In a pointer from PHP Magazine this morning, the Oracle Technology Network has posted the second in their "Hitchhiker's Guide to PHP" series.

This week's edition: Shortening the Distance Between Prototype and Product using PHP:

Among the core business functions for companies that are driven primarily by an accounts receivable business model are entering, tracking, and billing orders. Companies that do a good job of this can scale their organizations and increase their profits without encountering infrastructure limits. When order processes are cumbersome, error-prone, or inconsistent, companies lose money through direct costs and reduced productivity.

At the company he works for, Myers Internet, they needed to have a system to accept, manage, and store all of their customer's order information. The idea here is to define and impliment as quickly as possible a robust standalone application in as little time as possible. Their turnaround time? They started in June 2003 creating the application, and by late July 2003 it was completed and ready for internal training...