Choosing a PHP Framework
Since programming is a hobby, I figured I would try something new……a framework. I decided to use a framework for 2 reasons. The first was to hopefully streamline development. I seem to sometimes get caught up on some of the back-end systems and the project never proceeds. By using a Framework, I hoped to remove some of drudgery of coding. (Which did and did not happen.) My second goal was to find a framework that would be easily scalable to add more complexity as I built the system.
I started by doing a ton of research. After reviewing a ton of Frameworks and their sample code, I narrowed it down to 3. CakePHP, Codeigniter, and Zend Framework.
Zend was my first choice. I will admit that it is probably the most impressive from a feature set but I found it to be confusing. I also think that it is more for the professional programmers and not us weekend warriors. If I was going to start a project for work, Zend would probably be my first choice to give another shot.
CakePhp was up next. CakePhp had some awesome tools to help put together a skeleton of the site. My biggest issue with CakePhp was its reliance on those tools. Most of the tutorials we based around using the tools to “auto-build” portions of the program. While this was nice, I found myself fighting with those tools too much and spending too much time trying to learn the tools.
Codeigniter was one of the first that I looked at but I ended up coming back in the end. Codeigniter and CakePhp both use the MVC (Model – View – Controller) philosophy. CakePhp holds you to those rules where Codeigniter allows you to deviate if need be. Codeigniter also was the easiest to get a basic site up and running. It was as simple as download, copy files to your web directory and then edit a couple config files. Within a couple minutes I had a site with user controls such as login, register, profiles and such. (I downloaded DX_Auth library which added all of that functionality)
Now the hard part has been learning the MVC philosophy and the details of the framework. After about a week of trying, I feel pretty good about my choice. I still occasionally run into issues but Codeigniter has one of the best User Guides I have ever seen. The level of detail and ease of use is top notch. As someone learning from scratch, this is a huge resource.
My next post…..coming up with the game idea.
