I love seeing content coming from folks I have met (either in person or virtually)…this week’s list reflects that (and a very active/productive PHP community!). And,news/information/tutorials about Windows Azure continue…

• The SQL Azure team blogs about getting started with project "Houston", the web-based management tool for SQL Azure: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sqlazure/archive/2010/07/26/10042571.aspx
• Maarten Balliauw provides his take on getting started with project "Houston": http://blog.maartenballiauw.be/post/2010/07/23/Manage-your-SQL-Azure-database-from-your-browser.aspx
• This helps unravel the mysteries of how Azure Storage billing is done: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsazurestorage/archive/2010/07/09/understanding-windows-azure-storage-billing-bandwidth-transactions-and-capacity.aspx
• Rob Allen provides a great tutorial for getting started with Zend_Auth: http://akrabat.com/zend-auth-tutorial/
• Lorna Jane Mitchell walks through exceptions in PHP. This is great because it starts from the beginning (i.e. What is an exception?) and quickly goes deeper: http://thinkvitamin.com/dev/exception-handling-in-php5/
• A new project on CodePlex (which should compliment the PHPExcel project nicely), PHPWord: http://phpword.codeplex.com/
• Since I've mentioned PHPExcel, here's a good look at using it: http://www.devshed.com/c/a/PHP/PHP-Excel-Implementation-in-XAMPP-Localhost/?kc=rss
• I have to admit, I'm guilty of using the "do X or die()" pattern when writing code examples. This article has some good alternatives: http://codeutopia.net/blog/2010/07/28/the-do-x-or-die-pattern-must-die/
• I was glad to see that "How Microsoft Made PHP Suck Less On Windows" made Chris Cornutt's list of interesting PHP news from one year ago: http://www.phpdeveloper.org/news/14866?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
• The SQL Server Driver for PHP team is looking for more community input on their future direction: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sqlphp/archive/2010/07/26/another-opportunity-to-provide-feedback.aspx

Happy reading and have a great weekend.

-Brian

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