ZendCon 2013
7 - 10 Oct 2013 at Santa Clara, CA Convention Center

I felt this talk was a good overview of most software development processes. I was hoping this would be a more technical talk on code maintenance strategies and structure. Instead, this talk is probably half/half targeted at project/product managers and developers. I wish Zend would indicate the intended audience and presentation style better on the description of these talks.

There were a few code samples, but more coding samples and analysis of code should be included. Such as when talking about refactoring, code reviewing, etc, a example application that can be used as a theme throughout the whole talk would help.

Good general coverage of caching and tuning, but with most general talks, the deep dive into particular commonly used technologies is missing.

Of course, I would also have hoped for more hands on work within the session. These tutorials should all be workshops, not just talks, which is what the rest of the conference is.

First off, Evan, thanks for a great presentation! For me, not necessarily a waste of time, but this was WAAAAY over my head to get much out of it....other than realize how much I have to learn. I think there should be some expectations or prerequisites explained better in the session synopsis or maybe I just misread. I was expecting a introduction to the framework for PHP programmers who have never used the framework before. Another problem was it was supposed to be a hands on session but there were few power strips in the room so unless your battery life is good enough for the whole day, you're out of luck....again... not your fault. Evan's knowledge was beyond reproach; since he led the team that developed the framework, he was THE authority...and the fixes to the little "challenges" during the sessions showed you really know your shit! This, again, leads me to an expectations disconnect. I'm relatively new to PHP and have only used notepad (I did html back in 1995 for mosaic? browser) and zend studio for tools. I grew up with DOS and have no problem with the command line but I have no experience with GIT, composer or other topics used in the presentation so a lot of that just leaves me scratching my head. Because Zend Studio is so integrated with the Framework, I was hoping there would have been some examples using those tools...but it looks like all the presentations are going to be unix and command line....which I will, unfortunately, never use for the time being. My desktop is Windows and the server is IBMi. Maybe Zendcon, in general, should have a pre-requisite "topic" knowledge assumption to include. In any case, I'll be ready for next year.

This tutorial might have been a bit too ambitious for the time frame. For me it seemed like the patterns were rushed a bit to and I didn't quite get the point of all of them due to this. The exercises didn't personally help my understanding of the subject better than a good explanation but I really apreciate you guys trying to get the audience involved. I'm just the kind of guy who prefers to code in private in order to learn.

The presenters seemed knowledgable and competent, and I'm sure I'll be looking into design patterns when i get back home because of this talk.

At first I was bummed. My expectation was, as relatively new to PHP but programming in different languages for 20+ years, that we'd focus on stuff related to PHP specifically. The first part of the session was probably geared towards newer programmers and sole proprietors/consultants, as it seemed way too general. The 2nd half there was more focus on books, tools and topics more closely related to PHP and the outcome was very valuable to me. My situation is probably a bit unique; taking over in IBMi shop, all legacy code, virtually no functions (let alone classes) and just procedural top to bottom code with php echoing straight html unnecessarily in most cases. RPG program calls do much of the program logic. Oh...and did I mention I'm the only one on the "team" in addition to my other coding responsibilities? I learned some new terms "refactoring". Was hoping to hit up Adam for advice for stds in my situation but may check with some of the IBMi guys to see if they have advice.

Great session. Alan was very engaging and knowledgeable about the subject matter. Would be delighted to attend any workshop hosted by Alan.

Great session. Alan was very engaging and knowledgeable about the subject matter.

Very satisfied with this tutorial. It's easy to get lazy in your daily coding, and Adams talk helped me see some of the things I am doing wrong.