https://www.daveliddament.co.uk Articles and talks by Dave Liddament en-gb https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/type-safe-php/ Type hints reduce bugs and enable safe refactoring, but PHP's type system has limits. Learn how static analysis bridges the gaps. Wed, 15 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/type-safe-php/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/systems-to-cisterns/ The bootcamp for software engineers who want to switch to plumbing. Wed, 01 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/systems-to-cisterns/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/ai-writes-code-phpstan-keeps-it-honest/ As AI generates more of our code, custom PHPStan rules keep quality and coding standards in check. Fri, 13 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/ai-writes-code-phpstan-keeps-it-honest/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/rector-beyond-upgrades/ Rector is best known for code upgrades, but it can do much more. Learn how to automate repetitive tasks and enforce standards with custom rules. Fri, 13 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/rector-beyond-upgrades/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/static-analysis-first/ Where appropriate should PHP updates start off in static analysis world before becoming part of the PHP language? Sun, 08 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/static-analysis-first/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-injectable-version-attribute/ Learn how the InjectableVersion attribute ensures that correct interface of class is used in Dependency Injection. Tue, 03 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-injectable-version-attribute/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-restrict-trait-to-attribute/ Learn how the RestrictTraitTo attribute ensures that traits are used correctly. Thu, 26 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-restrict-trait-to-attribute/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/demystifying-dependency-injection-in-symfony/ The Dependency Injection Component is a key part of all Symfony applications. It helps developers write decoupled and maintainable code. Fri, 05 Dec 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/demystifying-dependency-injection-in-symfony/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-test-tag-attribute/ Learn how the TestTag attribute helps with testing. Fri, 28 Nov 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-test-tag-attribute/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/creating-custom-phpstan-and-rector-rules/ Full-day workshop covering how to write custom rules for both PHPStan and Rector. Wed, 26 Nov 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/creating-custom-phpstan-and-rector-rules/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-namespace-visibility-attribute/ Learn how the NamespaceVisibility attribute emulates the missing package visibility modifier. Tue, 21 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-namespace-visibility-attribute/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-must-use-result-attribute/ Learn how the MustUseResult attribute can prevent coding mistakes. Sun, 05 Oct 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-must-use-result-attribute/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-the-friend-attribute-in-php-creational-design-patterns-example/ Learn how the Friend attribute can be used to enforce the usage of creational design patterns. Sat, 27 Sep 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-the-friend-attribute-in-php-creational-design-patterns-example/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-php-language-extensions-library/ It's possible to use static analysis to emulate new language features in PHP. This article examines how, and introduces the PHP Language Extension Library. Sun, 14 Sep 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/introducing-php-language-extensions-library/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/custom-phpstan-rules/ PHPStan increases code quality and reduces bugs. Learn how custom rules amplify these benefits. Wed, 30 Apr 2025 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/custom-phpstan-rules/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/mastering-automated-refactoring-with-custom-rector-rules/ Workshop to create your custom Rector rules Sun, 03 Nov 2024 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/mastering-automated-refactoring-with-custom-rector-rules/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/elevating-legacy/ This talks through how to do upgrade legacy codebases. Wed, 14 Feb 2024 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/elevating-legacy/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/adding-phpstan-to-existing-projects/ This is the first part of a 4 part series of articles about adding PHPStan to existing projects. First we'll deal with team members who might object. Fri, 23 Jun 2023 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/adding-phpstan-to-existing-projects/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/getting-the-most-from-static-analysis/ Learn how to write code to get the most from static analysis tools, so you reduce the bug count on projects you're working on. Tue, 23 May 2023 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/getting-the-most-from-static-analysis/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/converting-php-engine-to-rust/ The code that executes PHP is currently written in C. Converting this to Rust offers many advantages. This article talks about work in progress to convert the C code to Rust, using Chat GPT. Sat, 01 Apr 2023 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/converting-php-engine-to-rust/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/writing-custom-phpstan-rules/ Workshop to create your custom PHPStan rules Thu, 03 Nov 2022 