Writing good code starts with a good development environment. An Integrated Development Environment (IDE) is the main part of a good development environment. NetBeans is a free and open source PHP editor that can be used for Magento development. In this recipe, we will set up a Magento 2 project in NetBeans.
Install the latest version of NetBeans IDE on your computer. You can download it from the following URL:
https://netbeans.org/downloads/
For PHP development, you need to download the HTML5 & PHP
bundle.
To create a new project, open NetBeans and navigate to File | New Project.
A window like the one in the following screenshot will appear on your screen. Click on PHP and PHP Application with Existing Sources.
Click on Next and configure the following settings:
Source Folder: This field is set to the location of your Magento code (like
/var/www/html/magento2/
)Project Name: The NetBeans project name is entered in this field
PHP Version: This field is set to PHP 5.5
Default Encoding: This field is set to UTF-8
In the next screenshot, you can see how everything is configured:
Tip
When you are working with a version control system like GIT, it is recommended that you check the checkbox. Put NetBeans metadata into a separate directory. If not checked, a
.nbproject
folder is created in your Magento root, and you don't want to have that folder in your version control system. Another possibility is to add the.nbproject
folder in the.gitignore
file.Click on Next and configure the final settings:
Run as: If you are developing on a local PC, choose Local Web Server
Project URL: The URL of your website
Index file: Set this to
index.php
The settings are shown in the following screenshot:
Click on the Finish button and your NetBeans project is ready. You can now start developing.