Wednesday, 14 February 2007

Overview of Creating a Business Case for PHP

Ben Ramsey in a new entry, over his blog recalls a discussion on #phpc on Freenode IRC about the need for white papers on the use of PHP in the enterprise/business world. He informs these white papers were supposed to serve as an advocacy for PHP. He says but more important than advocating the use of PHP, they would help answer questions relating to PHP management. The white papers would discuss the benefits of using PHP, highlighting its strengths and even noting its limitations. In short, it would answer the question, why is PHP suited or not suited for the task we need to complete? Ben explains.

Ben shows concern as three years have passed, but no one has ever published any white papers on PHP, giving it a business case. Even PHP enabled companies like Zend, OmniTI, and eZ Systems do not support any documentation from PHP in this area. He says that these white papers holds a lot of potential as it would outline how PHP can work alongside other languages like Java, and how PHP has support for XML and SOAP, making it a good choice to communicate with legacy/disparate systems.

He speaks about Stuart Herbert’s Google Group for developing a business case for PHP. He says though this group isn’t trying to advocate the use of PHP over other languages, he hopes that this group can generate white papers that will explain the benefits/advantages of PHP and why it is well-suited for particular tasks.