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Former Member
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Ring the bells, a new blog is born!

Welcome, my name is John Coggeshall and this is the launch of the first PHP/SAP specific blog on the SDN (at least as far as I know). Don't know what PHP is? PHP is an open-source web scripting language -- the most popular web application development language on the planet. For those of you who don't know me, and I'm sure that is just about all of you, let me introduce myself a bit. I am a Senior Technical Consultant for Zend Technologies -- the company behind the heart of PHP: the Zend Engine. I'm also an author with three  published books and over 100 articles about PHP, speaker at web technology conferences worldwide and PHP core contributor as the maintainer of the tidy, xml-rpci, and BLENC extensions.

Now I have to admit I am a bit biased, but if you haven't taken any time to check out what PHP is all about I really think you should. There simply isn't a better language for developing web applications. Yahoo! is using it throughout their web properties, IBM has teamed up with Zend to provide a PHP solution for their servers, and even big-name bands such as U2 use PHP for their high-performance sites. Why? Well because there just isn't a language that can do the job better.

I know that's a pretty bold statement, but I can say it with confidence because I am very familiar with the other solutions out there. Despite my loyality to PHP I do have 5 years of Java development under my belt including JSP. As for ASP.NET, well I learned everything I needed to when Microsoft invited us out to Redmond to meet with the senior developers and architects involved with IIS, C#, ADO.NET and ASP.NET. Even with everything I've seen and heard, no other solution has been able to perform in the way PHP does, which is why I've stuck with it for the past 8 years.

Now that I have filled my haughtiness quota for the month, let me tell you why I'm here writing on the SDN. I'm here to announce a wonderful new partnership between Zend and SAP to help promote PHP use within the SAP development community. A little more specifically, I'm here to announce a new section of the SDN explictally for SAP developers who are using (or interested in using) PHP for their web-based frontends. No matter if you are a beginner or a pro at PHP this new community promises to be an important tool in harnessing the power of PHP and SAP together. Besides this blog, where I will do my best to be an active contributor to (I also have a non-SAP related blog on my personal site), there is also a new SAP/PHP Forum which I will be moderating. This forum is an ideal way for you to get your PHP/SAP related questions answered, ask questions of myself or other PHP developers on the list, and learn why PHP is the hottest and most popular web application language in the world.

So let's start things off by asking a simple question: How are you using PHP? Don't worry, if you answer "I don't" I won't be offended -- however I'd have to ask: why not? Did you know that there is an extension for PHP that lets you communicate with SAP? (its called SAPRFC)  Have you tried PHP and found it not to suit your needs? Got any success stories? I'm very interested in taking the pulse of the SAP development community when it comes to PHP so why don't you take a moment and Post your response to the forum and tell us all of your experience.

So that's it! Welcome to my blog and welcome to the new PHP section of the SDN -- don't forget to bookmark us 🙂

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