tptompkins's avatar

Should I jump from Eclipse to ?

I've been using Eclipse for my IDE as long as I've been a developer (over 15 years now). It started with Java development in 2002 and in 2007 I transitioned away from Java and moved into the php world, but continued to use Eclipse. I'm probably what most of you would call an "old school php developer" and am just now getting around to refreshing my skills with the latest technology in the php world. I'm new to php frameworks and am just getting started with learning Laravel. As I'm jumping in head first, I'm noticing that everyone here seems to be using other IDEs instead of Eclipse:

PHP Storm: https://www.jetbrains.com/phpstorm/

Sublime Text: https://www.sublimetext.com/

Atom: https://atom.io/

All of the above are new to me and I'm starting to feel really old lol! Is there a reason why everyone seems to have abandoned Eclipse in favor of these newer IDEs? Eclipse is free while some of these newer IDEs are paid. Can you all please help me understand what benefits these newer IDEs have that I can't get from Eclipse? I'm not against change, and I'd love to become current. What IDE should I make the jump to and why?

Thanks all!

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9 replies
JeffreyWay's avatar

For a full IDE, PHPStorm is as good as it gets. It's incredibly nice.

2 likes
Jaytee's avatar

@JeffreyWay We all know that Sublime Text is the bomb.

I personally use Sublime Text because I just like it. It offers everything I need, but so do the others.

tptompkins's avatar

Woah..I got a reply from the man himself! Thanks @JeffreyWay. BTW - I'm loving the videos. Keep up the good work!

2 likes
londoh's avatar

@tptompkins

I used eclipse for many years. I still always install it on a new machine, and sublime too. But I dont use either of them much.

I also persevered with ZendStudio for more years than I'd care to admit. Its eclipse based, last time i used it was v10 (I think). and it was awful. clunky and crashed a lot. I put up with it because back then coming from a compiled lang background, I used think that a debugger was a critical thing to have and ZS had one built in. Of course its not really so important with php.

Then I found phpstorm. Honestly, I cant do better than quote @JeffreyWay:

For a full IDE, PHPStorm is as good as it gets. It's incredibly nice.

You can try it for free, but its easily worth the modest cost.

I dont use any where its full potential, rarely use the debugger anymore. There are some good PHPStorm videos on here.

regards

l.

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EliasSoares's avatar

Sublime text is fine, but incomplete, you need to install many extensions to have good tools.

I suggest PHPStorm, since it's a full featured IDE. It auto-completion is 10x better then sublimes equivalent. Just this is enough to choose PHPStorm, but you have infinite options with it, PHPUnit testing, XDebug integration, and many tools that make you a PRO.

1 like
Gravity's avatar

Like everyone said above If your coming from Eclipse and want a full IDE I would defiantly recommend PHPStorm. I personally use Brackets [ http://brackets.io ]

Brackets Is: Free, Great Plugins, Themes, Free, Adobe Itself Contributed.

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davestewart's avatar

If you go with PHPStorm (my total fave, it just covers so many languages, and with the new subscription model, you can also use others in the family) make sure you download the Laravel IDE Helper - otherwise you'll think it's somehow broken. It compiles all the magic into something PHPStorm can actually work with.

https://github.com/barryvdh/laravel-ide-helper

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saidbakr's avatar

PHPStorm as I understood from its official payment page, like joining public service such as mobile phone or cable TV, it need payment every year! This is not an acceptable option, It is like chronic disease that you always have to pay for its treatment!

1 like
Nash's avatar

@saidbakr You get something called a perpetual fallback license. It means that even if you stop paying, you can still continue to use your current version and get bugfixes, you just won't get any more automatic updates to the latest version unless you pay. This is not so different from buying a "regular" version of any application. You have to buy the annual subscription or pay for 12 consecutive months though (so the total price for the current software equals one year's subscription fee).

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