Every time I think of a script or a program that I need or want, I use Google and FreshMeat for hours, scouring the Internet, trying to find someone that has already written something like it. I would be okay with the fact that no one had. That just means it’s a novel idea, or it’s a bad idea, or an idea so difficult no one has attempted to tackle it. However, that is very rarely the case. Especially in the PHP world.
More often than not, someone has tackled the concept. And has done such a poor job that they were better off not doing it at all.
All I want is an application that has been written with a little bit of forethought. Don’t copy and paste the same twelve lines of code into every file of the program; write a function to do it. Don’t code everything in one big lump; break it into functions or, better yet, classes. Consider, for one second, that someone, somewhere, at some point in time, might want to use your software in a way that is slightly different than you intended.
I may as well not even bother looking anymore.