Rob Allen

Pragmatism in the real world

Zend Framework 2 in Action

Possibly the most frequently asked questions about my book Zend Framework in Action is whether it is going to be updated.

I’m delighted to be able to announce that Ryan Mauger (aka @Bittarman) 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 main topics we intend to cover are:

  • Creating an application
  • Bootstrapping
  • Controllers
  • Views
  • Models
  • Doctrine 2
  • Modules
  • Authentication and access control
  • Forms
  • Javascript integration
  • Navigation and pagination
  • Caching
  • Consuming web services
  • Serving web services
  • Internationalisation
  • Migrating from Zend Framework 1
  • Contributing to Zend Framework

We would appreciate your constructive feedback on our topic list. Obviously, we will be tracking the development of Zend Framework 2 and intend that Zend Framework 2 in Action will be the most comprehensive resource for the new framework and will be published after the release of 2.0!

Update:
It’s unlikely that this project will now happen as ZF2’s development schedule has been a lot longer than expected. I am intending to do a book of some sort though.

This article was posted on in ZFiA

40 thoughts on “Zend Framework 2 in Action”

  2. Great news! :)

    I like every chapter that you listed, atm cant think of anything to add there.

    What do you plan for chapter "Doctrine 2"? Just how to integrate it to zf project or do you plan to teach a bit about doctrine and how to use it?

  3. Would like to see a dependency injection or dependency injection container topic, if it makes sense :)

  4. Great news. Really hope to see a good material showing a good integration between ZF2 and Doctrine2. Also it would be really good if you explain the parts of the framework and show a good implementation of each feature in a system following the good practices, because one of the majors problems I see with ZF is that being too open, the developer has too do a lot of thing to use standard things like Auth, ACL or a Model implementation.

  6. Good to hear that you will be releasing a new book. I know that this book doesn't focus too much on the overall design of ZF, I think it would be a great idea to add in a common architecture section to the book that would discuss patterns that are in use and best ways to do things (aka when to use a view helper, an action helper, what should be bootstrapped, etc)

    Also a section on testing like XAngel stated above would be a good win.

  8. Greate. Do you allow pre-order with discount for "ZF2 in action"? Is there any version for Kindle? I'm from a very far away country (Vietnam) so that it's inconvenience to buy the hard copy, and the Kindle version is best fit for my need.
    Thank you

  10. Like GaVrA I'm also very interested in the different between Zend_Db and Doctrine 2. Does Doctrine have benefits over Zend_Db?

  11. Great news! I'm so looking forward to every topic that you two intend to cover. Maybe a topic about security will be great.

  14. Nice,
    I didn't buy the first book, but might well buy it when it covers ZF 2.0.
    Do you have an article what the main changes are for 2.0?

    Tnx

  15. That's great news for both of you.

    ZFiA was THE ZF book for users of 1.0 and I look forward to ordering a pre-release copy through Manning!

    I'd like to see a meta-chapter covering exceptions, auto-loading and possibly building your own components (re PEAR Coding Standards, design) to help users get the most out of the Framework's design in addition to simply consuming existing components.

  16. Hi Rob, I would like to see a chapter about Zend_Test. I'm currently struggling with this topic and I hope ZF2 will have a better documentation about this subject, or in your book ;-)

  19. I hope the way to build ZF Apps will not change so much as with ZF 1… it kinda made the book outdated pretty quick.

  21. Do you intend to cover Dojo in the Javascript chapter or in the forms chapter?

  22. I actually pre-ordered your ZFIA book a few years ago, and look forward to this new version. To be honest, I've been back and forth with Zend and am still learning it/frustrated.

    I would love to see a video series introducing Zend and MVC. I have a bootstrap file setup with a few basic sections (About Us, Contact Us) and would love to see a video starting with a single index page, and expanding to making a simple site using Zend Layout, then adding a static About Us page, then adding a Contact Us page incorporating a form and email submission, then expanding to a login page with registration, then pulling simple data from MySQL, then adding a search. This would all be in a video series that would include commentary and tips on why things are named the way they are and discussing MVC naming conventions.

    When I bought the book, a lot of the code wasn't working and I struggled to get the chapters working and fixed. I eventually gave up and just recently started getting into Zend and MVC again.

    I found another video tutorial with a basic bootstrap from killerphp.com and it was awesome to have someone explain things to me through video. Using this bootstrap and MVC structure I was able to make a static About Us and Contact Us page. My next goal was to add a form to the Contact Us page, where I used your tutorial on Zend_Form. I have your code in there but the struggle now is properly incorporating it into my site and adding this new functionality into it.

