New year; fresh installs and stuff

Well a new year is here and with it I have some nice fresh dev tools to use.  PDT 2.0 was released on 29th December 2008 and is something I've been looking forward to as a keen PDT user for a while.  PDT 2.0 is much better with dynamic languages now that it's using the DLTK.  The intelligence and code completion on PHP/HTML/Javascript projects is a real leap forward although it can appear a little sluggish re-building the workspace. After switching to PDt 2.0 I also noticed that MacPortts 1.7 had been released.  I've been on MacPorts 1.6 for a while and there's been an on-going issue trying to install a couple of ports; logrotate for one.  It also sometimes had problems doing a PHP5/Apache2 install when you didn't want MySQL in the mix.   Thankfully MacPorts 1.7 fixes this and I decided to completely refresh my PHP5/Apache2 install on MacPorts from scratch.   I've now got a lovely clean PHP/Apache setup with XDebug, PHPYaz & Memcache.   Don't things always feel much better when you've installed them again from scratch?! To top it all off I swapped out the PC I have been running as  a Gentoo Linux server for the last few years.   My parents upgraded their PC after the hard drive died and I inherited a slightly newer, quieter machine to use as a server.   Gentoo has been my distro of since 2003 after previously dabbing with Slackware, Mandrake and RedHat.   I alwasys go through the minimal install to get exactly the setup I want – no universal install CD's here please!  The result is a lean, fast and rock-solid Linux server tailored perfectly to the hardware it's installed on. The final addition to the list is a new router to replace my aging Draytek Vigor 2600We – that didn't work out so well though.   I just knew deep down that I shouldn't have gone to PC World and chosen one.  I just knew that PC World would only sell your typical Belkin, Netgear or Linksys shite but I went and bought one anyway – a Belkin F5D8633-4, 802.11n-draft wireless ADSL modem/router with 4 port switch.  It's going back to PC World this weekend and I'm now back on my trusty Draytek until I decide to invest in a better replacement, probably another Draytek.  More about that in my next post.