I've recently started using PHP for OO development. On OSX, I have outgrown Coda and feel like Textmate takes more time to set up than to actually use. I've downloaded a few of the "real" IDEs, but I feel like they are overkill and I can't find any way to ease myself into it and/or they are way too busy.
I'm looking for something that does code folding, validation, can colorize PHP/PDO/HTML in the same document, and hopefully do completion of my classes and methods that doesn't require 6 months to be productive again.
Can anyone throw me a bone?
Aptana
Eclipse PDT
Netbeans
Kate
Currently I'm using Aptana Beta 3 and there are a couple of bugs, but with the new IDE coming out in a couple of months it should be great. Been a avid Aptana user for a couple of years now.
NOTE: Aptana was Acquired by Appcelerator
I personally use netbeans 6.9.1 and have been very happy with it. Here are my favorite features:
-- functions, classes, comment blocks and other structures are automatically set up for code folding, but you can also highlight any block and make an arbitrary code fold.
-- syntax highlighting is good
-- full support for new php 5.3 features (namespaces etc.)
-- the autocomplete works, but also stays out of the way when I don't need it.
-- refactoring works really well
-- it has a lot of built in macros, plus you can create your own
-- it does nice, fast code validation.
-- completely supports xdebug through a local/remote web server.
-- has built in symfony support
-- tracks polymorphism well
-- I program a lot of c/c++ and java as well, so its really nice to get familiar with just one IDE.
-- it has seamless built in supprt for SVN/CVS and other SCMs. Things like renaming/deleting a file in the IDE play nice with your SCM. You can also commit, update, diff etc. in the ide. It also does live diff via colors on the left hand side.
-- I really like the scm diff features.
-- the learning curve isn't too steep, I feel the IDE's features/commands are pretty intuitive.
Overall I have been really happy with netbeans. I have used a lot of other IDE's and none of them are bad, but they just lack certain features that I need. netbeans is not perfect either, but for me its the best IDE I have been able to find. The things I don't really like about netbeans are:
-- everything has to be a project, you can't just work on some code without netbeans creating metadata. However, the location of the metadata storage is customizable, so it doesn't interfere with your source file directory structure.
-- profiling doesn't really work unless you install some weird solaris stuff.
-- it can't mount an svn+ssh working copy, you have to pull it down locally. if you want to use the SCM features.
-- it can be a little slow if you have a lot of large projects open at a time. You can close the projects so netbeans doesn't scan the source code continuously, and that helps. Re-opening a project isn't too slow or difficult either.
All in all, netbeans isn't really breaking any new ground, vim, eclise, phpide and others all do similar things. I just feel like those things work better in netbeans and are easier to access.
hth
I have to suggest vim despite potentially not meeting your last requirement: "doesn't require 6 months to be productive again".
Vim does everything you listed, but has a very steep learning curve. Not likely six months, but you will be fumbling around for a while. In the long run it you'll probably find it worthwhile.
I use Eclipse PDT on a regular basis, but have been thinking about checking out PhpStorm. It looks like it could be a nice alternative (albeit not free).
I suggest use of Nusphere php ide , its too great for php, it has auto complete features and in built server and you can debug run time, you can also set browser for debugging your code , its true php debugger, i am using this debugger since last 3 years ,it’s amazing and it has inbuilt ftp feature so you can also debug your ftp file.
I have been searching for the perfect web development IDE for some time now. I first started coding with notepad when all I wrote was HTML. Clearly, that was a relationship not meant to last.
Eventually I discovered Notepad++ and the wonderful syntax highlighting that it does. However, I got frustrated when I started working with server-side code and eventually moved to Netbeans, which I have been using for about a year now.
I enjoy using Netbeans quite a bit. The syntax highlighting is fantastic, the ability to push a button and step through your server side code (once you get your apache server set up properly). And the diff engine on it is fantastic for viewing code side by side. I dislike the learning curve (it seems awfully steep to me), and I've recently wanted to try Zen coding, which I can't do with Netbeans.
So, I am looking for an IDE that allows stepping through server side code, and the ability to install plugins such as zencoding. A good Diff engine would be fantastic (but not a dealbreaker), and making code versioning a bit easier would also be points for it.
