Phalcon is a high-performance PHP framework delivered as a PHP extension. This provides new opportunities for speed and application design, which until recently have been unrealized in the PHP ecosystem. Packed with simple learning exercises, technology prototypes, and real-world usable code, this book will guide you from the beginner and setup stage all the way to advanced usage. You will learn how to avoid niche pitfalls, how to use the command-line developer tools, how to integrate with new web standards, as well as how to set up and customize the MVC application structure. You will see how Phalcon can be used to quickly set up a single file web application as well as a complex multi-module application suitable for long-term projects. Some of the recipes focus on abstract concepts that are vital to get a deep comprehension of Phalcon and others are designed as a vehicle to deliver real-world usable classes and code snippets to solve advanced problems. You’ll start out with basic setup and application structure and then move onto the Phalcon MVC and routing implementation, the power of the ORM and Phalcon Query Language, and Phalcon’s own Volt templating system. Finally, you will move on to caching, security, and optimization.