DMZ Updates

DMZ Under New Ownership

Sat, 01 Jan 2011 18:25:09 GMT

After maintaining DMZ for over a year, I have run out of time to continue working on it. The code had begun to show signs of stagnation, and real problems were not getting fixed. But I do not / did not want the project to die.

Luckily, I had great resources in the community itself, and the project lives on, more open than ever.

For an updated version, along with updated docs, and better support, please visit:

http://datamapper.exitecms.org/

Important News Regarding DataMapper OverZealous Edition

Sun, 10 Oct 2010 22:59:57 GMT

Hello everyone,

As many of you might have noticed, I have not updated DMZ in quite some time (late March, in fact). This has been mostly due to the fact that since then, I have been working full time at a new job, in a different state. I really have not had a lot of time, and even if I did, I have been working off a small laptop.

Moving On…
In the last couple of weeks, I have started learning about Groovy and Grails, a dynamic scripting language built on top of the Java Virtual Machine, and a rapid web application development platform, respectively. In reading about these tools, I have found excitement in developing that I have not had in some time.

This platform provides nearly all of the rapid-development potential of CodeIgniter, as well as the ability to write well-defined, strongly-typed code when needed. It also has a large library of plugins, and many features that require a lot of hand-work to enable in CI. Maybe most importantly, it has a very powerful ORM built-in, one that not only does everything that DMZ does, and more gracefully, but is significantly more flexible and can even build and update your database on-the-fly, based on the models. There are so many features in Grails/GORM I always wanted to add to DMZ, but I never really found the time.

Many of my frustrations with CodeIgniter, such as the numerous bugs in the ActiveRecord library, poorly designed Session library, lack of built-in GET support, and various other issues, seem to be resolved in the Grails setup. This is probably because it is backed by frameworks that have been around for a while now, such as J2EE, Spring, and Hibernate.

For many of you, this may not be very interesting. Because I run my own servers, I have the ability to install Java and a servlet engine as needed. However, if you rely on a shared hosting plan, you will most likely not be able to use Java. In fact, this was the very reason I started working with PHP and CodeIgniter in the first place. (On that note: SliceHost is a great, low-cost way to get your own servers running.)

DMZ Can Live On!
What does this mean for DMZ? In short, I’m looking to hand the reins over to someone else. I haven’t used or worked on the library since late May. It’s already going stale, with numerous outstanding bugs that I have no plans to correct.

Because DMZ is 100% open source, you don’t have to contact me if you don’t want. However, I have extra materials and tools that I can pass on to anyone who’d like to make DMZ their own.

Please be aware that this is a large library, with a lot of complex code underneath. It requires a pretty strong understanding of PHP’s magic functions (__get, __call), database design and management, and memory usage. It also requires a bit of dedication, since the relatively small community around DMZ is highly active.

I really hope someone comes forward, and is willing to let DMZ live on. (When I stopped working on the HTMLForm library I asked for a volunteer, but no one offered, and it has effectively died out for that reason.)

So, please, if you are interested, I’ll happily ZIP up all of the content I have for DMZ, and send it over. I’ll eventually be replacing the current DMZ URL with links to anyone who would like to host the manual and downloads. (Please note, the current downloads are hard-coded in the manual to my website. If you do decide to host it, a search-and-replace will probably be in order.) If no one comes forward, I’ll upload the latest version to the CodeIgniter wiki, so it can still be downloaded.

Thank You,

- Phil DeJarnett

DMZ Version 1.7.1

Mon, 22 Mar 2010 03:14:09 GMT

Announcing DMZ Version 1.7.1:

Various bug fixes
New method for seeing if two objects are already related
All extensions have been updated to use or accept get_iterated
Please see the change log for details.

Download here

DMZ Version 1.7.0

Mon, 15 Mar 2010 03:14:24 GMT

DMZ Has been updated to version 1.7.0!

This is a major update to DMZ!

Not only does it include these fantastic new features:

Automatic Localization
Amazingly easy Paged Queries
New methods for streaming query results
PHPDoc documentation has been added for almost every magic method, which can be used for code-hints in an IDE
A brand-new extension for finding the row of a given object or id
And a whole lot more features.

But this version includes a staggering number of small performance improvements than, when added up, can reduce page processing time by as much as 50% (even on simple pages!), and reduce memory overhead by nearly as much, especially when combined the new get_iterated method!

There also have been a variety of bug fixes, and tweaks throughout the code base.

Make sure to check out the changelog — you won’t want to skip this update!

Download here

Significant bug in DMZ 1.6+

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 04:26:20 GMT

I've been doing some research on DB connections here. I was shocked because I had installed PGPOOL-II to increase database connection speed, and I disabled pconnect. But I kept having connection problems. I figured it was something misconfigured and did some research.

Well, there's a simple, but significant, flaw in the multiple DB connections that DMZ uses, combined with the way CodeIgniter handles Database objects: they never get closed!

For more information on possible short-term patches fixes, please see this post.

DMZ Version 1.7.0-RC2

Thu, 25 Feb 2010 04:21:12 GMT

DMZ 1.7.0 Release Candidate 2

This update includes several bugfixes, as well as the renaming of get_large_query to get_iterated. There are also two new methods, get_paged_iterated and count_distinct. Both are documented in the updated manual.

Original 1.7.0 Announcement:

• Significant performance improvements in both query generation and object creation.
• New ways to get your data, including large query streaming and paginated results.
• A new extension for looking up what row a given item is in a query.
• A handful of bugfixes.
• Extensive PHPDoc documentation for the source code, to assist code completion in IDEs.

Download here

View the change log

DMZ Version 1.7.0-RC1

Tue, 23 Feb 2010 11:27:11 GMT

A new, major update to DMZ has just been released. This version includes:

• Significant performance improvements in both query generation and object creation.
• New ways to get your data, including large query streaming and paginated results.
• A new extension for looking up what row a given item is in a query.
• A handful of bugfixes.
• Extensive PHPDoc documentation for the source code, to assist code completion in IDEs.

Download here

View the change log

Regarding the HTML Form extension

Thu, 14 Jan 2010 11:32:38 GMT

I understand that the HTML form extension is very useful to many people. However, I do not have the time to maintain it or support it.

I would like to find someone who is willing to take over maintenance and support for this extension. It needs some work, and I just barely have enough time to keep up with the work on the core DMZ library.

If you are interested in maintaining it, please let me know (via the forum link in this post). Just to be clear, everything I have for this extension is already included in the full DMZ download (including the documentation), so if you are interested, feel free to look at the source directly.

I would be willing to include someone else’s work with the full download, or pull the HTML extension out of the core download, and link to it somewhere else. The latter is probably preferable, since I won’t necessarily upgrade DMZ on the same schedule as the HTML form extension.

CodeIgniter forums

DMZ Version 1.6.2

Mon, 28 Dec 2009 20:09:30 GMT

DMZ Has been updated to version 1.6.2!

This version includes bug fixes and minor updates to the manual. It also includes several new language files generously provided by the community.

Download here.

View the change log

DMZ Usage Poll

Wed, 16 Dec 2009 06:31:32 GMT

I've posted a poll to help gauge DMZ's user base.

If you don't mind, clicky on over here, and pick an option!

Thanks!