Here are some choices:
EngInSite
Eclipse
Komodo
phpDesigner
Zend Studio
While I myself enjoy the simpler things in life such as VI or even notepad++. Your problem is going to arise when you want to do debugging, as you found it requires an apache plugin. My best recommendation to you would to look at zend studio although it is not free. I've used it with non zend framework apps, and its pretty handy.
As Stijntjhe mentioned zend studio , if you want free software , use eclipse or eclipse pdt.
Netbeans also could be good for it.
Hi recently i have started the same journey. And my main choices where eclipse with WPT, Aptana en Netbeans. And After a while I returned to Netbeans 7 beta. Which suits me perfectly fine. It is helps me in a robust way which in the end matter the most to me.
The Zeus IDE has support for HTML, CSS and Zen coding.
Zend Studio for Eclipse, I used it a while ago when I was still a windows user.
Html-Kit is also a good editor but if you're more advanced I prefer the first one.
Adobe Dreamweaver is also an excellent Web IDE. It is pricey (if you purchase it).
The best versions are MX2004, CS4, and CS5.
Surprised no one has mentioned UEStudio yet. It is not free, but is one of the more powerful editors out there.
And I second netbeans as well.
I'm trying to find a good environment to build and maintain an existing website. Would Adobe's Dreamweaver be a good purchase for coding in PHP, html, jquery, with a MySQL database?
I would recommend checking out open source solutions before putting money down on Dreamweaver.
To that end, I would highly recommend the Eclipse IDE for PHP development. You can also
get MySQL plugins for Eclipse as well.
Dreamweaver is mostly a waste of money unless the site is static or static mixed with pages that have procedural PHP. And only then the only real features that make it somewhat worth the money are the templating/library item features.
If youre building something with an MVC architecture or using a full blown CMS youre better off an actual IDE (Netbeans, Eclipse, etc..) or a lightweight text editor (Textmate, E, Notepad++, Coda, etc..).
No. I've done it myself, and Dreamweaver isn't really suited to PHP/jQuery/MySQL. It will get syntax highlighting mostly right, which is fine, but it's not a real IDE.
Let me go over the domains one at a time:
PHP: Syntax highlighting- Yes. Code completion- Flaky (sometimes incorrect)
jQuery: Not really acceptable
MySQL: No support
FTP: Yes, Dreamweaver will transfer files over FTP.
Instead, I'd recommend Netbeans, which I've just switched to, and is much better (and cheaper (it's free!)) than Dreamweaver.
I personally use and highly recommend Eclipse with WTP (web tools) and PDT (PHP Development tools) for PHP, js and css development.
Also it has lot of plugins to work with MySQL databases, apache servers, SVN repositories or whatever you could need...
To install it I recommend using an all-in-one package from here
I always strive to increase my productivity when developing applications and in the span of the last few years, I can say that I have made good steps towards increasing that productivity, but I still find I need more tools or methods. I need to edit faster and learn touch typing (currently in the process) and therefore I find a need to move to Vim. It has been now over one year I have trashed Windows and moved to Linux (Ubuntu to be more precise) and I am using the IDE Zend Studio combined with Aptana Studio for developing OO PHP5.3 websites. Although the IDE does everything I would need from an IDE (which I will enumerate shortly), it lacks the editing mode Vim would give.
So my question is: how would I have all the same following 'killer features' I already have within this IDE in Vim?
Here is the extensive list of features I need to keep the productivity at an high level for me:
Code completion for PHP5.3, not just PHP5 and not just the PHP functions, but any libraries that are added to the buildpath, such as Zend Framework and my own library.
Code formatting, I don't use it much, except for XML files, but that is something I would need soon as I will start to lead more people within my company and formatters will help to keep the code coherence.
I use Oxygen XML editor within Zend Studio (eclipse) for editing Docbook XML technical documentation. It has already proven of great quality to me and I would like to keep it.
Syntax validation for any file extensions that can be used on the Web, mostly for me would be PHP5.3 syntax, html syntax (not that important), CSS, Javascript (that's why I have Aptana Studio integrated with Zend Studio, their javascript editor is great with JQuery support)
Maybe a git integration just like EGit (eclipse plugin)? Not required but a nice addon.
Debugging features (already using it through the ZendDebugger)
Powerful searching within files
I know that is a lot, but I am already having all this within my IDE and as I said, I feel the need to move to mode based editors like Vim to be more productive when typing and I feel the learning curve and time invested in setting up all of this will be well worth the effort.
