What PHP frameworks and libraries make you more productive?

August 31, 2012 9:59 AM

New PHP project in the works that I'm going to us as an excuse to learn a new-to-me framework. Kohana and Laravel are at the top of my list, but is there anything else I should consider? The project will be relatively simple, so a microframework might also be appropriate.

I already have experience with Codeignitor, Symfony, CakePHP, WordPress, and Drupal.

I suppose the three main criteria are 1) will expose me to useful concepts, 2) will allow for rapid prototyping and development, and 3) will be useful in future freelance work/job hunts.

Bonus: Any general purpose PHP libraries that have made it easier for you to keep your code DRY, or sped up the process, etc. that might be worth incorporating?

Double Bonus: Aside from backbone.js, yepnope, jQuery, twitter bootstrap, and boilerplate, are there any awesome JavaScript or theme kickstarters that deserve a look?

posted by jsturgill to computers & internet (5 answers total)

Flamework is an extraction/reimplementation of Flickr’s internal bits, by all the developers who’ve left Flickr over the years for places like Etsy and Glitch, and wanted pieces of their former environment to come with them.

What sets it apart from other frameworks:

Flamework is not really a framework, at least not by most people's standards. All software development is basically pain management and Flamework assumes that the most important thing is the speed with which the code running an application can be re-arranged, in order to adapt to circumstances, even if it's at the cost of "doing things twice" or "repeating ourselves".

I’ve got quibbles here and there with the details, but what FW gets right is a deeply pragmatic commitment to getting things running and keeping them malleable, from the people who more-or-less popularized the idea of continuous deployment. Look to Chad Dickerson, Kellan Elliot-McCrae and John Allspaw at Etsy for current writings and presentations on these ideas in action.
posted by migurski at 10:19 AM on August 31, 2012

Among microframeworks, maybe Slim or Silex.
posted by Monsieur Caution at 10:31 AM on August 31, 2012

Anything interesting that differentiates the two?
posted by jsturgill at 10:32 AM on August 31, 2012

I haven't used it much so far, but some colleagues have spoken highly of Zurb Foundation for a theme starter.
posted by ndfine at 11:18 AM on August 31, 2012

Anything interesting that differentiates the two?

Mainly the fact that Silex is driven by Symfony 2 components and written/maintained by the most prominent Symfony guy. For me, those are positives, and it's nice to see a good code base being reused (see also Drupal 8's expected use of Symfony 2 components).

But microframeworks are pretty similar, and perhaps you have a dislike of Symfony, in which case Slim is a reasonable PHP alternative in the same genre.
posted by Monsieur Caution at 12:18 PM on August 31, 2012