Web Application Development with PHP 4.0

Comparing Technologies

Before even starting to think about code layout, there's a phase we don't know what else to call but "getting things together." This is the intermediate step between the idea and the specs/code layout stage—figuring out the inner workings and on what to base them.

To make it clearer, let's go back to the very beginning:

• What do we want to create?

• How are we going to create it?

• Are there any existing implementations of our idea already?

• Do similar systems exist that perform almost the same task?

• If so, can we reuse anything from that design?

• Can we reuse foreign techniques, maybe add up to our system with them?

Questions over questions.

The first is easy to answer. We want to create a chat system. How? Well, with PHP, and somehow ...