I know that there is Eclim, which integrates eclipse to its daemon and I am thinking of using just that, if anyone has feedback on Eclim used with Zend Studio that would be appreciated.
Along with Eclim, if I need more vim plugins to achieve my needs, I would gladly appreciate it if someone could direct me to them.
Aright, after playing around much with the tools that would increase productivity using vim I have made my choice.
I first installed GVim with the MiniBuffer, NERDTree, Bufkill, Matchit, PDV (phpDocumentator), taglist plugins and others to make sure I would be as much comfortable as I would need for replacing the functionnalities I already had within Eclipse. I also installed Eclim, which is a pretty good plugin to integrate with eclipse and it works great with completion assist when installed on Zend Studio 7.1 (although there is a minor bug within Zend Studio's completion assist that restricts its use on Eclim). I also followed those three blogs (O'Phinney's, Thomas Koch's and Schlitt's to make sure I was at the top of productivity). After trying my hands on all of that I still felt I was far from comfortable for some GVim editing.
Since I am already sold on the powers behind touch typing and Vim, there was absolutely no way I would return on bare editors such as the one Eclipse provide. Therefore I tried, viPlugin, Vrapper and vimPlugin, which were not what I expected from them. The viPlugin and Vrapper, which emulates vi into Eclipse, as opposed to vimPlugin who just integrates Vim as an external editor (rendering code completion, refactoring and such unusable), are not enough mature yet. Visual block is not working and some nifty bug gets on your way when you start to really use them. I am not bashing those plugins since they are still pretty good, but it was just not what I expected.
Then I just stumbled on Netbeans and their new version 6.8 released on December 2009, which now have fully support on PHP5.3, PHPUnit, Code coverage reports, refactoring, XDebug integration, Code completion. What made the grand finale is when I saw the jvi plugin which emulates vi into netbeans (and yes, visual block works!!). That plugin is just absolutely amazing and works very very well.
The only thing that was left out, as asked in my question, was the Oxygen XML Editor which is not integrated in a netbeans plugin, but I can still use their native editor so it was not even an issue for me. For Git integration, there is a plugin out there for netbeans, but I sticked with git gui.
If you guys out there want the best of both worlds just like I wanted, you should definitely checkout the new release for netbeans for PHP5.3 development, while keeping Vim as your main editor.
I'm interested in using Eclim with Zend Studio as well. However, I already have a Zend Studio Project and installing Eclim requires the creation of an "eclim project". That process, according to the eclim installation notes, will create a .project file in the root directory of the project. And that means it will likely overwrite the ZendStudio .project file...which will corrupt my project files... something I don't want to do in case I decide that eclim is not for me.
Let me know how it works out for you.
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I'm a PHP developer and now I use Notepad++ for code editing, but lately I've been searching for an IDE to ease my work.
I've looked into Eclipse, Aptana Studio and several others, but I'm not really decided, they all look nice enough but a bit complicated. I'm sure it'll all get easy once I get used to it, but I don't want to waste my time.
This is what I'm looking for:
FTP support
Code highlight
SVN support would be great
Ruby and JavaScript would be great
For PHP I would recommend PhpStorm.
It supports FTP/SFTP synchronization, integrates well with Subversion, CVS, Mercurial and even with Git. Also, it supports HTML, CSS, JavaScript and handles language-mixing well like SQL or HTML blocks inside PHP code, JSON, etc.
But if you need Ruby you can try another IDE - RubyMine with same capabilities but for Ruby.
NetBeans. Check out 7.0.1.
It supports FTP/SFTP synchronization, integrates well with Subversion, CVS, Mercurial and even with Git (with plugin). Also, it supports HTML, CSS, JavaScript, popular frameworks and more.
And its free.
Too bad no one mentioned phpDesigner. It's really the best IDE I've came across (and I believe I've tried them all).
The main pro of this one is that it's NOT Java based. This keeps the whole thing quick.
Features:
Intelligent Syntax Highlighter - automatic switch between PHP, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript depending on your position!
