CometChat is a Facebook-like chat application (which was featured before at WRD) with many features.

They are running a huge Black Friday Sale and also giving away 3 Basic licenses to WRD readers.

The application is built with PHP, sits in the footer of the websites and allows users/visitors to interact with each other via text or video chat.

It integrates tightly into many popular applications (WordPress, Joomla, vBulletin, phpFox, SocialEngine, etc.) and can be easily setup to work with custom websites.

Besides chatting with website users, it also supports Facebook + Google Talk and can display friends from them as well.

CometChat users can also make file transfers between each other, share each others screens and even play lots of games.

Also, a recently released version adds a mobile interface to all the functionality, moderation support for chatrooms, chat history and 10000+ games.

The Black Friday Sale

They are running an exciting sale until Sunday where Platinum Edition + Desktop Messenger is offered for $449 (one time) rather than $699.

For anyone willing to get CometChat, this may be a good opportunity.

The giveaway

CometChat is giving away 3 Basic licenses to WRD readers. In order join the giveaway:

• share your thoughts on “which CometChat feature you liked the most” as comments

and the winners will be selected randomly 1 week later (30 November 2012) with the query below:

SELECT * FROM wp_comments WHERE comment_post_id=3358 AND comment_approved=1 AND comment_type='' GROUP BY comment_author_email ORDER BY RAND() LIMIT 3

Good luck to all.

The winners

Here they are:

• der_robert (comment #863417)
• Faiban Bitter (comment #864523)
• Priyank (comment #863678)

Congratulations and thanks to everyone for joining the giveaway.

Git, Subversion and other version control systems are great for managing projects within a team and making sure that everyone in the team gets the latest versions of each file.

However, versioning databases is not a built-in feature in such systems and they should definitely be synchronized too.

DBV is an open source and PHP-powered application that can help us include databases in to the version control system we are using.

Once installed, it tracks each schema/record change (tables, rows, columns, views, functions, etc.) and allows us to export a SQL file reflecting the change (to a folder we want).

As this SQL file will also be committed with th version control system we are using, it’ll be received with other team members.

DBV supports MySQL by default and has a simple interface to implement connectors for any other databases.

We need different sizes of an image for responsive layouts so that they fit perfectly and so that visitors won’t need to download the full size when they are viewing from smaller screens.

However, it can be pretty time-consuming to create images with different sizes and “what is we need different sizes in the future”?

Responsive Img is a solution to all which combines a jQuery plugin with a PHP image pre-processor.

The plugin enables the page to change the src attributes of the images in parallel to the container width and the PHP file auto-creates the new/resized images.

Images are only created when requested for the first time and this process won’t be repeated for future requests to perform better.

It is possible to define the breakpoints and image dimensions for each breakpoint

Parsimony is an open source application which functions similar to content management systems but offers more and allows us to create any type of apps.

It brings the design, development and content creation/editing to the same interface.

Using its web-based database designer, we can create custom tables and even create custom modules (that can be inserted into web pages) using the data in these tables.

Whether it is a blog, an HR app or anything, Parsimony is capable of creating it only with drag ‘n’ drops.

There is a permission-based user management system which eases granting the necessary rights to each user.

The application is built with PHP-MySQL,  has a multilanguage interface and supports theming.

In order to simplify sign-in/sign-up processes and reach user data instantly, authenticating + authorizing users through social networks is a highly-used.

Social Auth is an open source and free PHP library that handles this process very easily.

It has support for 3 major networks: Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

The library is not limited to registration + login but can also pull user data where supported.

Everyone has a method for handling forms but it usually gets complicated when there are file uploads in that form.

Fine Uploader is a plug 'n' play script that ease file uploads and improve usability with the Ajaxed interface.

The script was known as valums-file-uploader (was featured at WRD) and deserves a 2nd shot with the improvements it had.

It only requires us to insert a CSS + JavaScript file and the rest is taken care of on the server-side with your favorite scripting language. No worries, ASP.NET, ColdFusion, Java, Node.js, Perl, PHP, Python implementations are offered in the download package.

Uploader can be the standard "file input" or it has support for drag 'n' drop uploads as well.

Also, there are options to limit the file size, file types, number of files and more.

PHP Error is an open source PHP library for converting the standard PHP error messages -that are usually faced during the development process- into better ones.

It integrates tightly into any PHP environment (works on all cases, only in development environment, only in some projects, etc.) and displays the errors with syntax highlighting.

Also, best of all, it includes the problematic PHP codes inside the error page so that we can instantly see which functions/classes/lines generate the error.

The library supports Ajax requests and has various options for customization.

In-page/floating chat systems always existed but it was Facebook who made the experience slicker and really functional.

Using ArrowChat, a jQuery and PHP-powered chat application, it is possible to bring this functionality to any website easily.

Similar to Facebook chat, ArrowChat sits in the footer of the web pages, displays the other users online and allows each user to communicate with each other.

Besides 1-to-1 chats, chatrooms exist too and anyone can create new chatrooms (with passwords, moderators, kicking, etc.). There is also a pop-out option for chatting while browsing.

And, optionally, you can activate video chats as well. With a Flash-powered interface, users with webcams can video-chat instantly.

The system notifies users visually and with sound when a new request (chat, friend, private message..) is received. Also, it has an "announcement" feature where we can send a mass announcement to users and they will again be informed from the same notification interface.

ArrowChat bar can be extended with other apps like games, social links, translation shortcuts and much more. A store exists for getting such apps and more themes to change the design of the bar.

There is a powerful admin panel for controlling all the aspects of the application like managing users, themes and features.

In case you a re willing to use ArrowChat with a CMS, it is integrated with almost all of them (WordPress, Joomla, vBulletin, phpBB, etc.).

And, yes, mobile support exists too. The chat app works well on mobile devices.

The discount

ArrowChat is offering a 10% discount for all WRD readers who use the coupon code "WRDREADERS" and this is only available when checking out with credit/debit card.

P.S. The coupon code is valid until 31 October 2012.

For anyone willing to share tweets when they are not online, various web services exist to accomplish this task (I had also built an open source app: Scheduled Tweets -not updated anymore-).

Tampon is a free and open source alternative (that is inspired from Buffer) that schedules tweets.

It is a Backbone.js application that uses MongoDB for storing the data and has a PHP-based REST API.

The application allows creating a schedule with multiple entries and auto-sends your tweets at those periods.

Tweets entered can be re-ordered with drag 'n' drops or, optionally tweeted instantly.

Considering it is open sourced, Tampon can also be a good starting point for creating a feature-rich, customized version.

Codiad is an open source web-based IDE application for writing and editing code online.

The application is built with PHP and doesn't require a SQL database but stores the data in JSON formatted PHP files.

Its interface has 3 panels:

• project/file manager
• code editor
• menu/actions 

where the left and right panels can be hidden on request for maximum coding space.

Codiad is capable of handling multiple projects with a single installation and any number of users can login to the application.

It removes the need of creating a local test/development environment and enables anyone to keep all data + the development process in a remote server.

Even though the application is still in an early development phase, it is mentioned to be stable and has an API for further improvements.