Disclaimer: This collection was published a few years ago on my blog, it was met with heavy criticism about featuring micro-optimiziations which have little to no effect at all compared to other things you can do which was then and is still today very true

As this was copied & published on a few hundred blogs in the aftermath here again the original list exactly as I published it many years ago.

I will follow up shortly with an article on more effective methods. Until then …

This is something I prefer to call my “programming list of shame”. Although having a formal university education with courses on software engineering, enterprise software architecture & database design I have been guilty of every single one of those things at one time or another. This is completely subjective & Eclipse oriented.

You are a lousy PHP programmer if you

1. don’t comment your code properly with something like phpDoc
2. don’t see the need and/or benefits of a good programming IDE like Zend Studio or Eclipse PDT
3. have never used some form of version control like Subclipse
4. don’t adopt some coding & naming standards and general conventions and stick to to them at least throughout the project
5. don’t use a consistent methodology
6. don’t escape and/or validate properly input or sql queries
7. don’t plan your application thoroughly before starting to code
8. don’t use test-driven development
9. don’t program & test with error reporting on
10. don’t see the benefits of a debugger
11. don’t refactor your code
12. don’t keep the different layers seperated using something like MVC
13. don’t know what these stand for: KISS, DRY, MVC, OOP, REST
14. don’t return content but echo or print it from your functions or classes
15. have never seen the advantage of unit tests or testing in general
16. return HTML, not data, strings, or objects.
17. hard code messages and configuration parameters
18. don’t optimize your sql queries
19. don’t use __autoload
20. don’t allow intelligent error handling
21. use $_GET instead of $_POST for any destructive actions
22. don’t know how to use regular expressions
23. you’ve never heard of sql injection or cross-site scripting
24. don’t allow simple configuration, can be parameters passed to a class’s constructor, set/get methods called later, or constants defined at a runtime.
25. don’t understand the benefits and limitations of Object Oriented Programming
26. misuse OOP / everything you write , no matter how small is OOP
27. you think reusable software equals/requires your code to be OOP
28. don’t choose intelligent defaults
29. don’t have one single configuration file
30. don’t want the file contents to be seen, but give it a .inc extension instead of .php
31. don’t use a database abstraction layer
32. don’t keep it DRY, Don’t repeat yourself. If you have to copy and paste or duplicate something your design may be off.
33. don’t make a function/class/method do just one thing and don’t make them interact.
34. don’t try to take advantage of OOP specific features like abstract/interface classes, inheritage polymorphism & access modifiers.
35. don’t optimize your application design with established design patterns
36. don’t allow your user to define a base directory if you have multiple files and/or directories
37. pollute the global namespace, one option is to prefix the functions in your library with a common string
38. don’t allow a table prefix when using database tables
39. use a separate template engine
40. don’t take a look at established php frameworks for inspiration, most of them have advanced web dev concepts and good code

I do not think much of a man who is not wiser today than he was yesterday. – Abraham Lincoln

Sometimes, reflecting on mistakes from the past – you wish you knew then what you know now. Here are a few of my PHP developer truths, learned the hard way by being young, stubborn and most of the times an arrogant prick, refusing to accept that others may actually know better.

1. If you don’t know OOP and OOP design patterns, you’re not playing the same game.
2. Code doesn’t exist unless it’s checked into a version control system. Use version control for everything you do. Any version control, SVN, Git, even CVS, master it and use it.
3. Choose an IDE or any text editor, learn to master it and stick to it. If you have found one you like and feel comfortable with, never waste time reading about the perfect IDE again. It’s not the tool but how you use it.
4. No matter how smart you think you are and no matter how readable you think your code is, commenting your code ought to be self-evident. Code alone only tells me what actually it does, not what it was supposed to do.
5. The users aren’t idiots, you are. All user input without exception should be treated as if it had the plague. Quarantine it, sanitize it and stri it to the bones. PHP has an excellent and comprehensive array of filtering functions.
6. Realizing something is “good enough” will be a major jump in your value as a programmer.
7. Premature optimization is not the root of all evil, lack of proper planning is the root of all evil.
8. Useful and clean high-level abstractions are significantly more important than performance.
9. Programming actually has little to do with language and everything to do with algorithm.
10. You should never test your own software, testing is about trying to uncover developer mistakes, find holes in their assumptions, and flaws in their logic, you simply cannot be objective about your own code.
11. 90% of the project is completed in 10% of the time, unfortunately the remaining 10% is completed in 90% of the scheduled time.
12. Tools, Methodologies, Patterns, Frameworks, etc. are no substitute for a properly trained programmer.