On PHPMaster.com today there's a a new tutorial helping you take some first steps with CakePHP, a popular full-stack PHP framework, by Vito Tardia.

CakePHP is a framework that provides a solid base for PHP development. It allows users at any skill level to rapidly develop robust web applications. [...] Personally, the reason why I prefer CakePHP over other PHP frameworks is its better support for console applications. CakePHP has a powerful console tool that can be customized to build applications for both the web and the console world. In this article I'll introduce you to two of CakePHP's most useful features: automatic code generation using the console tool Bake and dynamic scaffolding.

He walks you through the full (user friendly) installation and configuration, a few changes to increase security and where to go to set up your database connection. From there he shows how to use the "Bake" command to generate a "subscribers" model and automatically create the user interfaces to work with it (CRUD operations)

On NetTuts.com today there's a new tutorial posted about using a microframework for prototyping an application you may not need a full stack framework to get running. Their examples are based on the Slim framework.

Let's face it: we all have great ideas for a web application. Whether you write them down on paper or remember them using your eidetic memory, there comes a point when you want test whether or not your idea is really viable. In this tutorial, we'll use a micro framework, a templating language and an ORM to rapidly develop an application prototype.

There's an introduction to help you get Slim, some extras, Twig templating and Paris and Idorm set up and working happily together. There's code included for bootstrapping the application, creating a few routes, building models and using them to pull data from the database. They also create an "admin" area for their sample blog application, building an "add article" form and protecting it with a simple login system. You can download the source if you'd like to see it all working together.

Bradley Holt has a new post to his blog today talking about something he's a fan of in his development processes - rapid release cycles - and how something like the Zend Framework could benefit from it.

There has been some discussion recently on the Zend Framework mailing list around release cycles. I proposed a release cycle of six months for major versions (someone else suggested eighteen months, which may be more reasonable for a framework). Rapid releases allow one to accelerate the cycle of building, measuring, and learning. Gathering data from actual usage (measuring) provides an opportunity for learning that can be applied to the next release (building).

He points out that the post isn't specifically targeted at the Zend Framework project, merely that it was the inspiration point for the idea. He talks about what rapid release cycles are and what it can give the team that implements it - less worries about backwards compatibility breaks, a potential encouragement for development pacing and the ease for the customers doing upgrades.

A rapid release cycle allows you to apply new learning, knowledge, and perspective as often as possible. Do your best today, and give yourself opportunities to do your best in the future as well.

In this recent post on the Invoke Media blog Andrew Liem takes a look at the Zend Framework and shows how to create a simple site from install to execute.

This article is aimed at php developers who are looking to learn more about how not to reinvent the wheel, in particular, with the new Zend framework. This is not a comparative list of all php frameworks, as there are many good ones out there, CakePHP and Symphony to name two. I've evaluated other frameworks to some degree, not exhaustively by any means, and the Zend framework seems to fit nicely with my requirements. It may not for you, but I'll try to persuade you in this article

He introduces the framework first including a brief touch on MVC, the DOJO integration and its power and flexibility. From there he lists the tools you'll need to follow along with him, setting up the framework and creating a very simple site in it based on a pre-generated database (with the typical create/read/update/delete functionality).

The International PHP Magazine website has pointed out a new PHP 5.2+ framework that's in development - Aurora.

A slim modular model-view-controller (MVC) framework written in PHP5.2+ for rapid development of web- or console-applications featuring an integrated db-api, template-logic, pretty-urls, internationalization, caching, data-models and a multi-layered file-tree.

They've just released version 20071127 adding all sorts of new features and bugfixes. Right now, there's not a whole lot to go on - several bits of documentation are listed to the right of the site, but the only real page is the introduction. If you'd like to be kept up to date on the project, though, you can always subscribe to their news feed.

Packt Publishing has just released one of their latest PHP-related books just for the frameworkers out there looking to get introduced to one of the easiest to use PHP frameworks on the web - CodeIgniter. The book, "CodeIgniter for Rapid PHP Application Development", was written by David Upton director of a specialized management company. Here's Packt's official description from the press release:

This book explains how to work with CodeIgniter in a clear and logical manner. It is not a detailed guide to the syntax of CodeIgniter, but makes an ideal complement to the existing online CodeIgniter user guide, helping you grasp the bigger picture and bringing together many ideas to get your application development started as smoothly as possible.

[...] CodeIgniter for Rapid PHP Application Development is out now and is written for developers who are new to CodeIgniter. Basic skills in PHP and MySQL are required, but only rudimentary object-oriented knowledge is required.

You can purchase the book at your retialer of choice or you can get more information on the book itself from this page on the Packt Publishing website.

On the Blogge site, there's a listing of "must knows" that developers should understand about the CakePHP framework when working with it.

CakePHP is a rapid development framework for PHP which uses commonly known design patterns like ActiveRecord, Association Data Mapping, Front Controller and MVC. Our primary goal is to provide a structured framework that enables PHP users at all levels to rapidly develop robust web applications, without any loss to flexibility.

Among those on the list of handy tips for using the framework are things like:

• Static pages - Adjusting other data sent to the layout
• Viewing the SQL queries that are running behind the scenes
• Using bake.php
• Complex model validation
• Creating a model for a table that doesn't actually exist in the database
• Inserting multiple rows in succession

As Justin Silverton points out in his latest post to the JSLabs blog, CodeGear has officially released their version of Delphi for PHP.

From the official announcement:

CodeGear, a leader in developer tools, today announced that Delphi® for PHP '" an integrated visual Rapid Application Development (RAD) environment for the popular PHP Web development language '" is now shipping worldwide.

Delphi for PHP brings the RAD productivity benefits that Delphi users have enjoyed for years to PHP Web developers. PHP, designed to allow Web developers to write dynamically generated pages quickly, is the most prominent dynamic Web language today and has become one of the top 10 programming languages overall.

Features of this new tool include VCL for PHP, an open-source PHP 5 visual component library with more than 50 reusable components and seamless AJAX integration, an integrated PHP debugger, and a code editor with Code Insight, Code Explorer, and Code Templates.

Check out the main site for the software or one of the videos showing it in action:

• Using VCL for PHP to build database application and data dictionary in Delphi for PHP
• Delphi for PHP Simple Application

CodeGear (from Borland) has officially announced the release of Delphi for PHP, a new rapid application development environment for a more visual approach to PHP development.

Many web developers today use PHP to develop portal frameworks, forums, and web applications because PHP allows them to create dynamic web applications with solid database connectivity. However, PHP web development has been stymied by the lack of a powerful RAD visual development environment. The existence of an active and vital open source PHP ecosystem with myriad of open source components and options makes the need for an integrated RAD development environment even more critical.

You can check out this new software and all of its features on the CodeGear website.

The International PHP Magazine site has posted the results of their poll (still taking votes, by the way) about what some of the prerequisited of a good framework should be.

The International PHP Magazine conducted a poll last week, asking for your opinion on the 'Pre-requisites of a good framework'. The options provided include:

• Strong separation of data
• Web 2.0 support and preferably libraries built in
• Strong naming conventions and smart English recognition
• Robustness (ability to handle large volumes of traffic and data)
• Rapid development features (scaffolding etc.)
• A great IDE (preferably Eclipse)
• Others

The results so far show that two options are neck and neck for users - the correct/strong seperation of data and the framework's robustness for dealing with the loads. Pulling in close behind them is the need for rapid development, making it quick and easy to use.