Ever since the launch of Google App Engine a little over two months ago there has been a lot of mumbling and grumbling over the lack of PHP support. I am sure that there are good reasons why Google chose to launch with Python but, even so, I expect that this raised several eyebrows (mine included) when App Engine was first released.

It was therefore great to hear from a UK Zend employee that Zend is currently involved in talks with Google regarding PHP and App Engine. I am very pleased to see that some form of progress is being made on this front as it will certainly be interesting to see a PHP API for App Engine. Of course, no timescale has yet to be announced but it is certainly food for thought.

Rolling this over in my head a little more makes me think that there may be some scope for Zend Framework integration in App Engine. The fact that App Engine does not currently provide implementations of any Python frameworks makes the provision of Zend Framework seem less likely, but the very loosely coupled nature of the Zend Framework could greatly simplify deployment (either by Google, or by individual users of App Engine).

I can also not help wondering if this will be somehow integrated into Zend's various product offerings. For example, could we see a "Create App Engine Project" feature in Zend Studio for Eclipse? And what about debugging tools?

Whatever happens, I think that PHP for App Engine is coming our way, the only question is when. In potentially related news, I was told to keep an eye out for a number of Zend products launches in the Fall (aka Autumn) of this year...