    This is my biggest struggle, incorporating and piecing together other tutorials into my current project. Its relatively easy to copy a tutorial and get it to work, but there are underlying things that need to be adjusted like where to reference/point your new application code and to be honest I am completely lost. I am seeking help here in this thread I created:
    http://forums.zend.com/viewtopic.php?f=69&t=9598

    I don't mean to get off on a tangent here, but I am the perfect example of someone who is new to Zend and MVC, but I do have ~4 years of PHP experience. I bought your book a few years ago, had some problems and put it on hold. Now I am picking it up and am still struggling with basic concepts and linking new code/directories when I add on new functionality.

    Good luck with the new book, I am more committed to learning Zend now and hope to get past these frustrations.

  23. Kevin, you should checkout zendcasts.com while you wait for this book. There you'll find lots of good video tutorials about ZF.

  24. Hey There. If you're going to publish a new book on this, you could (if you haven't already) have a look at some of the reviews people posted for you book at amazon.com. I confess I was somewhat put off by the reviews, and albeit not necessarily true sometimes, they do provide some insight into what your readers are thinking. Thank you and keep you the good work!

  26. Great news! Just hope more time will be spend proof-reading and testing the code than with the ZF1 version. In all other aspects that book was excellent!

  27. Great post and look forward to purchasing this book too. My request is that you make the Doctrine coverage thorough. I know several developers use Linux but majority are using Windows. Setting up and using Doctrine on Windows doesn't have a good tutorial

  28. Nice info.Well done for the efforts and time.
    How about a chapter on search, zend_lucene search?
    Thanx

  29. Great ! I bought your previous book. It doesn't only show ZF but explain "how to create an app", "structure the code", "make classes", etc.
    It's a great news !

  31. Sounds like an interesting project to undertake. How are you going to write about models and views and controllers when the MVC isn't done? Any chance ZF2 will ever be released?

  32. Perhaps you may want to add chapters on debugging using PHPunit and Xdebug.

    The main problem I have encountered with other Zend Framework books or tutorials is that often the steps in setting up the system to run Zend Framework and Doctrine changes with each update.

    Perhaps you may consider a web site that provides the details on how to setup Zend Framework for each OS etc which is updated as each major Zend Framework/Doctrine programs are updated.

    I look forward to your new book.

  35. How easy to move from ZF 1.11 to ZF 2. will it be easy or have to struggle, like the people who are using symfony, as they are facing much difference between the symfony 1.4 and the current SF2. AS the current SF2 is entirely restructured.

    I am little comfort in using ZF 1.11, and also like to learn ZF 2, so can u guys please clarify my doubt as said above. And also please let me know when the stable version of ZF will be released and any other information which will help me in knowing about ZF

  36. Ten months ago i've bought your first book about Zend, and i'm surprised because it is realy fast for me – it is my first time working on a framework. Rails looks easier yet. I hope that ZF2 could be so easy and fast for developing as rails. I'll buy your translated book as soon as possible. My sugestion is: can't you sell this on a e-book? It is easier for me to have PDFs than a lot of books, you know..

  38. Great! I will appreciate to read how to use and integrate doctrine 2 and I would like to suggest something with social networks and services classes(amazon, yahoo, etc..) and some modern use of ajax would be nice.

  39. Great news Rob. First book was excellent.

    My main gripe with first book was that the framework had already gone through major change by the time i had bought the book, and the some of the code examples didn't work when using the latest version. I fear the same will be true with Zend Framework2 in Action, because you are writing it so early in the development phase of ZF2. That said, I want your new book ASAP so I can start learning.

    I'm really glad you are considering Doctrine2. For me Zend_Db, whilst great, doesn't scale up well when dealing with complicated relationships.

    Try to get manning to ensure diagrams are clearer next time. Some of the diagrams in first book were unreadable.

    Please take my comments as constructive criticism. I will definitely be buying your second book.

  40. Hi. TDD!

    I Hope that you will Guys pay attention to a lot of requests for Test Driven Development.

    Good luck with writing;)

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I'm Rob Allen, a software consultant and engineering leader, concentrating on HTTP APIs. A proponent of Open Source, I maintain rst2pdf and Slim Framework, and contribute to Apache OpenWhisk amongst other OSS projects.

I live in the UK, run 19FT and publish Daily Jotter for Mac. I am a public speaker and wrote Zend Framework in Action.

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