// create the image resource from a file
$i = imagecreatefromjpeg('otter.jpg');

// define the sharpen matrix
$sharpen = array(
	array(0.0, -1.0, 0.0),
	array(-1.0, 5.0, -1.0),
	array(0.0, -1.0, 0.0)
);

// calculate the sharpen divisor
$divisor = array_sum(array_map('array_sum', $sharpen));

// apply the matrix
imageconvolution($i, $sharpen, $divisor, 0);

// output the image
header('Content-Type: image/jpeg');
imagejpeg($i);

Otter, before and after sharpening

Image courtesy Kevin Law

Since the news of an API last week, I’ve been working on a little class wrapper – partly to hone my OOP skills and partly to support some great work by Bastian – and my class is now ready. I’ve named it ZooPHP.

$zoo = new ZooPHP($key, $secret);
$zoo->getPopularItems();

To start using ZooPHP, you’ll need a Zootool API key. The script is released under a BSD license and is documented, but should be fairly self-explanatory:

$zoo->setAuth('username', 'password');
$zoo->setFormat('array');
$zoo->getUser('bastian');
$zoo->getUserFriends('bastian');
$zoo->getUserFollowers('bastian');
$zoo->getUserItems('bastian');
$zoo->getLatestItems();
$zoo->getItem('iw6og3');
$zoo->getPopularItems();
$zoo->addItem('adamhopkinson.co.uk', 'adamhopkinson.co.uk', 'zoophp, php, wrapper');

You’ll only need to call setAuth if you want to add items or return private items with getItems.

Click here to download your copy of ZooPHP »

Get a PCA account

First, you’ll need to sign up to Postcode Anywhere and add some credits. A beginner pack of 300 credits will set you back £25+VAT and will get you 300 address lookups (if you only want the basic details returned for each address).

Use PHP to build the webservice client

An AJAX lookup works by passing some data to a script on the webserver, which performs some translation (in our case, connects to the webservice) and returns the result to the page where javascript makes the updates. Create a new php file on your webserver call getpostcode.php

Set up the defaults for the lookup:

<?php

$account_code = 'PCA_ACCOUNT';
$license_code = 'PCA_LICENCE';

$postcode = '';
$building = '';

?>

Then, get the postcode and building number or name from the query string:

if ( array_key_exists('postcode', $_QUERY) ) {
	$postcode = $_QUERY['postcode'];
}

if ( array_key_exists('building', $_QUERY) ) {
	$building = $_QUERY['building'];
}

Then we have to build the REST url that will ask the webservice for the address:

$url = 'http://services.postcodeanywhere.co.uk/csv.aspx?';
$url .= 'account_code=' . $account_code;
$url .= '&license_code=' . $license_code;
$url .= '&action=fetch';
$url .= '&postcode=' . $postcode;
$url .= '&building=' . $building;
$url .= '&style=simple';

Use the php file function to get the data from the webservice into a variable called $data

$data = file($url);

We’ve asked the webservice to return the data in csv format, so we’re expecting two lines. The first will contain the field names and the second will contain the values. First, we want to return an error if the webservice call failed:

if(!$data) {
	die('{"status":"error"}');
}

The status: error message is in JSON format so that it can be understood by the javascript which will handle the address lookup.

The php file function returns an array, with each line in a different array element – so the first line will be in $data[0] and the second in $data[1] (arrays always start at 0 not 1!).

Next we want to trim any whitespace such as spaces or newline characters from the end of each line:

$data[0] = trim($data[0]);
$data[1] = trim($data[1]);

then we trim all extra speech marks from the start and end to help us split the lines up

$data[0] = trim($data[0], '"');
$data[1] = trim($data[1], '"');

Now we can split the lines into two arrays, one for field names and one for values

$field_names = explode('","', $data[0]);
$field_values = explode('","', $data[1]);

and throw up an error if the number of fields isn’t the same as the number of values

if(count($field_names) != count($field_values)) {
	die('{"status":"error"}');
}

Empty the $data array and loop through the field names and values, building up an array of name => value pairs

$data = array();

for($counter = 0; $counter < count($field_names); $counter++) {
	$data[$field_names[$counter]] = $field_values[$counter];
}

PostcodeAnywhere returns a field called error_number if there’s a problem in the request. If this field exists, return an error to the form:

if(array_key_exists('error_number', $data)) {
	die('{"status":"error"}');
}

Finally, output the data in JSON format:

$output = '';
foreach($data AS $key=>$value) {
	$output .= '"' . $key . '":"' . $value . '",';
}
//$output = trim($output, ',');
$output = '{"status":"ok",' . $output . '}';
echo $output;

In part 2, we’ll look at how to use the Yahoo Connection Manager to put this data on your form. Check back in a few days…

I didn’t see any criticism along the way, and I think what is being offered is top notch. Maybe just because something hasn’t lived up to the expectations of one person doesn’t make it a failure? It’s better than most people have done…

Pages+ is my first decent wordpress plugin, and will be of use to those with many pages within their wordpress site. It replaces the Manage » Pages admin page with a more simple way of navigating to a page.

I’ve used it in wordpress 1.5 and 2.0 with no problems. The site it was developed for is currently at 2,200 pages(!) and is using this plugin as the main way of navigating through page administration. If you find it useful (or hate it), I’d appreciate a comment back.

Download Pages+

Update: I’ve added Croila’s suggestion of a child page counter. Now, each title is followed by the number of direct (first level) child pages under that page.

Instructions

1. Upload the pagesplus.php file into your wp-content/plugins folder on your website
2. In your wordpress admin area, click Plugins and activate Pages+