If you’re using Zend Framework 1.8+, and created your project with the command line tool, then it’s as simple as registering your database settings in your application.ini config file.
resources.db.adapter = "PDO_MYSQL"
resources.db.params.host = "your.database.host"
resources.db.params.dbname = "database_name"
resources.db.params.username = "username"
resources.db.params.password = "password"
resources.db.isDefaultTableAdapter = true
If your database settings are preceded by resources.db you won’t even need to do anything in your Bootstrap.php file because it will do it for you. Also, by setting the isDefaultTableAdapter setting to true, you can get an instance of your database adapter anywhere in your application.
$dbAdapter = Zend_Db_Table::getDefaultAdapter();
$authAdapter = new Zend_Auth_Adapter_DbTable($dbAdapter);