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/writing-custom-phpstan-rules/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/extending-the-php-language/ Learn how to implement new language features using static analysis. Thu, 20 Oct 2022 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/extending-the-php-language/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/introducing-static-analysis-to-legacy-projects/ Tips on how to use static analysis tools with legacy projects Mon, 03 May 2021 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/introducing-static-analysis-to-legacy-projects/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/sarb-v1-released/ Static Analysis Results Baseliner (SARB) is used to create a baseline of these results. As work on the project progresses SARB can takes the latest static analysis results, removes those issues in the baseline and report the issues raised since the baseline. Learn all about version 1. Thu, 18 Mar 2021 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/sarb-v1-released/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/php-generics-standard/ Generics in PHP is already a reality with static analysis. The leading static analysers have largely converged on an unofficial standard. This article proposes the first steps towards a standard. Mon, 14 Dec 2020 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/php-generics-standard/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/php-generics-today-almost/ Many PHP developers would love generics. We might have to wait a while until they come along. This article shows how existing tools can give us the power of generics now (almost). Wed, 05 Jun 2019 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/articles/php-generics-today-almost/ Article https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/php-generics-today-almost/ Many PHP developers would love generics. We might have to wait a while until they come along. This article shows how existing tools can give us the power of generics now (almost). Wed, 05 Jun 2019 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/php-generics-today-almost/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/practical-static-analysis/ Static Analysis can drastically reduce the bug count in your codebase. This talk gives practical advice on integrating static analysis into your development workflow. Sat, 01 Sep 2018 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/practical-static-analysis/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/code-review-and-ci-in-your-lunch-break/ Code review and CI are vital parts of the modern software development process. It also dead easy to set these up for your project. Find out why and how in this talk Sun, 01 Jul 2018 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/code-review-and-ci-in-your-lunch-break/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/assert-true-is-decoupled-my-tests/ It's good practice to write decoupled code. That good practice should include minimising the coupling between your test code and the code under test. This talk examines why this is important and how to achieve it. Tue, 01 May 2018 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/assert-true-is-decoupled-my-tests/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/effective-code-review/ There are so many benefits from code review; lower development costs, increased code quality, quick up-skilling and on-boarding of team members. This talk shows you how to get the best out of code review. Sun, 01 Apr 2018 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/effective-code-review/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/the-git-eureka-moment/ Let me share my git eureka moment with you. The moment when suddenly everything git related made sense. We'll delve just below the surface to understand what commits and branch really are. With these concepts cemented we'll look at some of git's more advanced features. Wed, 15 Nov 2017 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/the-git-eureka-moment/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/beat-the-bugs-before-they-beat-you/ This talk will show you how to write cleaner code with fewer bugs. And best of all you can apply them the next time you write code. Thu, 29 Jun 2017 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/beat-the-bugs-before-they-beat-you/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/dont-be-so-primitive/ A quick look at Value Objects, what they are, the benefits they offer and why sometimes they should be used instead of PHP's primitive types. Wed, 10 May 2017 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/dont-be-so-primitive/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/test-suite-holy-trinity/ This talk look at the properties of unit, integration and system tests in terms of what they test, how fast they run and how quick they are to write. Will look at how to get the most out of testing at each of these levels, how best to architect code for testing and where best to make comprises. Sat, 01 Apr 2017 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/test-suite-holy-trinity/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/decoupling-with-events/ Decoupled code is easier to understand, test and extend. This talk looks at how you can use events for decoupling. Wed, 12 Oct 2016 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/decoupling-with-events/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/code-review-with-gerrit/ Quick introduction to integrating code review using Gerrit into your workflow. Wed, 14 Oct 2015 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/code-review-with-gerrit/ Talk https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/design-for-testability/ Testing code is difficult right? Not if you design your code with testability in mind. Learn how with this talk. Wed, 13 Aug 2014 00:00:00 GMT https://www.daveliddament.co.uk/talks/design-for-testability/ Talk