Zend released a PHP Application Server beta today called "Zend Server" - http://www.zend.com/en/products/server/. It looks interesting, especially given the recent addition of AMF support to the Zend framework. I hope to find time to "play" with it in the very near future and, when I do, will post about my thoughts and experiences with the product. I'd also be curious to hear what experiences other people have with it.

How does this affect ColdFusion? To be honest, I won't be surprised to see some companies decide to use the Zend Server instead of CF - simply because it's PHP (not to say that there aren't some benefits inherent in that fact). That said, I don't see it as a technical competitor to ColdFusion because the decision to use one application server over another should be based on the features of that platform - the Zend Application Server appears to be a vanilla server out of the box whereas CF is integrated with dozens of features. Having support for these same features on the Zend Server would require writing or downloading the PHP code necessary for that functionality and then integrating it into the server environment. Of course, business decisions about software and programming languages aren't always based entirely on 100% sound technical merit.

If you're in the New York area, next month Ricky Robinett will be giving a presentation on Flex integration with the Zend Application Server at the New York Flex User Group (http://www.nyflex.org).

Ricky Robinett, who is a Zend Certified PHP developer and an Adobe Certified ColdFusion Developer who works with me at Nylon Technology, has just published a great article about using PHP and AIR to power desktop applications. You have to shell out $3 to get the PDF (or buy the print copy when it is on the shelves next week) - http://phparch.com/c/magazine/author/294.