What is the Zend Framework?

Zend Framework is a PHP based open source , object-oriented web development framework. It uses a the MVC (Model-View-Controller) methodology which means your web application is divided in three major parts (Models, Views, and Controllers). Its that simple! It not only makes your code cleaner, but it really enforces object-oriented programming (Zend views each application component as an object. Including HTML forms). In this particular article I would to share some light on when and why you would use a framework to make your web applications, what back-end databases it supports, and throughout the tutorial series I will teach you how to get setup on developing your applications using the framework.

Why use the Zend Framework?

A brief explanation on why the Zend framework is best suited for your web applications is given on the Zend website: zend framework site

With its extensible / flexible architecture this framework really increases productivity, saves you time, and doing so with simplicity. Not only that, but businesses use Zend because it separates the layers of an application which enables us as developers to preserve core business logic from the presentation logic. And one of the best things is that the application components are loosly coupled which makes it easier to perform unit-testing. Frameworks have completely revolutionized our way of making web applications and we here at codexperience recommend that you start using a framework in developing you applications.

What about Database, PDF, and Email support?

Zend supports a number of databases such as Oracle , MySQL , PostgreSQL , etc and has built in email and PDF generation functionality at your disposal. Of coarse (Since it's extendable) you can integrate other modules that do the exact same thing if you're more comfortable using them instead of Zend, but we will dive into that section when the time comes.

So what's next?

Next up is we need to set you up for developing apps using Zend Framework. Our next tutorial under this category will explain in detail the tools needed and the setup process as a whole. So stay tuned