On the IBM developerWorks site, there's part one of a new series that combines the latest version of the Zend Framework with the power of Google applications to create a custom web application.

In this three-part "Create a productivity package with the Zend Framework V1.5 and Google applications" tutorial series, we will build an application with Zend Framework V1.5 that uses the Google applications. Here in Part 1, we explore the various features of the Zend Framework, outlining the many new features in V1.5 that we will take advantage of to build an example Web site.

This first part introduces the Framework briefly and helps you create some simple controllers and views. They use the Zend_Layout to help with the output and show how to implement view helpers to make components for the pages. There's no connections to Google in this initial part - that'll come later on.

You'll need to register/login to get to it.

Matthew Weir O'Phinney has posted a few handy tips for PHP developers fond of working in one of the most powerful command-line editors, Vim.

I use Vim for all my editing needs -- TODO lists, email, presentation outlines, coding in any language... everything. So, I thought I'd start sharing some of my vim habits and tools with others, particularly those that pertain to using Vim with PHP.

He includes tips for things like mapping keystrokes (to the PHP interpreter and linter), using the Project plugin to make setting up projects easier and a mention (again) of ctags.

The Zend Developer Zone has posted briefly about an award that the Zend Framework/DevZone received at this year's Jolt Awards (the "Oscars of our industry).

Both Zend Framework and Zend's DevZone were nominated for Jolt Awards this year. Zend Framework walked away with a "Jolt Productivity Award", for a project that is still in it's 1.x version, this is awesome!

Other categories in this year's event included "Technical Books", "Collaboration Tools", "Development Environments" and the category the Zend Framework was in - "Libraries/Frameworks". It beat out the Eclipse Modeling Project and the Spring Framework for the top spot in productivity.