(August 2011)
As I have been programming more towards a total object oriented way I have found the need for a better editor than the old phped which I have used for many years. I required a new PHP editor (maybe IDE), so I setup to find one and as I use both Windows and Linux it had to run on both platforms.
Requirements: MUST have autocomplete for variables, functions and classes (when you have a large app its impossible to remember all the associated variable names), and run on Windows and Linux.
Here are the ones I tried:
these FAILED to meet the requirements:
- Netbeans - Java, so no thanks (dont program in Java, dont like Java, and Java is often the root of the issue if my development machine crashes!)
- Aptana - good but would not run at ALL on Ubuntu!
- Codelite - basic*, no autocomplete (for pre-defined vars, functions, classes).
- gPHPedit - OK, but no autocomplete (for pre-defined vars, functions, classes).
- Bluefish - OK, but basic,* but again no autocomplete (for pre-defined vars, functions, classes).
- vim - too basic*
- FCKEditor - setup docs useless, took too long to work out how it worked!
- mped - so uneventful I fail to remember anything about it...
*for some of the “basic” editors above you can spend your life adding plugins to attain required functionality.
DID NOT try - although I had them on the list:
- Zend Studio - seemed to be too bloated (the bloated framework drove me away from Zend, in favour of Kohana)
- geany - installed it, but where and how to use who bloody knows...
The WINNER:
- Komodo edit - brilliant, runs on both platforms, and its open source, hooorahhh.
Runs fast, and seems to be well supported. So thank you to Activestate for providing a great PHP editor.
Download here: http://www.activestate.com/komodo-edit(its the “Komodo Edit” which is open source - NOT the IDE which is a commercial app)