Christopher Jones has pointed out a new customer interview that was done covering PHP and the connection pooling in Oracle 11g for Oracle Magazine.

Oracle Magazine's May/June 2008 issue contains a "Developer Nation" article. In it, David Kelly interviews Levi Dixon from Community Connect about using PHP and Oracle.

The article references the Oracle/PHP "strange combination" that used to exist and how it's evolved into a vital, living part of Oracle's stack (like with the OCI8 extension).

Padraic Brady has pointed out the "new kid in town" when it comes to magazines about PHP - Enterprise PHP:

There is a new PHP magazine called "Enterprise PHP" available in English, German and French which might even console those missing the apparently ill-fated International PHP Magazine. Back before publication the usual tree of suspects led me to being interviewed for the initial edition published a short while back.

The current issue (which you can get for free after a survey) has articles looking at testing your PHP scripts, how "professional" it is to use PHP and the fact that Java is not PHP (wait, isn't that backwards?)

As is pointed out both by Cal Evans and the Zend Developer Zone, there's been another article posted due to the response from the (now infamous) CIO article - "PHP's Enterprise Strengths and Weaknesses, Take 2" (by Zend's John Coggeshall).

So, in the digital toolbox of the developer, where has PHP been designed to work best? And where is it, perhaps, not the best tool for the job? [...] While other languages can surely be used to solve The Web Problem, in this article I explain why PHP is the premier solution for server-side Web scripting.

John talks about how PHP was written for the web, how it approaches and handles web requests, the security of the language and some of the major software packages that are being used in PHP development today (like the Zend Framework, PHPUnit and PECL extensions).

Maggie Nelson has pointed out an article in the most recently published edition of php|architect magazine (the February 2008 issue) that's an introduction to database design for programmers (by Mac Newbold).

It's a pretty good article about database design and I think all PHP developers who are just starting to integrate databases in their applications should read it. However, there are a few things I'd like to add and point out.

The "blurb" for the article mentions MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, Microsoft SQL, SQLite and database schemas. You can find out more about this issue, including how to get your own copy, from the php|architect website.

Carsten Lucke has has mentioned a new article he wrote that's in the latest issue of t3n-Magazin covering the Zend Framework.

I wrote an introductory article on the Zend Framework for the german t3n-Magazin. It is published in issue #11 and covers all the stuff you should know, to get started with the Zend Framework.

It includes some basic knowledge of the request processing the framework does, how the MVC pattern works, a look at some of the components and an introduction to renderers and helpers.

Ivo Jansch points out a recent interview he was asked to do in the Computerworld UK magazine about the recent launch of the Ibuildings company there in the UK.

I was recently interviewed by Computerworld UK regarding our launch in the UK and the current rise of PHP in the corporate world. The result is online here.

He also asks readers how they see PHP adoption going in their companies: "Post a comment to let me know how 'PHP' and 'Business' go together in your region."

This month's edition of php|architect magazine has been released - the January 2008 edition. Articles included in this month's issue include:

• PHAR: PHP Archive Files from Gregory Beaver
• Webmail 2.0: Introducing RoundCube by Tim Klampackel
• Killing the For Loop from Paul Chandler
• The Doctrine Framework by Nicolas Berard-Nault
• and the usual columns - /Etc and Test Pattern

If you're already subscribed, you should be getting your issue any time now but, if you're not, there's two ways you can get your hands on a copy - either "quick buy" it from the php|architect website or subscribe and get this and other great future issues jam packed full of great PHP content.

In case you missed the news, the folks over at php|architect have redesigned their website to make it even easier for PHPers and customers to find what they want. Marco Tabini, publisher of the magazine has posted about it to his blog too:

As you may have noticed, php|architect has a new website to replace our five-year-old ball of code. This change has been almost eighteen months in the making, and one of the main reasons behind my general absenteeism from almost any form of non-necessary social activity during that period.

[...] Here, therefore, are a few observation on our new platform, its development and our strategy. Consider this the "how we did it" piece, with its "why we did it" companion to follow in a future post.

He talks about the work that was involved (over 3 million lines of code!) and how the development process had happened before. To correct the situation, he headed up an effort to rework the site, bringing it back to a more manageable state. He describes some of the pains he went through in the process (i.e. hating databases, thinking about Python instead of PHP) and the three components they eventually hammered out - a custom framework for the logic, a templating system for the frontend and a service-oriented architecture for the backend that would make expanding in the future much simpler.

So, since it's a special occasion and they want to pass their joy about the release on to their customers, you can get free shipping for a limited time on all of the books shipped to the U.S. or Canada (and special prices for international orders).