CakePHP is a free and open-source rapid application development (RAD) framework for PHP that provides a structured and rapid way for programmers to create web applications without loss of flexibility. It takes the monotony out of web development by providing features like an active community, flexible licensing, MVC architecture, code generation, and database integration through its model-view-controller structure. To use CakePHP, one would download the CakePHP package, extract it to their web server's directory, create the database and application models/controllers/views following CakePHP's conventions, and then access the application.