PHP (both version 4 and 5 are supported)
SQL (MySQL, MSSQL 2000, MSSQL 7, Ingres, Interbase 6, Oracle, Sybase)
HTML/XHTML
CSS (both version 1 and 2.1 are supported)
JavaScript
VBScript
Java
C#
Perl
Python
Ruby
Smarty
PHP:
Support for both PHP 4 and PHP 5
Code Explorer for PHP (includes, classes, extended classes, interfaces, properties, functions, constants and variables)
Code Completion (IntelliSense) for PHP - code assist as you type
Code Tip (code hint) for PHP - code assist as you type
Work with any PHP frameworks (access classes, functions, variables, etc. on the fly)
PHP object oriented programming (OOP) including nested objects
Support for PHP heredoc
Enclose strings with single- or double quotes, linefeed, carriage return or tabs
PHP server variables
PHP statement templates (if, else, then, while…)
Powerful PHP Code Beautifier with many configurations and profile support
phpDocumentor wizard
Add phpDocumentor documentation to functions and classes with one click!
phpDocumentor tags
Comment or uncomment with one click!
Jump to any declaration with filtering by classes, interfaces, functions, variables or constants
Debug (PHP):
Debug with Xdebug
Breakpoints
Step by step debugging
Step into
Step over
Run to cursor
Run until return
Call stack
Watches
Context variables
Evaluate
Profiling
Multiple sessions
Evaluation tip
Catch errors
Are you sure you're looking for an IDE? The features you're describing, along with the impression of being too complicated that you got from e.g. Aptana, suggest that perhaps all you really want is a good editor with syntax highlighting and integration with some common workflow tools. For this, there are tons of options.
I've used jEdit on several platforms successfully, and that alone puts it above most of the rest (many of the IDEs are cross-platform too, but Aptana and anything Eclipse-based is going to be pretty heavy-weight, if full-featured). jEdit has ready-made plugins for everything on your list, and syntax highlighting for a wide range of languages. You can also bring up a shell in the bottom of your window, invoke scripts from within the editor, and so forth. It's not perfect (the UI is better than most Java UIs, but not perfect yet I don't think), but I've had good luck with it, and it'll be a hell of a lot simpler than Aptana/Eclipse.
That said, I do like Aptana quite a bit for web development, it does a lot of the grunt work for you once you're over the learning curve.
Eclipse PDT is very nice.
I'm always amazed that more people don't use ActiveState Komodo.
It has the best debugging facilities of any PHP IDE I have tried, is a very mature product and has more useful features than you can shake a stick at. Of note, it has a fantastic HTTP inspector, Javascript debugger and Regular Expression Toolkit. You can get it so that it steps through your PHP, then you see your Javascript running, and then see your HTTP traffic going out over the wire!
It also comes in free (Komodo Edit) and open (OpenKomodo versions).
Oh, and if you don't always hack just on PHP, it's designed as a multi-language editor and rocks for Ruby and Python too.
I've been a happy customer for around 5 years.
There's no "best" IDE, only better and worse ones.
Right now I'm trying to settle in with Aptana. It has a lot of cruft that I don't want, like "Jaxer" doodads all over the place. It's reasonably fast, but chokes on large files when syntax highliting is on. I have not been able to figure out how to set up PHP debugging. Three good things about Aptana: easy plugin installations, very fast and intuitive Subversion plugins, ligning fast file search.
I tried Eclipse PDT and Zend for Eclipse, but they have nightmare levels of interface cruft. Installing plugins is a living horror of version mismatches and cryptic error messages.
I also use Komodo (they bought us licenses at work). Komodo has a very intuitive interface, but is ridiculously slow, chokes on medium sized files with syntax highlighting. File search is intuitive, but rather slow. Subversion integration is not that great - slow and buggy. If not for slowness, I would have probably stuck with Komodo, especially for the debugger.
To get you started, here is a list of PHP Editors (Wikipedia).
For PHP in particular, PHPEdit is the best, and I tried and worked in some of them including, Dreamweaver, Elipse, Emacs, Notepad++, NetBeans, UltraEdit ...
Geany is a great lightweight editor -- like Notepad++ for Linux, only better. I find this, combined with a few shell scripts and symlinks for linking modules into a web source tree, make developing on Linux easy and fun.
I love JetBrains IDEs. For PHP it is JetBrains PHPStorm.
http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/opensource/library/os-php-ide/index.html
Personally, I love Notepad++... :D . The above link compares some of the better IDEs and the best ones aren't free.
I'd recommend Komodo 4.4 though (I used the trial version) since it was awesome. Better than Notepad++, but not free... :(
I would recommend Zend IDE for the integrated debugger.
