Rob Allen has happily announced that he will be updating his popular "Zend Framework in Action" book for the release of the Zend Framework version 2 in the upcoming months.

I'm delighted to be able to announce that Ryan Mauger and myself have agreed with Manning to write a new book on Zend Framework 2.0. to be called Zend Framework 2 in Action! It's very early days, so we have planned the Table of Contents, but have very little manuscript. The current plan is to cover the major components of Zend Framework 2 in the context of a long running application that we will start in chapter 2 and then build upon as we go through each chapter.

The book will cover topics like creating Zend Framework applications, bootstrapping, modules, Doctrine 2 integration, caching, making and consuming web services and migrating your application up from the world of Zend Framework version 1.x.

Giorgio Sironi has posted a review of a book he's recently gone through and shares some of his thoughts on the book's contents and how well he thinks it reaches its target audience - "PHP in Action".

It is very rare to encounter a book like this, which teaches object-oriented programming from a non naive point of view (How do I write those "classes?") in the PHP environment. PHP is still catching up with other languages in this field and many developers can only benefit from improving their modeling skills and design practices.

He talks about the topics the book focuses on including a bit of information on design pattern and test-driven development as well as some of the basics of really getting to know the PHP language. This isn't a beginner book, though - as Giorgio notes:

The average developer which has a deep understanding of the PHP technology will find this book useful to start upgrading his skills to the next level. [...] The level of the book is adequate for the intermediate coder, thus I found it easy to read. Nevertheless, it is a good panoramic of the PHP landscape in term of the transition to object-oriented programming.

I want Enums in PHP

That's how this new post on the PHP in Action blog starts this morning. The one thing that he wants is enumeration support in PHP. He shows how it can currently come close with a "roles" system:

Useful examples I've encountered in web programming are states or stages in a process and user roles. Another kind of example is one I used in PHP In Action: an authorization system with three fixed roles or categories of user: regular, webmaster and administrator.

He sets up an example class that sets constants for the different access levels rather than just relying on strings to handle it (which, as he points out, could very easily be misspelled and not throw any kind of error) .

The Zend Developer Zone has released a new episode of their PHP Abstract podcast. They tried something new this time - a book review.

Today we are going to do something a little different. I've got books stacking up here that need reviewing, so I'm going to start interjecting book reviews into the podcast stream. [...] This week's book is "PHP in Action" by Manning Publications.

You can grab the mp3 of the podcast directly from the site or you can add the podcast's feed to your aggregator of choice and get this and other great episodes.

The Zend Developer Zone has released a new episode of their PHP Abstract podcast. They tried something new this time - a book review.

Today we are going to do something a little different. I've got books stacking up here that need reviewing, so I'm going to start interjecting book reviews into the podcast stream. [...] This week's book is "PHP in Action" by Manning Publications.

You can grab the mp3 of the podcast directly from the site or you can add the podcast's feed to your aggregator of choice and get this and other great episodes.

The PHP in Action blog has a new note about something that's been a long time coming - the release of the print version of their book.

Again a somewhat belated announcement: PHP in Action is in print. [...] Strenuously objective as always, I have to say that it's a pretty good book. I've had to read it about fifteen times already, and I still sort of enjoyed it the last time.

You can get more information on the book from its page on the Manning Publishing website as well as purchase a copy - $39.99 USD for the print version (plus PDF ebook) or just $20.00 USD for the PDF ebook by itself.

The PHP in Action blog has a new note about something that's been a long time coming - the release of the print version of their book.

Again a somewhat belated announcement: PHP in Action is in print. [...] Strenuously objective as always, I have to say that it's a pretty good book. I've had to read it about fifteen times already, and I still sort of enjoyed it the last time.

You can get more information on the book from its page on the Manning Publishing website as well as purchase a copy - $39.99 USD for the print version (plus PDF ebook) or just $20.00 USD for the PDF ebook by itself.

In a note from the PHP in Action blog, they point out the release of their ebook in PDF format:

Manning Publications has released the book PHP In Action as ebook in PDF format. I wrote it with help from my co-authors Marcus Baker and Chris Shiflett. The print version is due out June 30.

You can order both the ebook only or a combo of the ebook plus the print version directly from Manning.

In a note from the PHP in Action blog, they point out the release of their ebook in PDF format:

Manning Publications has released the book PHP In Action as ebook in PDF format. I wrote it with help from my co-authors Marcus Baker and Chris Shiflett. The print version is due out June 30.

You can order both the ebook only or a combo of the ebook plus the print version directly from Manning.

Raphael Stolt has posted a book review of one of Manning Publishing's PHP-related books, "PHP in Action: Modern Software Practices for PHP".

Over the last few days I got the chance to skim through the upcoming Manning release "PHP in Action: Modern Software Practices for PHP" by Dagfinn Reiersøl et al. The reviewed book is seperated into four main parts, covering lots of interesting topics in a good and fluent writing style.

Raphael outlines the book, mentioning the four parts the book is divided up into:

• Basic PHP tools and concepts
• Developing applications via Test Driven Development
• Web presentation and user interfaces
• Object-oriented development including things like database abstraction

Raphael gives the book a positive rating and recommends it for anyone that has the basics down and is looking to extend their knowledge that much more.