The document discusses common myths about the Symfony framework. It addresses criticisms that Symfony is hard to learn, extremely coupled, just configuration rather than programming, restrictive, badly performing, and the ultimate tool. For each myth, it provides counterarguments, explaining that Symfony has good documentation, a supportive community, and flexibility. It concludes that while Symfony has a learning curve, it must fit the project and team, and there is no single ultimate tool.

2. myphp-busters:
symfony framework
php|tek uncon
22-05-2009

3. Adam Savage

4. Jamie Hyneman

5. Stefan Koopmanschap

6. About me
• Professional Services Consultant at Ibuildings
• Husband, father of 2, slave of 6
• Symfony advocate
• Initiator of SymfonyCamp
• Founder of symfony-framework.nl
• Plugin author/maintainer

7. The myths:
symfony is...
• ... hard to learn
• ... extremely coupled
• ... not really programming, just configuration
• ... restrictive
• ... badly performing
• ... the ultimate tool

8. cc-by 2.0 http://www.flickr.com/photos/shonk/418180402/
Symfony is hard to learn

9. Steep Learning Curve
• Full-stack
• MVC
• ORM
• YAML

10. Great documentation
• The Definitive Guide to
symfony
• Practical Symfony
• Propel Edition
• Doctrine Edition
• Various other languages

11. Great documentation
• Official books in digital
form
• Forms in Action
• symfony and Doctrine
• The Cookbook
• API documentation
• Tutorials & Screencasts

12. Community
• IRC: #symfony on
freenode
• Forum
• Mailinglists
• Wiki
• Snippets
• Blog posts
• Various local sites

13. Symfony is hard to learn
• Steep learning curve
• Great documentation (online and offline)
• Friendly and supportive community

14. Symfony is hard to learn
The Verdict

15. cc-by 2.0 http://www.flickr.com/photos/u-suke/138067687/
Symfony is extremely coupled

16. Perhaps in 1.0
• symfony was the glue between components
• ORM integrated in the core
• It was full-stack or nothing

17. by-nc-nd 3.0 http://www.symfony-project.org/blog/2008/06/23/the-symfony-1-1-architecture
symfony platform

18. by-nc-nd 3.0 http://www.symfony-project.org/blog/2008/06/23/the-symfony-1-1-architecture
platform and framework

19. Symfony is extremely coupled
by-nc-nd 3.0 http://www.symfony-project.org/blog/2009/02/18/dailymotion-powered-by-symfony

20. Symfony is extremely coupled
• 1.0 had quite some coupling
• 1.1 introduced decoupling of the core: symfony
platform
• it is now possible to use core symfony classes
without symfony

21. Symfony is extremely coupled
The Verdict

22. symfony is not really programming, just
configuration

23. Just configuration is no fun

24. Programming should be fun
• No boring repetitive tasks
• No standard stuff you did 100 times before
• Write cool stuff
• Focus on the cool parts

25. Yes, there is configuration
• To minimize the boring tasks
• To ensure you don’t repeat yourself
• To enable you to concentrate on complex logic

26. So what is configured?
• database credentials
• caching
• access control (authorization and authentication)
• application specific values
• routing
• admin generator

27. So where do I touch code?
• Your custom complex business logic
• Application specific controller code
• View displays
• Custom administration tasks
• Your own libraries

28. symfony is not really programming, just
configuration
The Verdict

29. by-nc-sa 2.0 http://www.flickr.com/photos/two-wrongs/205467442/
symfony is restrictive

30. symfony is restrictive
• Default directory structure
• Default set of classes
• Default set of libraries
• ORM included

31. Default directory structure
• Easily change the most
important directory
locations:
• document root
• cache directory
• log directory
• You usually don’t need
to do this!

32. Default set of classes
• Default set offers most
common uses
• Easy to use your own
custom class using
configuration

33. Default set of libraries
• Default libraries
• lime (unit testing)
• prototype / scriptaculous
• Dozens of plugins
• jquery, dojo, extjs, YUI
• PHPUnit

34. ORM included
• Propel is default
• Doctrine is distributed with symfony
• There is no need for an ORM

35. You can just disable both!

36. Hell, disable the database
• When you don’t use the
database
• Models approach web
services

37. symfony is restrictive
The Verdict

38. Symfony is badly performing

39. Symfony doesn’t perform

40. Symfony doesn’t perform

41. Disclaimer:
No benchmarks!

43. by-sa 2.0 http://www.flickr.com/photos/mattieb/131215442/

44. Symfony doesn’t perform
• Slow
• Hard on the server

45. Symfony doesn’t perform
• Overhead
• just like any framework
• tweak it the right way

46. Symfony doesn’t perform
• Select your caching strategy
• Page caching
• Function caching
• Query caching
• Supercache!

47. Cache

48. Cache

49. Symfony doesn’t perform
• Turn off what you don’t need
• ORM
• Plugins
• Database
• Logging
• Helpers

50. Symfony doesn’t perform
• Don’t believe me!
• Yahoo! Answers
• Delicious.com
• DailyMotion.com

51. Symfony is badly performing
The Verdict

52. by-nc-nd 2.0 http://www.flickr.com/photos/mandolux/34418046/
symfony is the ultimate tool

53. Symfony is the ultimate tool
• full-stack framework
• based on MVC
• automation of common tasks
• supports agile approach
• MIT license
• DRY
• All the buzzwords

54. Symfony is the ultimate tool
• Learning curve is more steep
• Has to fit your project
• Has to fit your project team
• There is no single ultimate tool

55. symfony is the ultimate tool
The Verdict

56. Reference
• http://www.symfony-project.org/doc/
• http://www.symfony-project.org/blog/2008/06/23/
the-symfony-1-1-architecture
• http://www.symfony-project.org/blog/2009/02/18/
dailymotion-powered-by-symfony
• http://www.symfony-framework.nl/

57. Questions?
• http://joind.in/438
• http://www.leftontheweb.com/
• http://www.twitter.com/skoop
• http://www.ibuildings.com/
• http://www.slideshare.net/skoop