The PHP editor phpDesigner 7 comes with several great features, the best of which is the auto-complete. While the auto-complete is snazzy, there are other features that are missing in this PHP editor that are essential for coding not only quickly, but accurately. This PHP development software application is a good one overall, but you may want to make sure it has everything you need for creating your best work.

The highlight feature of this PHP editor is the auto-complete. Rarely have we've seen an auto-complete that is as easy to use and functional. Not only does it prompt the tag and the possible attributes within the tag, but also the variables that are compatible with the tag. When you're working with the alignment in a paragraph tag, the options that are visible are left, right, center and justified. This is true whether you are working in HTML, PHP or JavaScript. This feature alone is a great way to save time and reduce errors. Especially with the PHP scripts and arrays, having this comprehensive auto-complete makes it very simple to get all the characters where they need to go without worrying about remembering everything exactly.

Some of the other features we found useful in this PHP toolkit include the preview and the debugger. While all of these features are indeed quite valuable, this application has limitations when it comes to other feature options. One of the key features missing with this application is a spell-checker. There isn't any kind of task manager, unit testing or snippets tool either. The syntax highlighting for the code was very comprehensive for the HTML side of things, but for the PHP coding there wasn't as much. Overall, this PHP editor instigated a few useful features but missed out on other key elements that other PHP development software applications have.

This application has a lot of elements that help make this PHP editor easy to use. One of the components we found especially valuable was the hover support. When your cursor is in a variable, script, array or tag, a box appears which explains what that particular factor does. There is also the option to add bookmarks, change the layout, and find and replace. With all these options, this PHP editor is easy to use, whether you are an experienced programmer or freshly out of school.

The help and support offered by the developer for this software is comprehensive. The PHP software application contains a help menu complete with categorized topics and a search box, making it easy to find the answer you are looking for. If you need some more personalized help you can always contact the company directly by phone or email. We were also pleased to see that there are a few tutorials and forums available that provide up-to-date information on the latest codes and scripts. This kind of information is always important when you are working with PHP codes.