@Taylor: Thanks for mentioning the Maintainable Framework, it is the first time I hear about it. On a first glance it looks very nice, I have to investigate it further.

– Good design decisions for PHP (array shortcut, short open tag)
– Good code base
– Solid ORM implementation (object instance, STI, has_many :through)
– migrations and yaml.
– I think its way faster than Cake because Cake’s naming convention and class loader slower it down where Maintainable uses much simpler class loading

@David: Yes, that’s a good point. A framework should support you to become a better developer. And in this regard, Cake does a relatively good job.

@RainChen: If you are looking for a Rails-like PHP framework, then Akelos is probably the better choice than CakePHP. Akelos claims to be a Rails port, whereas CakePHP is “only” inspired by Rails. And yes, Cake is much less powerful than Rails…

And that’s what I’ve found some years ago. I really appreciate a framework that forces me to have good practice. I’m a trivial programmer and I did learn a LOT with this framework. T’was not always clear or simple, but made me Think ! ==> Why is that happening that way.. uh yea.. ok, I see….

:)
my two cents

Yes, my “wishlist” is a bit broad because I consider most features as “nice-to-have” and not as “must-haves”. If I look at my current usage of CakePHP, then there are only a few things I really need: ORM, MVC, clean urls (routing), and the CSRF prevention by means of the Security component and the Form helper. Everything else is “nice-to-have”.

And yes, it is a journey every developer is on, and it is not limited to finding the best framework. The same also applies for finding the best IDE, the best version control system, the best xy…

The wishlist at the bottom of that post is more what I’d hoped for, but in that case it’s very focused on the REST architectural style. I look forward to hearing more about your journey to finding the best framework for your needs. It’s one I think we’re all one whether we’re writing them or improving them through our reviews, tutorials, or gripes. :)

Thanks again for your blog and this post.

@titang: I only partially agree with “Simple to use and to understand” and “Very intuitive” ;-) Though those statements are true for many parts, there are also parts that are not that intuitive (e.g. Auth component).

And yes, in the end it is a matter of preference which framework you prefer.

@Brandon: Yes, I agree with you, a framework should encourage and support the developer to come up with a good design.

Yes, it’s not that clean that you can access the DB directly from anywhere, though it is a direct consequence of the design. And it is up to the developer not to use it anywhere ;-)

Yes, maintainability and extendability are often more important than rapid application development. And those points are usually the result of “slow” application development, because good design takes its time.

And yes, the core code of CakePHP and ZF are very different worlds ;-)

For instance, getting direct access to the DB from anywhere – yes, ANYWHERE within an app:

$ds = ConnectionManager::getDataSource(‘sourceName’);

EEK! That’s scary from many perspectives!

Personally, I see frameworks that emphasize rapid application development (aka “RAD”) as a step sideways. For those developers who use these frameworks for something bigger than a blog or CMS know that your time spent in development pales in comparison with the time you will spend in maintaining and continued development an app.

Many frameworks emphasize the idea of “Develop an app quickly” over “Develop an app correctly” but luckily I have enough sweat equity in this arena to see through the “cool features” of frameworks and look at the core code to see how solid.

Compare CakePHP and Zend Framework’s core libraries. It becomes painfully obvious in the first 20 minutes which package is better managed, designed and coded. And to me, that’s what’s most important.