I use notepad for editing PHP, What am I missing?

[smashingjay]

is notepad2 the same as notepad++ ???

i got shown notepad++ the other week and fell in love! it supports about 15 different languages and has an auto-complete feature for PHP which is very similar to microsoft's intellisense.

Notepad ++ is great and works on a multitude of platforms.

I use HTML-Kit but it's syntax highlighting is not extensible and modifiable except for a few colors. There are all sorts of plugins for HTML-Kit including a PHP kit that provides a toolbar with all sorts of code segments. In addition you can do snippets and in browser uploads with HTML-Kit as well.

I used to use Dreamweaver and found that by MX 2004 it uses so much system resources that it is almost silly for editing HTML and other languages. I can do all my editing on my PIII 600 if I have to without any issue with HTML-Kit or Notepad.

Line numbers tabs and syntax highlighting are the most important parts when getting into PHP (for me).

Jay

[caban]

Another vote for JSoft's Editpad Lite.

No need for syntax highlighting but lots of other features.

-dan.

[KDesigns]

I use EditPlus and Zend Studio.

A couple, perhaps unmentioned, good features that you don't get in notepad are line numbers, automatic indentation for loops and control structures, ftp support for working directly on server, code analyzer (Zend).

There are more but those few serve as a good excuse for getting another text editor besides notepad.

[mark_W]

oh i forgot to mention another real good editor (although i havent used it much for php) is Jedit
http://www.jedit.org/

Yeah, Ive been using jEdit a lot recently and its excellent. Although, I too have not seen many people use it for PHP.

[wwb_99]

I am on a rather crazy system now:

1) PHP Designer 2005 for the actual coding work.
2) Visual Studio .NET 2003 to handle source control. Basically I create a new database project for the DB scripts as well as add a copy of the site's folder structure to the project. Then I checkin to Visual Source Safe as appropriate. VS.NET has some awesome DB change scripting routines, which is why I started this.

Works very well in practice, especially insofar as DB changes go.

[samsm]

Second abalfazl's quote of scoates in post 39.

I was just going to mention keeping tabs and line numbers, Scoates' list went above and beyond. Now that I think about it, the 8 character tab is probably the biggest deal-breaker for Notepad.

[krayziepjf]

I haven't seen jedit in this thread much, so I thought I'd throw in my vote for it. (www.jedit.org). I use it exclusively for all programming I do. Great (free) editor with a multitude of plugins. Here is an article here at sitepoint done on jedit.

[frezno]

I learned PHP using wordpad. The only thing you're lacking is line numbers and syntax highlighting

you should have used edlin - ok, no syntax highlighting but line numbers at least...

[betterpc]

Rightly or wrongly I have always used notepad to develop my PHP applications. I have always found it very quick and easy to use BUT I know there are so many programs out there specifically designed for developing PHP apps.

I was wondering if those of you who use editors specifically for PHP could tell me what I am missing and perhaps suggest some good alternatives. I am particularly interested in features such as syntax highlighting for instance.

I'd really like to hear peoples thoughts on the subject.

Thanks!

probably you are missing school/work, because you are wasting a lot of time counting lines each time you have error in php code. Imagine that you have an error in line 257! There is a better choice - crimson editor. it's freeware php/html/etc. editing tool that numbers lines and highlights tags. www.crimsoneditor.com

[RRWH]

So far nobody has mentioned vi (or variants such as vim) Simple to get to any line number, no ftp hassles - edit right on the server, as many macro's as you need.

But I do use Dreamweaver MX or Zend most of the time.

[CapitalWebHost]

I'm a Dreamweaver user myself...yes, it's expensive, but it's powerful.

Sometimes I get lazy and just edit my stuff in CuteFTP..lol..on the fly.

[centrilo]

Editplus is a great tool, it has lots of capabilities for multiple languages and is extremely customizable. It is also lightweight and very fast. I highly recommend it.

[M.Zeb Khan]

I was using winsyntax before, but when I saw the feautures of Macromedia Dreamweaver MX, I left winsyntax, and now always usng Dreamweaver MX

[jaswinder_rana]

First i used to use notepad, then Editpad, then Ultra Edit, then Zend and
finally setteled for Dreamweaver.

[eerok]

Allow me: http://www.scintilla.org/SciTE.html. Small, sleek and great for quick edits.

I also like scite for php -- along with rox-filer on linux. Everything is quick, and the syntax highlighting has saved me from errors (especially typos) many times. I don't really like the extra features of the big, fancy program editors.

[ruben]

Coding in Notepad is like playing football with a pig bladder.

[mark_W]

Coding in Notepad is like playing football with a pig bladder.

Have you ever tried.....Footbal with a pigs bladder that is!

[joebert]

Untill you actually know what you're doing, I think everyone should use somthing like the notepad 2 mentioned earlier.

[jaswinder_rana]

I used to use notepad too. before i used Frontpage (which adds irrelevant code on its own) and compared to that notepad was quite heaven (before trying anything else in existsense for the first time)

[Musicbox]

i use 1stpage you can find more about 1stpage here http://www.evrsoft.com

[caban]

I do indeed use VI quite a bit but I often edit right on a production server/script.

Anyone want to throw me a bone on how to avoid the backups VI makes? From what I understand when you're in VI or when you crash; filename.ext~ is created.

This is a huge security risk I didn't even think of but a nessus scan showed it. In my case index.php~.

Viewing index.php~ in my web browser showed the php code including a db call in plain text.

-Dan.

So far nobody has mentioned vi (or variants such as vim) Simple to get to any line number, no ftp hassles - edit right on the server, as many macro's as you need.

But I do use Dreamweaver MX or Zend most of the time.

[squire]

To back up Johnny Gulag, REMIYA and others I would reccommend Crimson Editor. It is fantastic although I almost always use Notepad. believe it or not, its because I am too lazy to go to the effort of opening Crimson Editor when Notepad has short links lol.

I dunno but I will defniately move to it as sometimes problems crop up with notepad such as trying to Undo code.

[Viflux]

Downloaded and checked out this PHP Designer, and man...it seems pretty sweet at first glance.

Will play with it some more.

[domain sale]

Just hit Shift-F9 & that will open the snippets pane, create your own custom folders etc as well. Snippets used to be a feature of Homesite before macromedia purchased Allaire.

domain sale, I am aware of the snippets concept, but didn't realise it was a feature in Dreamweaver? How does one go about enabling this.

another feature i like about DW is the design/code view - just hit Control + ~ to switch, much faster than previewing in a browser. If u learn all the DW keyboard shortcuts or create your own your be suprised how productive it is, there are many other features that make it a no brainer from a designer/developer 'view point' on what is the best editor and too many features to mention but one thing i like in mx 20004 is the CSS can be previewed in the properties pallete (contl + F3)

ive been using it since version 2 & i think it is one of the best software programs ever made.

[magistudios]

I've always used DreamWeaver and haven't run into any problems using it thus far.