How does PHPEclipse compare with other PHP Editors?
Feature comparison
How does PHPEclipse stack up against other PHP editors? Are you looking for features available between editors. The goal of this chart is to outline the features between PHPEclipse and other editors that are available.
| Feature comparison | PHPEclipse | PDT | PHPEd |
| Runs on | |||
| Linux, Solarix | Yes | Yes | No |
| Mac OSX | Yes | Yes | No |
| Windows | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Coding features | |||
| Syntax Coloring | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Brackets Matching | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Code folding | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Code Completion | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Parameter hints | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Mark Occurrences | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Hover Tooltips | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| PHP Manual integration | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Code templates | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Debugging | |||
| XDebug support | Yes* | Yes* | No |
| DBG Support | Yes* | No** | Yes |
| Zend Debugger | No | Yes | No |
| Version control | |||
| CVS | Yes | Yes | Yes*** |
| Subversion | Yes*** | Yes*** | Yes*** |
| Connectivity | |||
| Database Support | No | No | Yes |
| SSH Support | Yes*** | Yes*** | Yes |
| FTPS Support | Yes*** | Yes*** | Yes |
* Requires Feature to be installed when installing product. Can be in the projects update site.
** I could not find any documentation on there site about DBG. So if I am wrong please correct me.
*** Third party plug-in Subclipse, Subversive, Remote System Explorer
More Data
The above outline is just a quick view of the features that each project supports and is not complete by any means. The following is an attempt to outline the strengths and weaknesses of each project. If you find that this document leans to heavy one way, i apologize, i am trying to be unbiased as possible. Even tho i am a PHPEclipse developer. Corrections are welcomed. The main views will be between PDT and PHPEclipse. The reason for this is that both are free to use, and many people are confusing PHPEclipse with PDT and vice-versa. Maybe i should come up with a star system that shows which project has the better support.
Code Coverage
Title may be a bit misleading, for what this section will cover. I will be detailing when writing code in each project how they assist the developer, or hinder the developer.
Remote Project
There are developers that will need to work with code that are on remote systems. In this section i will outline how each project addresses remote development.
Debug Support
We all make mistakes, just some more then others, and that is why a good debugger is needed when you develop new solutions in PHP. What debuggers are available for each platform, how easy it is to use the debuggers, and how well does each project utilize the features of the debugger.
Unit testing
A good tool to help keep mistakes from catching you by surprise is unit testing. How do you utilize PHPUnit or SimpleTest with each of these projects, and do either of the projects interface with the Unit test projects and make using them easier?
