php[podcast] episodes from php[architect]

 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. X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ 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 Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/er helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/ The post The PHP Podcast 2025.11.06 appeared first on PHP Architect.

 Key Takeaways Expertise in PHP development transcends basic programming skills. Comprehensive understanding of asynchronous programming and SOLID principles enhances code quality. PHP’s “alive and kicking” status proves its adaptability and ongoing relevance in web development. Bert De Swaef emphasizes the importance of PHP in enterprise solutions and long-term projects. Tools like Composer and PHPUnit are essential for modern PHP development workflows.   Introduction to PHP Concepts timestamp: 00:19 PHP’s ongoing relevance in the development world is affirmed by its adaptability. Bert De Swaef emphasizes: “PHP remains a key player in both small-scale and enterprise-level projects thanks to its flexibility and robust ecosystem.” Structured development in PHP leverages key concepts and tools, critical for maintaining productivity and code quality: Asynchronous Programming timestamp: 06:21 Asynchronous programming is pivotal in PHP for managing I/O-bound tasks efficiently. It allows developers to write non-blocking code, making applications responsive and scalable. With asynchronous programming, PHP can manage concurrent tasks without waiting for each to complete, making it perfect for high-load applications. PHP in Enterprise Solutions timestamp: 11:53 PHP’s strength in enterprise solutions lies within its expansive library of tools and frameworks. Bert details how PHP encourages efficient development in complex environments: Enterprise-grade applications benefit from PHP’s resilience and its vast collection of frameworks, such as Laravel and Symfony, which provide the absolute flexibility needed for scaling. Advantages noted: Scalability: Capabilities to handle extensive scaling requirements with optimized performance. Maintainability: Ease of code management and updating due to robust framework architecture. Community Support: A vibrant community ensures rapid issue resolution and continuous improvement. The Role of Testing timestamp: 21:22 Testing is a cornerstone of high-quality PHP development, underlying the importance of consistent and structured testing processes: Testing is the backbone that supports reliable application functionality, guaranteeing each change maintains system integrity. Emphasized tools such as PHPUnit streamline integration into workflows.   Advanced PHP Practices timestamp: 26:50 Modern PHP development encompasses advanced techniques for enhanced efficiency and code management: Employing robust design patterns and architecture not only fosters enhanced, maintainable code but also aligns with industry standards for effective PHP programming. PHP Architect Social Media: X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/ The post PHP Alive and Kicking – Episode 11 – Bert De Swaef appeared first on PHP Architect.

PHPARCH25 – 25% off any certification – valid til April Jasper hasn’t written a line of code since his Commodore 64 days—and he’s perfectly fine with that. While most guests talk about their first “Hello World,” Jasper’s entry into PHP came from the business side. Twelve years of organizing Laracon EU taught him something crucial: the PHP community is different. The way people support each other, lift each other up, and genuinely care? He hasn’t seen that in any other tech community. Salvaging a Sinking Ship Two years ago, Jasper was approached to help save the commercial Laravel certification program. What he found was alarming—the quality was terrible, the community was frustrated, and Taylor Otwell had already pulled official support. Most people would have walked away. Instead, Jasper saw an opportunity: what if certification could be open source? For the community, by the community? Deleting Everything and Starting Fresh In August 2024, Jasper took control and essentially deleted the old program. Starting from scratch meant building an entire ecosystem: a board of advisors (senior Laravel folks, agency owners, product leads), an exam committee to ensure quality, a contributor platform for the community to submit questions, and exam reviewers to validate everything. Oh, and he built all of this while not being a developer himself. From One Exam to an Entire Pathway The old program had one exam. One level. That was it. Now there’s student, junior, and senior certifications, plus practice exams and test exams. The goal? Make it accessible for beginners while challenging enough that senior developers can actually benchmark their knowledge. And with a 75% passing grade—significantly higher than most certifications—good luck guessing your way through. The Daily Battle Against Bad Memories Almost every day, someone tells Jasper: “Isn’t this that program that got discontinued?” The previous owners left such a bad taste that fighting perception has become part of the job. It’s not the old certification—it’s a completely new, community-driven, open-source program. Getting that message across? That’s the real challenge. Why Open Source Needs Commercial Viability Jasper shares wisdom from someone at Spatie: open source cannot exist without commercial use. If there’s no way to make money sustainably, people won’t invest time and effort. Looking at PHP today—Laravel’s recent investment, the PHP Foundation’s increased activity, the general enthusiasm—proves that commercial viability and open source can coexist beautifully. The PHP Community’s Golden Age After 12 years in the community, Jasper says he’s never seen this much enthusiasm about PHP. Not even close. Between the PHP Foundation stepping up, major investments in the ecosystem, and the energy rippling through conferences and communities, PHP is more alive than ever. Listen to hear why a non-developer is the perfect person to run a developer certification program, and what it takes to rebuild trust from the ground up PHP Architect Social Media: X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/ The post PHP Alive And Kicking – Episode 10 – Jasper Willems appeared first on PHP Architect.

