Top 10 Open source tutorials and articles -- November 2011

1. How to use Subversion with Eclipse

   From the beginning, Eclipse included tight integration with the Concurrent Versions System (CVS) in order to provide access to change-management capabilities. Now, many projects — notably those run by the Apache Software Foundation — are using a different change-management system: Subversion. Find out how to use Eclipse for projects that use a Subversion repository.

2. Generate PDF files from Java applications dynamically

   If your application needs to generate PDF documents dynamically, you need the iText library. The open source iText library makes PDF creation a snap. This article introduces iText and gives a step-by-step guide to using it to generate PDF documents from Java™ technology applications. We create a sample application to better understand iText.

3. Read and write Excel data with PHP

   Learn how to use the XML support in PHP to read the data from the XML exported from Microsoft Excel 2003. Also, learn to export data from your PHP application as Excel XML so your users can see their data in a real spreadsheet.

4. 30 game scripts you can write in PHP, Part 1: Creating 10 fundamental scripts

   PHP is an easy to use, easy to learn, widely accessible programming language. It's well suited for developing simple scripts that you can use to help you in all kinds of games. Whether you play simple pen and paper games by yourself, complex tabletop role-playing games with a group of people, or online games of any kind, this series will have something for you.

5. Developing web applications with Tomcat and Eclipse

   Using Eclipse as a Web development platform is even easier when you integrate it directly with Apache Tomcat. Learn how to set up Eclipse and Apache Tomcat V5.5 to develop the quintessential Hello World servlet.

6. Introduction to Android development

   Android can be useful for other platforms and applications. In this article, get an introduction to the Android platform and learn how to code a basic Android application.

7. Developing applications using the Eclipse C/C++ Development Toolkit

   When most people think "Eclipse," they think "Java IDE." Eclipse is much more. With the proper plug-ins, you can use Eclipse to work with PHP, Ruby, and Groovy, C, and C++. In this article, you get started with the Eclipse C/C++ Development Toolkit (CDT). Build a simple application in C++ using the CDT and the C++ Standard Template Library (STL) to streamline the process and take advantage of some of the powerful features of C++.

8. Build GUIs with the Eclipse Visual Editor project

   The Visual Editor project has released a reference implementation. The Visual Editor release 0.5 is a GUI builder for AWT/Swing applications, a long-awaited Eclipse feature. Release 1.0 includes support for SWT. Get an overview of Visual Editor and the technology behind it, along with a short demonstration of Visual Editor V0.5's features for building AWT/Swing applications and a preview of the SWT support in Visual Editor V1.0.

9. Seven great PHP IDEs compared

   Discover what you should expect from an integrated development environment (IDE), and compare the cost and benefits of seven popular IDE choices.

10. Open source physics engines

    Graphics give games a visual appeal, but it's the internal physics engine that gives the game's world life. A physics engine is a software component that provides a simulation of a physical system. This simulation can include soft- and rigid-body dynamics, fluid dynamics, and collision detection. The open source community has a number of useful physics engines operating in the 2D and 3D domains targeted to games and simulations. This article introduces the use and basics of a physics engine and explores two options that exist: Box2D and Bullet.

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