For the record, I still think RMS is a raving lunatic ... but that "they're trying to lock you in" crap he's always going on about (say, with Java)? I ran into that today. Yes, FileMaker Pro is as stupid as "a rheusus monkey on crack", no, its ODBC driver only goes one-way, and yes, going from XML to PHP is stupid when you have a relational database right there.

Speaking of which, why bother with an RDBMS if you're not gonna set up any relationships?!

It is teaching me a lot, though, and I suspect my PHP skills will be greatly improved by it. And despite the ranting, despite the brick wall(s) I'm banging my head into, I'm quite enjoying the challenge. Weird, eh?