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This blog post is just for me, so I can look it up later... I suppose you can borrow it if you find it useful :)

Using dynamic strings inside a regex can be annoying, especially if you can't guarantee that the strings are actually sane. Including a URL in a regular expression is downright obnoxious, since URLs and regular expressions share most of the same special characters, but they mean entirely different things. I threw this function together to make strings regexable. Enjoy.

Function

/**
 * Prepare a string for use in a regular expression.
 * 
 * @author Justin Hileman {@link http://justinhileman.com}
 * @access public
 * @param string $str
 * @return string
 */
function preg_real_escape_string($str) {
    $replace = array('\\' => '\\\\', '^' => '\^', '.' => '\.',
        '$' => '\$', '|' => '\|', '(' => '\(', ')' => '\)',
        '[' => '\[', ']' => '\]', '*' => '\*', '+' => '\+',
        '?' => '\?', '{' => '\{', '}' => '\}', ',' => '\,');
    return strtr($str, $replace);
}

Yeah, the name is a bit weird. This function is an analog to mysql_real_escape_string(), so it seemed fitting.

Usage

// basic usage (this is actually exactly the case I wrote this function for).
$regex = '/^' . preg_real_escape_string($name) . '/i';
$nameless = preg_replace($regex, '', $something_starting_with_name);
 
// trying to find a URL via regex can be especially obnoxious.
$regex = '/' . preg_real_escape_string($my_url) . '/';
$some_text = preg_replace($regex, '<a href="$1">$1</a>', $some_text);

Seriously. It even does realtime updates.

This post is mostly pretty pictures. I just ran some really quick benchmarks on a couple of of the YAML parsing options available for PHP. The blue line is the Spyc YAML library. The green line is the syck PECL extension. The yellow line is a standard PHP include(), and is on the chart as a reference point.

The first two charts were tested with a fixed file size and a variable number of iterations. The final chart tracks the change in parsing time as file size increases. Each test was run with 100 iterations, and the file size was doubled at each stage.

The pretty pictures

More info than you cared to know

• This is a very informal benchmark. Feel free to supplement it with testing of your own.
• All benchmarks were run on the same Ubuntu 9.04 virtual machine running PHP 5.2.x.
• Tests were run in a Zoop Framework skeleton app (from the upcoming Lunar release), since I had one handy and it's really easy to deploy.
• The YAML benchmarks on the first two charts consist of loading and parsing a ~160 line file (a YAML dump of the default Zoop skeleton configuration).
• The PHP include benchmark exists only as a reference point. It consists of loading a var_dump()'d version of the same configuration array used in the YAML tests. This file was included via a standard PHP include().
• The first two sets of tests were run with 1, 50, 100, 250, and 500 iterations, respectively. The final test was run with 100 iterations and variable file size.

Via the Twitter:

pepsi: Hey Throwback fans!We've been listening 2 you & are now debating bringing it back 4 another limited time period. But we need your feedback!

about 4 days ago

Thu Jul 23 14:41:11 +0000 2009

pepsi: Tell us why you love it/want it back. We're listening and looking at every #Throwback tweet. (so using # would help).

about 4 days ago

Thu Jul 23 14:41:29 +0000 2009

So what are you waiting for? Tell @Pepsi to bring back Mountain Dew Throwback!

I've been using Pukka—a Mac client for Delicious—for a bit, and it's pretty great. (More on that later, it's already the subject of a half-finished Technophobe review). I like it enough that I recommended it to a friend today:

bobthecow: @storiesofmac Pukka is pretty okay (Delicious + Mac)

about 2 hours ago

Sun Jul 19 02:05:23 +0000 2009

And what do you know, Justin Miller (the creator of Pukka) noticed:

incanus77: @bobthecow Any way I can make Pukka 'really ok'? :-)

about an hour ago

Sun Jul 19 02:52:12 +0000 2009

So here, other Justin, are a couple of ways to make Pukka great:

• Pre-populate the page title when dragging a URL into Pukka for bookmarking: I was actually surprised that it didn’t already work like this.

• Popular tags support: I still use the official Yahoo plugin in Firefox to do the majority of my bookmarking because of this one feature. I will drag a page from Safari to Firefox and bookmark it there just so I don’t have to think up all the tags to use.

• Global keyboard shortcuts for bookmarking: I'm not sure how this one would work, but I’d like to be able to bookmark via hotkey in any browser. It might need to be an input manager or a set of browser plugins. Think 1Password for bookmarks.

• Bonus: if you can work it into the plugin/input manager goodness, I love being able to select a paragraph from the site to use for my Delicious description text.

• Real Spotlight integration: For this it might make sense to stash the local bookmark cache as a folder full of webclips, and make sure they’re named, tagged, and commented in a Spotlight friendly way.

You're well on your way, and I'd love to see Pukka get even better.

After reading a couple of blog posts on a comment system called Disqus, I want to give it another shot.

I tried Disqus back in the day, and it was really slow and generally fairly annoying. Most of their issues seem to be resolved, and they've picked up a lot of steam in the meantime. So now I'm considering swapping out my current comments for something a little more hip and magickal. But I'd like your feedback on the issue. So here's what you've gotta do:

1. Leave a comment below.
2. Let me know how you feel about the experience.
3. That's it!

You'll notice that there are several ways to identify yourself. If you have a Disqus, Facebook, or Twitter account you can use one of those. Feel free to try out a couple of accounts, or choose none at all. You can also link to this post on just about any social media site (FriendFeed or Twitter or Reddit or YouTube, for example) and it should pull in those comments as well.

So I'm curious what you think about it.

How is the experience? Do you like it better than a traditional blog comment system? Can you see yourself actually voting on other comments à la Slashdot/Reddit/Digg?

Have you used Disqus (or Intense Debate, or another similar service) in the past? Was there anything about it that you couldn't stand?

Most importantly, will this make you more or less likely to join the conversation?

We don't need to make a decision right away. We can play with Disqus for a while and see how we feel. If it's horrid, the old comment system is just a pref setting away.

So talk to me :)

Note: This is the first post on my blog (and currently the only one) with Disqus comments enabled. All older posts still use the native comment system. So you've gotta try Disqus out on this post. Thanks!

Apparently nobody cares what you had for lunch. Nobody wants to hear about your bodily functions (or so I hear). So what else is Twitter good for?

Keeping your finger on the pulse of awesome, of course!

And the best tool for the job is Twitter Search. Check out some of my favorite Twitter searches below. Make up some of your own and share. Enjoy!

Note: Because some people on Twitter use offensive language, these searches occasionally return content that gets apps blocked from the iTunes App Store.