I'm using Zend Studio. It has decent syntax highlighting, code completion and such. But the best part is that you can debug PHP code, either with a standalone PHP interpreter, or even on a live web server as you "browse" along your pages. You get the usual Visual Studio keys, breakpoints, watches and call stack, which is almost indispensable for bug hunting. No more "alert()"-cluttered debugged source code :)
Have you looked at Delphi for PHP (<http://www.codegear.com/products/delphi/php>) ?
Joe Stagner of Microsoft really likes Delphi for PHP.
He says it here: "[Delphi for PHP] 2.0 is the REAL DEAL and I LOVE IT !"
Eclipse with PDT.
I use and like Rapid PHP.
What features of an IDE do you want? Integrated build engine? Debugger? Code highlighting? IntelliSense? Project management? Configuration management? Testing tools? Except for code highlighting, none of these are in your requirements.
So my suggestion is to use an editor that supports plugins, like Notepad++ (which you are already used to). If there's not already a plugin that does what you want, then write one.
I use Coda on Mac OS X.
There is a new guy in town, PhpStorm from JetBrains. You use it and I bet you will forget all the other editors. It's bit pricey though, unfortunately.
RadPHP (previously known as Delphi for PHP) is the best.
All are good, but only Delphi for PHP (RadPHP 3.0) has a designer, drag and drop controls, GUI editeor, huge set of components including Zend Framework, Facebook, database, etc. components. It is the best in town.
RadPHP is the best of all; It has all the features the others have. Its designer is the best of all. You can design your page just like Dreamweaver (more than Dreamweaver).
If you use RadPHP you will feel like using ASP.NET with Visual Studio (but the language is PHP).
It's too bad only a few know about this.
Aptana supports this and I use it for all of my web development now.
Hands down the best IDE for PHP is NuSphere PHPEd. It's a no contest. It is so good that I use WINE to run it on my Mac. PHPEd has an awesome debugger built into it that can be used with their local webserver (totally automatic) or you can just install the dbg module for XAMPP or any other Apache you want to run.
The best IDE for PHP in my opinion is Zend Studio (which itself is based on Eclipse PDT). Note that in this case "best" does not necessarily mean "good." It is slow and a bit buggy, but even so, it's still the best option for PHP programmers. I've tried a ton of PHP editors over the years and I haven't yet found one that works great.
Komodo IDE would be my second choice. My only problem with Komodo is that the autocomplete is not as good. With properly structured apps where you use phpDoc to document return types etc., it should be alright. But I work on a project that doesn't really do that and Komodo can't read across files to know that $user is a User object for example.
Personally everything that is based uppon Eclipse or NetBeans is an overkill, the GUI is crap and the performance is soooo slow compared to other alternatives.
If you're willing to pay I would suggest Zend IDE (version 5.5, not 6 because it's based on Eclipse) and EditPlus for a more lightweight yet powerfull code editor.
If you're looking for free alternatives, or if you code in other languages other than PHP, OpenKomodo is a really nice IDE with almost all the features (no SVN neither CVS) that you require, the only con I see about OpenKomodo is that sometimes it messes my code indentation, but then again I don't use it on a very regular basis.
As for a free lightweight alternative: Notepad++. =)
My personal preference is Eclipse (with various plug-ins) as I am developing in several languages (PHP, Java, and Ruby) and this way I am always used to interface and keyboard shortcuts. This is not a minor thing as you become very productive this way.
I haven't used Aptana, but will (hopefully) soon - it does look interesting, though.
For others IDEs I have used: jEdit (for little Java), Notepad++ (still for some scripting and short test code runs).
And for the features You asked: Eclipse support many source code version servers (Subclipse); your project can be on a Samba share; ZendDebugger/xdebug for debugging.
I've tried Eclipse PDT, with some success. Aptana is also pretty good, or if you are doing a lot of AJAX stuff, it's great. Your mileage may vary, however, depending on what additional plugins you want to use with them.
PHPEclipse is as close to Eclipse java power as it could get. Eclipse PDT is much weaker (last time I checked).
I'm using PHPDesigner but I will go for Eclipse PDT. I was always against Eclipse until few months ago when I have one Java project to finish... Great IDE
Now I can't imagine one day without Eclipse. :)
Have you tried NetBeans 6? Zend Studio and NetBeans 6 are the best IDEs with PHP support you'll come across and NetBeans is free.