In Chicago for php|tek

16 May 2007

After a very long and eventful day filled with multiple cancellations, delays, and overbooked hotels, I'm finally in Chicago (well, Schaumburg) and ready for php|tek. I'm fighting a cold (and currently losing; the travel problems haven't helped), so I might be incognito Wednesday morning while I try to recover. I should be around before my talk at the end of the day Wednesday, and of course I'll be around for the remainder of the conference after that. If you're going to be here, please stop by and introduce yourself.

I'm giving two talks, and the one I'm most excited about is The Truth about Sessions. This talk is similar to one I gave a few years ago in Toronto, but this time it's better. :-) The talk focuses on teaching you exactly how sessions work, beginning with the very basics (HTTP, statelessness, etc.). I spend a bit of time talking about session security at the end, but if I do my job, you'll understand sessions well enough by that point to devise solutions to basic security problems yourself. It's definitely a teach a man to fish talk.

My other talk is called PHP Security by Example, and it's more hands-on. The time slot of one hour isn't enough to let you work through each of the exercises independently, but I have tried to structure the talk to make it easy to follow along, so bring your laptop.

By the way, if you're wondering why Sean is so excited about Andy McKee, check out the highest rated videos on YouTube. (He currently holds 3 of the top 6 slots.) His mastery of the guitar reminds me of Kaki King, and I'm sure it will be really cool to watch him play Thursday night.