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All of my content in one feed, newest first.
5th November 2025
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Laravel's HTTP::batch(): Parallel Requests Done Right (Finally!)
Article
You know that feeling when you need to fetch data from multiple APIs, and you're sitting there watching your application make request... after request... after request... while your users are staring at a loading spinner that's been going for so long it's practically become a screensaver?
28th October 2025
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RectorPHP and Laravel: The Automated Refactoring Tool We Should Have Been Using Years Ago
Article
Hands up — how many of you have a Laravel 9 or 10 application that should be upgraded but the idea of refactoring thousands of lines makes you want to switch careers? We’ve been there. More than once.
25th October 2025
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Great Barr 9 Holes the Competition that Imploded
Golf
22nd October 2025
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PHP 8.5's URI Extension: Because parse_url() Has Been Lying to Us for 20 Years
Article
PHP 8.5's new URI extension finally fixes 20 years of parse_url() problems.
22nd October 2025
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Great Barr
Golf
18th October 2025
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Never Lose a Queue Job Again: Laravel 12.34's New Failover Driver
Article
Laravel 12.34 dropped earlier this week with a feature that made me actually say "oh thank god" out loud: automatic queue failover.
18th October 2025
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Great Barr 9 Holes - 18/10/2025
Golf
15th October 2025
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PHP 8.5's array_first and array_last: Finally, Native Array Helpers We Can Use
Article
Right, let's talk about something that's been bugging us for years. If you've been writing PHP for any length of time, you've probably written some variation of "get the first item from this array" more times than you'd care to admit. And if you're a Laravel developer like us, you've probably been spoilt by the Arr::first() and Arr::last() helpers that make this dead simple.
13th October 2025
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PHP 8.5's Pipe Operator: Finally, Readable Function Chains That Make Sense
Article
Right, I'm going to be honest with you - when I first heard about PHP 8.5's pipe operator, my initial reaction was "oh great, another operator to remember." and I can't see me needing to use this. But after spending some time playing with it I've completely changed my tune. This little |> operator might just be the best quality-of-life improvement PHP has seen since constructor property promotion.
8th October 2025
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Laravel Pipelines The hidden Class We've been sleeping on
Article
I'll be honest with you - we've been using Laravel for over a decade, and it's only the last year or so that we've properly discovered the Pipeline Class. I know, I know, it's been sitting there in the documentation this whole time, but somehow we just never gave it the attention it deserved.
1st October 2025
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The Laravel Community: Why Getting Involved Changed Everything for Us
Article
I've been thinking a lot lately about what makes Laravel special. Sure, the framework is brilliant. But if I'm being completely honest, it's not the code that keeps us coming back year after year.
26th September 2025
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