PHP IDE suggestion required

Hello,

Can anyone please advice me on a good PHP IDE which has

- Syntax highlighting
- Syntax completion
- Code folding
- Debugging and profiling

I use Zend Studio but wants to know what you guys use.
Is there an IDE built in C/C++ as Zend Studio is built in JAVA?
Further is there any cheaper option? Zend is expensive

Thanks in advance for your input.

 

Eclipse: eclipse.org

Eclipse is also built in Java but can be downloaded for free.
Take some time to find out which plugins you should use.
It is the only serious alternative to Zend Studio I know.

 

Can you please explain more on plugins?

I am downloading pdt-all-in-one-1.0-R20070917-win32.zip file from:
http://download.eclipse.org/tools/pdt/downloads/?release=R20070917

Is this all I need to get something going close to Zend Studio?

 

Eclipse is highly configurable and can be extended by using plugin components. You should visit eclipse.org and download phpeclipse as a start. If you do a lot of (A)JAX development you might want to have a javascript environment as well. You can accomplish this by choosing the right Eclipse plugin that understands js. This way you can manage all your projects files from one IDE. There are numerous other plugins, like the plugin that cooperates with the (server-side) Zend-debugger. Best way to get started is to look for the phpeclipse package, download it, read the tutorial, which you can also find at the eclipse.org site, and just get started.

/edit: your download file looks okay to me

 

Thanks for your input.

 

I recently found the PDT version of Eclipse available at http://www.eclipse.org/pdt/ which is full of great tools to help build and test PHP code. It's an all-in-one package that installs in minutes and includes all the basics. It seems as if it's several versions ahead in its underlying version of Eclipse compared to the J!Code, EasyEclipse and phpEclipse versions that also use Eclipse as their foundation.

To add debugging I got the Xdebug client from http://xdebug.org/. It was really easy to install and get up and running. I tried for quite some time to get the Zend Debugger from http://www.zend.com/en/community/pdt#ws_debugger to work with my PHP/Apache environment (using PHP as a CGI which is a requirment of my production host) and ultimately gave up as Xdebug worked in less than a minute.

I added Eclipse SQL Explorer from http://eclipsesql.sourceforge.net/ which I found worked great for both local and remote databases. I personally preferred it to the QuantumDB plugin from http://quantum.sourceforge.net/ as it enabled me to sort data within tables in the gui by just clicking the column names--behaviour just like you would expect from any desktop OS. A small difference, I know, and the Quantum plugin was solid too.

For a SVN client, I added Subversive from http://www.polarion.org/index.php?page=overview&project=subversive which made staying in sync with a SVN repository from within Eclipse a snap. I liked the way it showed histories in a directory tree which the main alternative Subclipse from http://subclipse.tigris.org/ did not. Subclipse though was just as good in its other SVN capabilities.

A neat tool which I just found yesterday is Mylyn from http://www.eclipse.org/mylyn/ which essentially allows you to create and manage a list of tasks, assign categories and priorities, and integrate with bug tracker systems too.

The Remote System Explorer from http://download.eclipse.org/dsdp/tm/downloads/index.php is the final bit I've added, which helped to move files between my local machine and my remote FTP host.

I'm sure I'm also just scratching the surface of what else is available!

 

my vote for the best php IDE goes to Zend

 

mine goes to TextPad

 

I've used Zend and many others......... For my tasks and needs, Zend is the best one.

Costly I know

 

Active State's Komodo IDE

http://www.activestate.com/Products/komodo_ide/

 

I use vim with syntax highlighting but that's more like a text editor hehe. You might want to try eclipse though.