Question

What is a great problem I can give a couple of potential devs that don’t know Zend Framework?

My goal is mainly to determine their ability to learn something new quickly and by themselves (namely, the framework). It would have to be something they would normally complete in a couple of hours, but that in this case, since they are not familiar with the framework, would take them some more hours because of the additional reading and stackoverflow.com usage 😉 , so, something that I can have them do over a weekend.

Also, the problem would have to be very directed to the View and Controller part, as frontend work is mostly what I’ll be needing from them. (and the Zend Framework doesn’t really help out with Model very much). The problem would probably require them to do a little ajax, and generally “pretty, functional, but not very complicated in the backend” stuff.

Answer 1

For me, basic skills that each ZF developer should have are connected to these:

1. Writing custom view helpers – it would be best, if they had to be custom namespace, not Zend, because that will learn them how to register helper path in View.
2. Definitely write some forms classes using Zend_Form (and fight with decorators;). Maybe even some custom form elements, which also will require to register helper path AND new namespace – basic skills.
3. Writing simple ACL system. And there you can check how they do it – which gives you information about their software architecture knowledge. Do they implement as a Plugin? Maybe hardcoded in index.php? Or custom controller and init or preDispatch method.
4. Auth – In ZF its 10-15 lines, but you have to search for it 🙂
5. Some db model work – simple. Two, three tables and relations between them – it can be simplest ACL table: users, role, user_has_role.
6. Using layout of course and using ZF’s view helpers to append scripts and styles.
7. Defining some custom routes.
8. Implemement caching at some level.
9. Understanding how bootstrap works – for mostly of these task it will be easiest to use Bootstrap and application.ini based Bootstrap resources.

Simple “app” which will cover almost all of that skills could look like that:

1. Simple database which have three tables: user, role, has_role. In
   user table column created_at which
   is automaticaly set when I insert
   record. (covers Zend_Db_Adapter,
   application.ini).
2. App has three modules/controllers/pages – call it
   what you want.
   a) ability to add, remove and edit user and roles. Typically CRUD.
   Additionally, you can say that grid
   has to be frontend side (jqGrid,
   DataTables etc.) using AJAX to get
   data from app. There you will check if
   they implement AJAX output at their
   own, or use ZF’s contextSwitch
   feature. (covers
   Zend_Db_Table_Abstract, relations
   between them, understanding of model,
   Zend_Db_Select, Views and maybe
   viewhelpers like appendScript,
   Zend_Form)
   b) uploader for custom files – such a web based storage. Simple form
   to upload file and table bellow with
   list of them and possibility to
   download (covers security, could cover
   Zend_Form and Zend_File_Transfer,
   maybe partials in view if they use the
   same table as in a))
   c) page which display 10 last tweets of whoever you want from
   Twitter, which must be cached for x
   hours.(covers Zend_Cache, and then
   maybe Zend_ervice or XML,JSON
   knowledge – depends how they implement
   it)

Additionally, app requires user to log
in using login and password (you can
say, that registration must be another
part of an app). And for take
advantage of ACL system, user has
access only to b) and c) (and of
course register/login page ;), but
admin to all three pages.

And now you have two aproaches.
First is saying:

“It must be in ZF. But form has to be made using Zend_Form, and models using Zend_Db_Table_Abstract. For auth you must use Zend_Auth for ACL front controller plugin And so on….

Second way is saying:

“It must be in ZF. How you do it internally – it’s totally your buisness – but it must work.”

Which will you choose, depends from your needs 🙂

PS. Personally, at the recruitment process I use second approach (sometimes even without specifying framework) – because like I said before, it shows me candidates way of thinking – which is also important. Do candidate is “DIY person” which want to do everything by her/himself, despite the fact that there are already 10 such solutions, or she/he rather RTFM person, or both. When you have to do app and on you own figure how to do it, which components to use, it’s more creative. And after candidate make such app, you still can do a code review and show them where something could be done differently – that way they learning something new and maybe you will learn something from their approach 🙂