 This week on the PHP Podcast, Eric and John discuss Longhorn, JSTek, PHP 8.5 Website Design, the User Group Meetup, and more. Links from the show: Why are you so obsessed with me? #vonage #meangirls – YouTube Longhorn PHP JS Tek 2026: Call for Speakers @ Sessionize.com Call for Designs: Refresh the PHP 8.5 Release Page — The PHP Foundation — Supporting, Advancing, and Developing the PHP Language PHP.NET – THE WORLD’S MOST HYPERACTIVE SCRIPTING LANGUAGE!!! 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. X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ 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 Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/er helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/   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. X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ 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 Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/ The post The PHP Podcast 2025.10.30 appeared first on PHP Architect.

   In this episode, Scott talks with Edward Barnard about his column in PHP Architect magazine and his current series on using N8N with PHP to create reusable workflows. Links: N8N – https://n8n.io/ Beyond Prompt Engineering – https://leanpub.com/beyond-prompt-engineering Lean Startup Book – https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Startup-Entrepreneurs-Continuous-Innovation-ebook/dp/B004J4XGN6/ displace.tech – https://displace.tech/ Our Discord – https://discord.gg/aMTxunVx Buy our shirts – https://store.phparch.com/products/community-corner-podcast-t-shirt Scott’s Social Media: Website – https://scott.keck-warren.com/ Bluesky – https://bsky.app/profile/scottkeckwarren.bsky.social LinkedIn – https://www.linkedin.com/in/scott-keck-warren-91689810/ Mastodon – https://phpc.social/@scottkeckwarren The post Community Corner: N8N With PHP With Edward Barnard appeared first on PHP Architect.

 Zuzana didn’t grow up coding at age 10, she came to development later in life, looking for flexible work she could do around raising three kids. A chance encounter with an online bootcamp that happened to use PHP (not JavaScript like most today) set her on a path she never expected. WordPress meetups and self-directed learning became her entry point into a world that would soon feel surprisingly lonely. Learning to code in her home bubble felt comfortable and welcoming. Then Zuzana walked into her first in-person PHP meetup and realized: she was the only woman developer in the room. WordPress meetups had women, but they were in design, SEO, and marketing—not development. The question hit hard: Where are all the women? Why am I the only one here? While searching for role models in Laravel, Zuzana found herself reading Django Girls and PyLadies stories religiously. Not because she used those frameworks, but because she desperately needed to see that people like her, with different backgrounds, ages, career paths—could succeed in this field. Laravel had no equivalent community. When she asked on Twitter if one existed, a stranger replied: “Why don’t you create one and call it Larabelles?” For a year, that suggestion sat in the back of her mind. She was nobody. She was too new. This was for “real developers” to create, not her. But friends pushed her to just do it—and within days, she had a domain, a one-page website, and a tweet. She had no plan for what it would become. She just wanted to meet someone like her. Larabelles isn’t just for women—it’s for anyone who doesn’t identify as a man and feels underrepresented in tech. Finding the right language is hard (the website tagline keeps evolving), but the mission is clear: if you don’t feel like you belong because of your gender, you belong here. One member described attending her first conference with Larabelles as feeling like instant friendship—like going to a Taylor Swift concert where everyone just gets it. No more shouting into the void on Stack Overflow or wondering if anyone will answer. Now there’s a community that will actually respond, mentor, and connect. Making Excuses Obsolete With speakers in the Larabelles directory and a growing community across Discord and beyond, conference organizers can no longer claim they “don’t know any female speakers.” The directory exists. The community exists. The work to reach underrepresented developers might take more effort, but the excuse is gone. Recent survey results reveal what many suspected: the community is still heavily male-dominated, but the numbers for women and other genders are creeping upward. Real change starts at the top—diversity in leadership at places like the PHP Foundation matters because it trickles down and shows what’s possible. PHP Architect Social Media: X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/ The post PHP Alive And Kicking 8 – Zuzana Kuchnova appeared first on PHP Architect.

