Those PHP developers that live around the Columbia, MD area might want to drop in to the PHP user group meeting that Theo Schlossnagle mentions on his blog today:

Just a friendly reminder that we'll be having our first meetup [on 05.14.2008] as planned. I thought as a good kick-off we could all collaboratively share what we do with PostgreSQL. We'll start off with a whirlwind tour of how OmniTI uses PotsgreSQL, taking a brief look at ZFS, DTrace and large datasets.

The event will be happening here and will start at about 6:30pm.

Mike Lively has made the announcement that the Las Vegas area finally has its own user group:

I am pleased to announce that Las Vegas finally has a PHP User Group and our first meeting is...tomorrow. I am pretty excited as I know there is a fairly decent size PHP programmer community in LV, it just hasn't been organized yet.

Their meeting is later today (April 11th) at 4pm at PT's Pub east of I15 and south of 215. It's an "anything goes" sort of even so expect to come, socialize and meet up with lots of great developers from the area.

If you're going to be in the San Francisco area on March 6th this year and are a Zend Framework fan, be sure not to miss the traveling roadshow Zend will be doing at the SF PHP Meetup.

Wil Sinclair and Brad Cottel of the Zend Framework team will bring their unique brand of wacky antics, PHP-fu and in-depth knowledge of all things Zend Framework to the SF PHP Meetup this month as they present "Zend Framework 1.5: New Features".

They'll be showing off the latest and greatest that the Framework has to offer. If you'd like to check it all out, find out all the details on the SF PHP Meetup page.

Terry Chay, a popular speaker at many of the PHP conferences and photog to the geek chic crowd in San Francisco, will be speaking at the upcoming PHP Meetup for the SF PHP group. He'll be giving a talk titled "OOps! The PHP Fear and Loathing Guide to OO Design".

How does the PHP developer in the trenches create powerful object-orientation code? By doing what the PHP's architects did, of course: cherry picking the most pragmatic of OOP principles and patterns! This talk is targeted at the PHP developer who has basic knowledge of PHP OOP syntax but wants to find out where OOP principles can fit into a program.

If you'd like to attend, head over to the meetup page for the event and let them know you're coming. It'll be happening at the CNet Network offices February 7th @ 7pm.

Brian Moon (of dealnews) has officially taken the lead of the local PHP user group for North Alabama:

As of today I have taken over organizing the PHP/MySQL meetup.com group for north Alabama. Anyone willing to drive into town is welcome to come. Our first meetup that I will organize will be Monday, December 3, 2007. I will be posting directions and more info at Meetup.com once they grant me access.

The group is having a meetup tonight being sponsored by Codango - no word yet on the presentations, but several have already RVSPed to attend. If you're in the Huntsville area and want to attend, head over to the Meetup page for the group and let them know.

As mentioned in this new post from Chris Shiflett, an announcement was made at the most recent Columbia PHP meetup by Andrew van der Stock (of OWASP) about an incentive to work in their Spring of Code 2007 competition - a bit of financial reward.

The Spring of Code 2007, an effort that will distribute $100,000 to worthy projects, is divided approximately as follows:

• $20,000 for one lucky project.
• $10,000 for 10 open source projects.
• $40,000 for 8 large projects.
• $22,500 for 9 medium projects.
• $7,500 for an internship.

Chris notes that the projects should be related somehow to web application security and interest was shown in helping out with the security issues that surround PHP (both the language and developing applications in it).

PHP developers around the Columbia, MD area looking for ways to connect with other developers in your area show check out the new user group Chris Shiflett has started up - the Columbia PHP Meetup.

I just created the Columbia PHP Meetup Group, something we have been wanting to do for a while. The inaugural meeting is going to be held at our headquarters on Mon, 05 Mar 2007.

The plan for the first meeting, according to Chris, is to give lightening talks on whatever subject the attendees decide on. Other OmniTI-ers might show as well (Wez Furlong, George Schlossnagle, etc).

For those in the Jacksonville, Florida area, Codewalkers has a something that might interest you - the forming of a new PHP user group for the area.

For those of you in Jacksonville, Florida (like me) there is a new PHP user group. You can find it at www.JaxPHP.org. Currently the domain just redirects to the Meetup.com page. I plan to try and go to these meetings and help in anyway I can. If you are in the Jacksonville area, sign up!

Their next meeting is happening in 31 days (the last one just happened on the 3rd, the upcoming one, on September 7th), but you can RSVP now to attend the next meeting. The group already has several members, so if you're interested, sign up today!