title: How do I use namespaces with Zend Framework?
body: <p><strong>Namespaces</strong> are really useful and PHP had no support for them until the recent few releases, AFAIK.<br>
  When I'm using Zend Framework, I have to remember <strong>long names with underscores</strong> - like <code>Zend_Form_Element_Button</code> or <code>Zend_Form_Decorator_HtmlTag</code> and so on.<br>
  If I use namespaces, this might be possible, and so much easier:</p>
  
  <pre>
  namespace Zend {
    class something {
      // ...
    }
  }
  
  namespace Zend\Form {
    class something {
      // ...
    }
  }
  
  namespace Zend\Form\Element {
    class Button {
      // ...
    }
  }
  </pre>
  
  <p>And to use it I do this:</p>
  
  <pre>
  use Zend\Form\Element\Button;
  $btn1 = new Button();
  </pre>
  
  <p>So my question is, <strong>is it trivially possible</strong>, given the autoloader system and a lot of meta-class "black magic" that lives inside Zend Framework, to <strong>rewrite the structure of the code using namespaces</strong>, and then have more sensible class names?<br>
  The problem is not the length of the class names - Eclipse/Netbeans/Aptana handle that very well, it is <strong>the irritant that long names are</strong>.<br>
  Tends to get <strong>confusing</strong> after some time if some classes you use <strong>have similar parts in the names</strong>.<br>
  Since <strong>ZF is open source</strong> licensed, I don't think Zend would mind a namespaced version of the code, <strong>if mere renaming and some re-organization of code can achieve that</strong>.</p>