around a tool like inertia which is this, JavaScript bridge in the laravel framework that will allow you to use variables from your uh laravel app in JavaScript right it’s a very very cool project a matter of fact I don’t know if they’ve always owned the project or were always the maintainer of the project but they are now like I I they made a big deal of announcing that you know they you know they’re maintaining inertia would you be open to that person presenting at jste it’s inertia.js right. No yeah it’s a nurse at JS but it’s it’s really I mean it’s it’s only something you would use actually more as far as I know more specifically if you’re using laravel but yes it’s inertia JS in the the goal of it
[58:43] is to allow you to develop your JavaScript how you know how to how to develop it but. Be able to Leverage The Power of PHP yeah I don’t see why not. Right I think that some of you if you haven’t if you need to do that submit your talk today if you’re listening to this, submitted to JS tag well we we will we will Fast Track yeah well don’t say that that’s not a guarantee don’t say that we’ve often had JavaScript talks at PHP Tech. So it’s not like we’re trying to have this Hardline separation it’s more of a we want. We want to bridge the worlds of JavaScript and PHP which they’re already bridged anyway so why not bring the communities together. Learn from each other I’m often curious about. JavaScript build processes because I still don’t fully understand it I just do what I’m told to do and I kind of monkey it through that’s me yeah so giving me a chance to learn that side of it maybe give JavaScript developers a chance to learn from the PHP Folk.
[59:47] You know could be fun. Yeah I think so we’ll see it’s it’s it’s a it’s a weird little experiment we’re doing but we all have JavaScript developers reach out to them and let them know about this and. Maybe help us spread the word please, yeah tweeted out I’ve been like I posted on we don’t know what we’re doing yeah I posted on LinkedIn recently I don’t know where where JavaScript developers hang out I tried looking at the oh I went down to the corner last night they weren’t there, no well you got to get the alleys I think is where the alleys that’s right no they’re they’re all playing D and D or something so listen I forgot to mention this last year and I I I wanted to give you a little nod because I, this is the sort of thing that it’s funny in my head. And I realized I’m probably the only 1 that thinks it’s funny but at our last meet up so John and I have had a business for over a decade.
[01:00:42] We do especially things in the PHP Community we typically will do together right I mean it’s occasionally we’ll get go on a podcast or something but I mean for the most part like if people think of PHP architect or if. Somebody mentions my name somebody think they realized you know John’s probably not too too far behind I like to think the same of John yeah, I’m wrong there yeah I’m very wrong so our last meet up there was a there was a new attendee there. Who was a big WordPress person. And he says well obviously I know you everybody knows who you are I see you everywhere I’m like pointing to John I’m like what the fuck I mean she’s gonna say me next right I forgot about nope I forgot about that I had no idea who I was so congratulations man you’re making a name for yourself surprisingly I I think you always said that because I was a speaker. If you are presenting you would have said the same to you about you.
[01:01:59] All right I think that’s it you got anything else John uh nope I think we uh buried ourselves on that 1. Thanks for listening and uh we’ll be back next week bye this has been PHP podcast the official podcast of PHP architect the industry’s leading Tech magazine and publisher focused on PHP and web development subscribe today at PHP arch.com to see what the leaders in the community and Industry are talking about.
| Air date | November 6, 2025 |
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| Hosted by | Eric Van Johnson, John Congdon |
| Guest(s) |
