NuSphere PHPEd Review

NuSphere PHPEd Review
By: Reynold E. Lariza (reynoldlariza.com)

NuSphere PhpED is an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) for PHP, a server-side HTML-embedded scripting language. PhpED provides a flexible, easy-to-use platform for developing web sites using PHP, XML, CSS style sheets, and HTML.

PhpED also provides streamlined functionality for debugging code, publishing projects to remote servers through FTP, SFTP and WebDAV, working with SOAP servers, and integrating with repository-based code management systems such as CVS. PhpED is suitable for multiple developers and very large projects.

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PhpED IDE is a powerful development environment for developing applications in php. Balanced combination of advanced code editor, reliable PHP Debugger, productive database connectivity client and fast and secure deployment abilities make PhpED a complete solution for the most sophisticated developer needs. For example, developing a console php application with ncruses may require running and debugging it using php command line interface (php-cli). At the same time developing a web application designed to run on the remote server requires special tools for the effective work with a remote server, such as remote debugger, source deployment and most likely, the profiler.

System Requirements:
• Microsoft Windows 2000 and higher
• 256 MB RAM or better

My job as a web developer began at my 2nd job as IT Administrator in a Freight/Shipping Company, and that was year 2005. The company needed a system reformation to accommodate new changes of the industry it is sitting on. When we were thinking of new system, we all agreed of a centralized one. So, we decided for a Web-based development and agreed as well to use PHP as the standard development programming language for this purpose.

When we started our development, we were using a variety of Text Editors. Like EditPlus, PSPad, Notepad++, and SEG editor for writing PHP modules extensively.

Hmmm… Come to think of it… I haven’t realized why it’s called SEG.

Anyway, I can say, we were doing great then. We were able to develop the core modules a few months early before the set deadline in our timeline.

When we reach the 6-month era of our development, our difficulty with our development rise to what we’re ignoring from the beginning. The project was getting bigger and the deadline was getting nearer. Keeping track of everything we do is getting more difficult. I have more than 20 opened PHP files which are all related to each other. Which is a bit tiresome for our current development culture, but we managed to complete it anyway. Though we were a few days late to our expected deadline.

During these time of development. I was asking myself, is there a better way for doing this?

April 2006, I’ve began my research to answer this particular question. I was looking for an editor that combines everything I need. Like code editing, a built-in PHP manual, database connectivity, as well as be able to directly edit PHP files from the server thru SCP/SSH protocol, plus my favorite HTML and color toolbar. In short, an Integrated Development Environment, or simply IDE.

In a matter of seconds, I just realized that it was that easy to find answer I’m looking for.

I found many PHP IDE, including the very popular among PHP developers is Zend Studio, WaterProof PHPEdit, and NuSphere PHPEd.

I first tried the Zend Studio 5 and I was really amazed to what it can do. All the features I needed, plus some extras were really great. However, I only tried it for a about a week, and got frustrated with it. Why? It’s was slow, compared to the PHP editor I was using. Yes, that’s right. Speed is important to me. And that’s one thing I didn’t like with Zend. It’s most important feature is that, its cross-platform, which means that it can run on Linux as well, aside from Microsoft Windows. But that time, we only use MS Windows XP Pro SP2 for Development, so it got nothing to do for us.

The next IDE I tested was WaterProofs’ PHPEdit. The Workspace is a bit different from Zend Studio. But it does have everything I needed. It’s also much faster than Zend Studio. So I decided to try it. But just the next day, during the development… it crashed!

What the *$^#*$& !!!

All of my unsaved changes which took me about a few hundreds of lines, have all gone to nothingness. I hated it at that instance. So I conclude that this IDE is NOT for the likes of me.

I looked for another option. And there I found NuSphere PHPEd. Like the the previous IDE I mentioned, it got all the necessary tools I needed. Plus it was faster than WaterProof’s PHPEdit. But the question popped into my head. Will it crash too? Like WaterProof’s?

So I gave it week. And to my surprise, it never crashed.

Need I say more? If there’s one IDE that’s worth to use and buy, It’s NuSphere PHPEd. No more, no less.

You ask, what are the features? I don’t think re-writing it, is necessary, since its all in the manual. But for the sake of it, Ill put it here too.

NuSphere PhpED features:

This chapter provides a basic introduction to PhpED features. Key features of NuSphere PhpED 5.2 include:

*Features marked with the asterix are not available in Standard and Educational versions of PhpED

Advanced Editor
• Multiple Language Syntax Highlighting
Code sensitive syntax color highlighter gives you the ability to have separate highlighting for different languages in the same file. Highlighting for each language is of course fully configurable in PhpED’s settings.

