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I'm using Zend and want to know if there's any disadvantages to using it for a small website. The website is maybe 4 pages: a couple of forms and a couple of static pages.
Will Zend still speed up development for such a small website? or the opposite?
Does the whole bootstrapping flow and MVC structure and routing overburden performance for such a small website?
I see it being useful for a big website serving lots of content, but for a brochure website, does it still make sense to use the framework. It's sitting on the server so there's no initial cost to adding it to the project, but is there performance and implementation issues (maybe longer implementation time) for such a small project I'm not noticing yet?
I'm getting suggestions for other frameworks. I'm sure Codeigniter, Kohana, and modx are great, but they require time to learn their API. I already know and use Zend so the choice is between it and plain PHP.
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Originally Answered: Do you use the Zend framework? Why or why not? I have used Zend Framework on a couple projects and have found it to be beneficial in the way you described with all the modules it has to handle certain task. It does seem to be bloated as a pure MVC framework though.
So what are the Advantages and Disadvantages of Websites? The first and perhaps most obvious advantage of a business website is the potential for reaching a wider audience. The internet is used by literally millions of people, all of them are looking for something and some of them might be looking for you!
If you're using ASP.NET, you're at a disadvantage: It's a leaky abstraction at best, and at worst makes it a pain to do things that are trivial in other frameworks that don't hide the fact that you're working on the web.
Having a website risks attracting bad publicity. If a customer is unhappy with your service or products, then they may feel the need to vent their frustrations online and reference your website in their review/comments. This could be potentially damaging, hurting both your reputation and your search engine ranking.
I opt for the framework on nearly all sites.
In my experience, a site rarely stays as small and static as one might think when starting out. Using the full framework on a small site might seem like overkill, but it still assists in rapid application development.
Even if the site - as currently envisioned - is only a few pages, those pages probably share a common layout. So use the layout/template functionality of the framework.
Handling the forms and their submissions is easier in an MVC environment. The framework helps there.
And ultimately I find it aesthetically pleasing to truly separate concerns: bootstrapping, controllers, layouts, views, etc. Gotta put all that code/information somewhere. Why not in a set of standard places?
The most compelling argument against using a full framework for a small site would be if you had to actually "learn" the framework to do it. But since you are already familiar with Zend Framework, there is no learning curve associated to getting up and running; you get the RAD benefits right out of the gate.
In short, I find that it's faster to use the framework and it gives me the firm foundation to grow the site.
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It might speed up development, but it might be funny having a 27Mb library on a site with only 4 pages.
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