Introducing: Zend Framework

1. Introducing: Zend Framework John Coggeshall

2. Welcome • Today I’ll be introducing you to the Zend Framework • What it is • Why we’re doing it • How to use it • Where it’s going • How to be a part of it

3. Getting Started • Zend Framework is.. • A modular collection of PHP classes based on PHP 5 to simplify common tasks • A starting point for your applications • A demonstration of PHP 5 best practices • A smaller component of the PHP Collaboration Project • Zend Framework isn’t… • A free-reign open source project • A religion

4. Goals of the Framework • Zend Framework strives to be fundamentally…. • An industry-leading framework for PHP application development • A partnership between many companies already experienced in PHP Framework development • Zend Framework strives to be technically… • A source of high-quality, PHP 5 / E_STRICT compatible application components • Completely PHP 5 powered, requiring as few external PHP extensions as necessary • A minimal object hierarchy to achieve the necessary goals • Modular design allowing developers to use the framework at will, as they see fit.

5. Why Yet another Framework? • Keep PHP competitive with other technologies • .NET, Java, etc. • Provide “clean” IP to enable commercial use • Real companies can’t just “borrow” code from the Internet without clear licensing • “Extreme Simplicity”: It may not be simple technically, but using it should be. • Take full advantage of PHP 5

6. The Framework License • Zend Framework is licensed using a PHP/BSD style license • Anyone can use it, for anything, no strings attached – period. • Along with the license of the framework itself, contributors must sign a Contributor License Agreement (CLA)

7. There’s no such thing as a free… • Why spend so much time and effort on something, just to give it away? • Yes, we’re still interested in making money • For the continued success of PHP it must be a collaboration beyond OSS hackers • Through the PHP Collaboration project, and projects like Zend Framework, we can leverage the knowledge of some of the best in the industry in the benefit of PHP as a whole • As you might expect, Zend benefits with PHP

8. We eat our own dog food • Zend Framework is more than unit-tested, it is used in real-life production environments • Gives us the ability to test performance, ease of use, etc. in a practical environment • Zend and its partners are already using the preview release of the Framework to speed development of their applications • Both the Framework homepage (framework.zend.com) and our new Developer’s Zone (devzone.zend.com) use the preview release of Framework as their foundation.

9. The grail: Extreme Simplicity • Many of PHP 5’s most exciting new technologies are really simple to use: • Simple XML • SOAP • Tidy • While the underlying technologies may be extremely complex, the end-user APIs are reduced to an extremely simple interface

10. Getting the Grail • To achieve the grail of extreme simplicity • “Simple things should be simple, complex things should be possible” • Use-at-will architecture • You shouldn’t be forced into buying the whole pizza just for a slice • Use individual components (controller/model) without being forced to use everything (your own template/view) • Configuration-less • The framework should be plug-and-go, no configuration files necessary

11. Zend Framework from 10,000 feet

12. Completely PHP-5 focused • Requires PHP 5.0.4 or later for near future • Takes full advantage of the PHP exception model • Constants are all at the class-level • No functions in global namespace • ZE2 / SPL technologies fully utilized where it makes sense • Black magic __magic() functions used very sparsely

13. Preview Release • PR 1.2 is the latest preview release of the Framework including many immediately useful tools such as: • A basic MVC framework for application design • A PDO-based database layer • Feed (RSS, Atom) ingestion and manipulation • An HTTP client • Input data filtering • Json support for AJAX • PDF generation and manipulation • RPC / Web service support • And more!

14. Getting Zend Framework • You can either get the framework preview release or check out the latest repository version • Preview Release: http://framework.zend.com/ • Repository: $ svn checkout http://framework.zend.com/svn/framework/trunk

15. Installing Zend Framework • Installing the framework is very easy, just modify your include_path to include the library/ directory From php.ini: From .htaccess …… include_path=“.:/usr/local/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/ZendFramework” …… …… php_value include_path “.:/usr/local/lib/php:/usr/local/lib/ZendFramework” ……

16. MVC Pattern • MVC, or Model View Controller pattern is a powerful technique for developing user interfaces • Originally was conceived for client-side GUI applications and adopted to the web • Zend Framework provides a simplistic MVC model

17. Example Controller • Note: indexAction() is declared abstract in Zend_Controller_Action, and therefore must be defined in any Action/Page controller

18. Passing Parameters • Beyond $_GET/$_POST you can also pass parameters to a specific controller action by appending them to the URL: • http://localhost/foo/dosomething/param1/value1/param2/value2 • Parameters can be accessed from within the action by name • $this->_getParam(<key> [, <default value>]); • $this->_getAllParams();

19. Dealing with 404s • 404 errors are no longer the responsibility of Apache per-se, and are more likely to result in a ‘Class not found’ / ‘Method not found’ exception • To deal with these Zend Framework provides two methods • In the event of a controller not found, the IndexController::noRoute() method will be called instead • In the event a controller action is not defined, it is the responsibility of the controller to implement safeguards (i.e. __call() which traps bad action calls)

20. Chaining Controllers • Controllers can be chained together to either break business logic out into components, or to otherwise redirect the user • $this->_forward(<controller_name> [, <parameters>]) • Parameters are a series of key/value pairs • Controller Chaining does not occur until the current action is complete, to immediately forward you must return from the current action after calling _forward() • Forwarding does not cause a refresh on the client, to physically refresh the browser • $this->_redirect(<url>);

21. Final thoughts on MVC • Although the pattern dictates three individual class types, they are as conceptual as functional • For instance a “model” or “view” isn’t absolutely necessary to gain most of the benefit of MVC • You can always perform queries from a controller • You can always print output from a controller • Although not necessary, they are never the less recommended

22. Input Filtering

23. Zend_InputFilter • Security is a primary concern in Zend Framework • As such, we provide facilities to clean and manage untrusted data in your applications via Zend_InputFilter and Zend_Filter • Provides a number of methods for filtering data against many common data types (digits, alphanumeric, alpha, phone, etc.)

24. Using Zend_InputFilter • With Input Filter you can both test data types and retrieve filtered data easily • Note, by default the source of the data and all of it’s references are destroyed when filtered

25. Zend_Mail • Simplifies building and sending e-mail • Supports MIME types and multipart e-mail • Supports multiple transports and persistent connections automatically • Supports large file attachments via the streams API improving performance

26. Sending HTML mail is now really easy

27. Zend_Search • PHP 5 implementation of the popular Lucene search engine from the Java world. • Simplified API • Requires no special PHP extensions • Fully compatible with the binary index format of Java Lucene 1.4 and above

28. Zend_Search Features • Ranked Searching • Best results always first • Many Query types: phrase, wildcard, proximity • Search by field (Author, title, body, etc.) • Robust, and simple API • One-method intelligent searches against indexes, or complex OO queries if desired • Index multiple document types, with different field requirements

29. Using Zend_Search • Using Zend Search is very easy • The search engine also boasts a parser for google-like searching: zend php -java

30. Adding documents to the index

31. Cool things about Zend_Search • The Lucene search engine allows you to index multiple document types in a single index, each with different index fields • Index Individual documents with different searchable criterion • I.e. Index code samples by functions used, while articles by title, author, and keywords in the same index • Because it is 100% compatible with Lucene 1.4+, it is compatible with all pre-created index files

32. Questions?