I'm just wondering what is the possibility of PHPonTrax using Zend framework lib instead of PEAR lib.

Is there some license issues preventing this? I know QCodo, another PHP framework, is hesistant of using any of the Zend Framework lib due to license issues. But seeing that the zend license is pretty close to the PEAR license, i don't see why PHP on trax can't use it.

The reason why i'm advocating the use of Zend framework or ezComponents framework is 2 reasons:

1) It makes life easier for the phpontrax developers to mimic the rails features and develop new features. Most of the trax lib is coded from scratch. But i see that a lot of the trax lib could have actually used the zend lib to simplify and speed up development.

Take the router as an eg. The Zend Router Rewrite lib is flexible and feature packed. Instead of coding from scratch, the phpontrax could just create a wrapper around the router rewrite lib to create the desired features, instead of writing from scratch.

Want to mimic rails's Cache implementation using PEAR Cache lite? Why not just use Zend_Cache? It has file, APC, and memcached adapters. It is definitely easier with the Zend Cache.

Config files reader? You can use Zend_Config lib instead of coding the config reader from scratch.

And many more eg..... The zend components are loosely coupled, like PEAR. so it's easy.

2) Everyone is scared of PEAR. Many times, i mention PHPontrax in forums, the comment i get is that "Phpontrax is cool. But i rather use cakephp because it doesn't use PEAR." or "i've so much trouble setting up PEAR..." etc. Even if there is separate phpontrax download with built-in PEAR lib that is ready to go, the phrase "PHPonTrax uses PEAR" just turns people off, because of its terrible connotations. If PHPontrax uses the Zend Framework components, there is no such aversion.

Anyway, it's just some food for thought. I just feel that it would be easier for the phpontrax developers to leverage on the huge development community behind the Zend framework.

It is VERY UNLIKELY that phpontrax will be a duplicate of Zend framework.
Because Zend has already said that they do not want to copy rails. They have their own ideas. So most likely, they'll end up like Cakephp. Somewhat rails like, but totally diff from rails. (which makes it difficult for ex-rails developers to jump ship to)

Phpontrax aims to be a direct port of rails right? So i believe both zend and phpontrax frameworks can exist in harmony.

Oh well. enuff rambling. I would love to hear your comments on this.

I had similiar ideas. That change Trax to use all Zend components and use the buzz of Zend framework or components.... I think their database wrapper thang isn't mature as MDB2 or even better use PDO, but PDO requires you compile your driver into php which I don't like I want it to be ready to go or just add a lib file not to have to have special compile options for it to work. I have no objections to using Zend components in Trax. What is the licensing like with it? I want anyone to be able to do anything they want with the code. Currently Trax is under a MIT license.

I agree on the PDO issue wholeheartedly. I don't understand why they can't make PDO Mysql a default installation for the latest PHP 5 version.

So PEAR MDB2 should be a better choice... for now. at least until PDO Mysql is installed by default.

The zend license is utter liberal.





The only restriction i see is:

license info here: http://framework.zend.com/faq/license

Another good point about the zend framework lib is the better documentation. Take a look at it and compare it with the PEAR doc. It's top-notch.

http://framework.zend.com/manual/en/zend.db.html

So, the zend framework is like the Linux kernel. Phpontrax is the linux os.

There will be a lot of php frameworks built around the zend framework, such as Django on Zend, Struts on Zend etc. phpontrax will be Rails on zend.

Is there any benchmarks MDB2 vs Zend_Db...?

there is no benchmark b/w those 2 db abstraction lib.

but considering that pdo mysql is written in c code, i would expect the zend_db to be faster than mdb2