• Dynamic Syntax Highlighting
The editor will automatically switch the syntax highlighting dependant on the position in the file. The strength of PHP is in ability to embed it in the other documents, like PHP. However, sometimes the document becomes too crowded with the lines of code from multiple languages. Auto-switch feature will let you focus on the code and the language that you are currently working on. It will only highlight those parts of the document, which are written in the same language as the current position of the cursor and dim the rest of the text. The editor will switch between php, html, smarty, css and javascript, depending on the type of the file.

• Smarty Highlighter
NuSphere continues to embrace the best technologies and design patterns in PHP. PhpED comes with Syntax Highlighter for Smarty’s .tpl files. This feature, combined with Dynamic Syntax Highlighting and Multiple Language Syntax Highlighting provides for unmatched convenience and productivity of PHP developers using Smarty templates in their work.

• True Unicode editing. Create projects in several natural languages simultaneously.

• Code templates allow you to type whole code fragments at once by a single key press. You can add new templates and change existing ones.

• Fully customizable shortcuts, advanced editor features such as brace matching, context-sensitive auto-indent and smart-home speed up your work significantly.

• Search and replace scope. Find and replace works in multiple files and directories as well as in all opened files! Regular expressions allow you to find text using complex conditions.

• Drag-n-drop operations support. Try to drag an image from the file browser or project manager in to your HTML page directly. Database explorer supports drag operations too.

Code Insight
• Code Completion. Dynamically provides the available properties and methods for a given variable or class, and automatically concludes partially typed keywords. Code completion works for HTML and CSS too. It shows properties for tags, classes and attributes. Nested calls are supported with unlimited nesting level.

• Tool tips and Instant error analysis for both php and HTML make coding an easy task – no more simple mistakes and typos.

• Project-wide code explorer in PhpED IDE shows all php classes, methods, properties, functions and variables in every detail and facilitates object-oriented programming.

• Hints show you arguments and returning value for a just typed function, as well as a short description for them.

• Fast functions reference shows you all the PHP functions as they are available from PHP extensions.

Debugging and Profiling
• Commercial versions of PHP DBG Debugger – the best debugger currently available provides unmatched debugging productivity in both local and remote debugging modes.

• NuSphere Toolbar for Internet Explorer

• The best debugger on the market got even better. PhpED’s unmatched remote debugging capabilities are now simply breathtaking with this feature, which allows starting the remote debugging session with one button click.

• Remote debugging of code on external servers.*

• Local debugging of code on integrated WEB server or PHP CGI module.

• Supports debug sessions

• Advanced PHP profiler

• PhpED profiler shows executing time for each line, function or module of the code with tenth millisecond’s precision. You can locate all the bottlenecks quickly and efficiently. Profiler saves all the timings among multiple sessions so your can compare them and evaluate your improvements

Project and File Management
• Quick deployment. Once publishing is set up according to your needs, you can upload your PHP projects with a single click!

• Project-wide code explorer in PhpED IDE shows all php classes, methods, properties, functions and variables in every detail and facilitates object-oriented programming.

• Secure deployment. Support for SFTP*, FTPS (TLS/SSL*) and WebDAV/HTTPS (SSL*) protocols make deployment and data transfer secure now.

• Publishing filters. The user can exclude and include files and directories for publishing thus saving time and traffic

• Enhanced integration.* Integrate PhpED IDE with 3rd party tools like Tortoise SVN or Tortoise CVS.

• Terminal connections (Telnet and SSH) are supported. Perform your remote administration tasks from within PhpED *

• Embedded tools for more effective coding, editing and code management. PhpED IDE includes a number of pre-configured tools like PHP documentor, HTML Tidy, Code Formatter, Html Validator and CVS client. *

Database client
• SQLite, MySQL, MSSQL, Oracle, UltraSQL/PostgreSQL and InterBase support

• Quick access to multiple types of databases through a GUI tool boosts up your productivity. Browse the tables, drag and drop fields, tables names, views, stored procedures, triggers etc. and run any sql statement to manipulate the data and the metadata stored in the database – all without leaving the IDE.

• DB form wizard enables easy creation of database forms

Running abilities
• Built-in SRV web server allows to run php scripts locally independent from your web server

• All browsers installed on your system are supported. Choose your default browser or specify the desired browser for the run.

• Launch box allows saving and applying different run parameters (browser, run parameters, variables, etc)

• Run history for Run and Run-in-debugger for easy run tracking

NuSOAP Wizard
• Easily generate PHP script for calling SOAP services using NuSOAP script library.

About the author
Reynold Lariza is a Junior Developer at SimpleSoft Inc. Reynold is a very active member of PHPUGPH and has contributed a lot in the organization. His website can be found at http://reynoldlariza.com

Some of his recent works are:
http://www.firstorient.com.ph
http://ctpl.com.ph
http://www.sarisaristore.com

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