 The Bored Sysadmin Who Chose PHP Over .NET a young Linux sysadmin whose job involves kicking the mail server once a week and spending the rest of the time playing Call of Duty. Steve watched the dev team actually creating things and decided to join them. JavaScript looked “kind of cool,” PHP “made sense,” and .NET? “I’ll see you later.” The choice was made. The Pre-Cloud Cloud Storage Solution Before iTunes existed in the cloud—before the cloud existed—Steve forgot his MP3 player USB stick at home one day. Rather than face the horror of talking to people at the office, he did the socially awkward thing: taught himself PHP and built an online MP3 player. Later, refusing to pay for Dropbox before a holiday, he built his own file storage app. Sometimes the best motivation is just being cheap and antisocial. How “Fucking Steve” Was Born Steve listened to PHP Ugly for the first time and tweeted that he didn’t like how much they bashed Laravel. Eric saw the tweet, then noticed Steve appearing on multiple other podcasts that same week. The next episode: “You’ll never guess who was on Voices of the Elephant… fucking Steve.” A legend was born from a single critical tweet. The British Education System vs. Dyslexia Both Steve and Mike share stories of being told in school to “do something with your hands” because of dyslexia. Mike was held back in maths despite excelling at it, finishing work while the teacher was still explaining to the class. Decades later, both are thriving developers. Take that, 90s education system. Streaming Philosophy: Mistakes Are Features Steve’s approach to educational content is refreshingly honest: take advanced concepts, explain them clearly, and when things go wrong (which they will), work through it live. After 10+ years of development, he still makes typos and mistakes constantly. The point isn’t perfection—it’s showing less experienced developers that imposter syndrome is normal and mistakes are just part of the process. The Great Date Format Debate Mike once spent an hour debugging code before Joe pointed out: “You’ve got your date and month the wrong way around.” Carbon doesn’t care that you’re British. The team regularly argues about spelling (it’s “colour” with a U, thank you), and Steve has a simple solution: “I build APIs. You don’t need a pretty date from me. You just need some data.” AI as a Shortcut, Not a Crutch ChatGPT is useful when you understand what it’s giving you back. Steve uses it to skip tedious debugging, but he knows when the AI invents PHP functions that don’t exist. The new Laravel error page lets you copy errors as markdown and paste them directly into your LLM—proper copy-pasta coding, but with comprehension. PHP Architect Social Media: X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/ The post PHP Alive And Kicking: Episode 7 – Steve McDougall appeared first on PHP Architect.

 Matt takes us back to the mid-90s, learning HTML and PHP alongside his older brother – back when there was no CSS or JavaScript, and getting a header and footer to include across multiple pages felt like magic. Fast forward to today, and that early foundation still influences how he codes and thinks about technology. Before there was an official Laravel partner program, there was just Matt and his buddy Taylor Otwell talking in IRC about turning Laravel into something sustainable. Hear how that friendship evolved into a partnership program that now spans the globe, and why being one of the first three partners was very different from being one of forty. With 80% of the web running on PHP (yes, WordPress helps with that number), Matt breaks down why the language’s longevity and breadth matter more than Silicon Valley’s opinions. From ERPs to CMSs to bespoke applications, PHP does it all – and that’s exactly the point. You’ve probably heard Matt reference “the pub fight” if you were at Laravel Live UK. Now get the full story: an attempted intervention, a violent drunk, and Matt’s wife swinging her purse like nunchucks. Spoiler: he learned an important lesson about paying attention to threats when you’re trying to help someone. Matt shares his philosophy on managing developers: small full-stack teams, minimal meetings, maximum trust. Why does he think the entire agile world is toxic? How does he handle disagreements between developers? And what’s this upcoming free Laracasts course about building dev teams all about? From choosing company insurance policies to resolving technical debates, Matt explains how having clear company values makes tough decisions easier. Keep it simple, ship features, and don’t build for futures you can’t predict. PHP Architect Social Media: X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/ The post PHP Alive And Kicking: Episode 6 – Matt Stauffer appeared first on PHP Architect.

In this lively discussion, Nuno Maduro, a key member of the Laravel Core Team, shares his journey from novice PHP developer to mastering Laravel. He dives into the evolution of the framework and its growing community, exploring how Laravel appeals to newcomers. Nuno also tackles the ethical debate of billing for thinking time and contrasts the PHP and JavaScript ecosystems. With insights on AI integration in tooling and the significance of testing frameworks like PHPUnit and Pest, this conversation is a treasure trove for any developer.

 PHP Architect Social Media: X: https://x.com/phparch Mastodon: https://phparch.social/@phparch Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/phparch.com Discord: https://discord.phparch.com Subscribe to our magazine: https://www.phparch.com/subscribe/ Streams: Youtube Channel Twitch Partner This podcast is made a little better thanks to our partners Displace   Infrastructure Management, Simplified Automate Kubernetes deployments across any cloud provider or bare metal with a single command. Deploy, manage, and scale your infrastructure with ease. https://displace.tech/     PHPScore   Put Your Technical Debt on Autopay with PHPScore Honeybadger.io Honeybadger helps you deploy with confidence and be your team’s DevOps hero by combining error, uptime, and performance monitoring in one simple platform. Check it out at honeybadger.io   Music Provided by Epidemic Sound https://www.epidemicsound.com/ The post PHP Alive And Kicking: Episode 5 – Saifeddin Gmati appeared first on PHP Architect.