Latest News from Juan Rivera

PHP 5.3 Syntax Support

Sun, 06 Dec 2009 22:42:29 EST

I've just recently added support in VS.Php 2.8 for the new language features in PHP 5.3

Here is a screenshot of a file using namespaces and lambda functions:

Now the focus is getting namespaces integrated into the intellisense engine.

If you are interested in trying it out, go to VS.Php's development site and download a copy of VS.Php 2.8

I'll keep you posted,

Juan

Updated VS.Php 2.7

Wed, 04 Nov 2009 22:38:25 EST

I have fixed a bunch of issues on 2.7 so I've decided to make it available to all.

Here is the list of fixes:

Improved project-wide intellisense
Address some of the XDebug crashes in Apache. Only allow one thread at a time to avoid concurrency issues in XDebug/PHP
Improve PhpDoc intellisense, protect better against invalid expressions for evaluation
Allow to create IIS project on root directory of IIS
Make XDebug integration much more robust
Using PHP 5.2.10
Fix issues with snippets

What am I up to?

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 19:21:14 EDT

Guys,

I've been quiet on my blog lately so I wanted to give everyone an update on what am I up to.

First, VS.Php 2.7 has been a great release, probably the best one so far. But while the product has evolved with new features, bugs have crept up as well. I wanted to take time to fix bugs, lots of them. And that's what I've been doing and will be doing for some time.

There are new features I plan, like PHP 5.3, refactoring and obviously VS2010.

But it is time to do some house clean up and put the extra effort in going through the bug backlog.

VS.Php for Visual Studio 2010

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 18:45:00 EDT

Now that VS.Php 2.7 is out, I'll like to share our progress with VS.Php for Visual Studio 2010.

If you are currently participating on the VS2010 beta program, you can try VS.Php for Visual Studio 2010.

Here is a screenshot of VS.Php running on Visual Studio 2010:

There are a number of things broken but basic functionality is there.

You can download the latest build here: vsphp_en_2010.exe

VS.PHP 2.7 Adds Support For Silverlight Integration

Mon, 03 Aug 2009 18:00:00 EDT

We pleased to announce the release of VS.Php 2.7 for Visual Studio 2008 and Visual Studio 2005. This release introduces a number of new key features and enhacements of existing features. Silverlight One of the most exciting new features is Silverlight integration. With VS.Php 2.7, you can develop Silverlight applications and host them in your server side PHP application. VS.Php makes it easy to develop, debug and deploy these types of applications.

Changes in smart indentation

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 09:13:43 EDT

I have made some improvements to the smart indentation feature in VS.Php. Smart indentation can be enabled here:

I tried to address a number of issues with the previous version where things didn't align well. In many cases things don't align well if there are syntax errors so it is difficult to do it then.

One of the things I do as I write code is Ctrl+K Ctrl+D, this will auto indent the entire document. You can also do Ctrl+K Ctrl+F if you want to auto indent selected text.

More on IIS integration

Thu, 30 Jul 2009 09:07:15 EDT

In VS.Php 2.7 I made changes to the IIS integration in which you could use IIS with any existing project by simply changing the debug mode in the project properties. I also had removed the Local IIS project from the new project types. In the lastest build, I reintroduced the Local IIS project which creates a standard PHP 5 local project and then runs the IIS configuration wizard for the project.

Also, in the case you run into this type of error:

Make sure you install the CGI component in IIS:

VS.Php 2.7 bootstrapper

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 00:20:03 EDT

One of the things we are doing in regards to the standalone edition is that VS.Php will automatically install the shell if you don't have it.

You will download a bootstrapper executable. This executable checks if you have the .Net runtime and Visual Studio installed. If you don't, it will go to the Microsoft site and download those and run their installers. Once all the prerequisites for VS.Php are met, the bootstrapper will download VS.Php from the jcxsoftware site and run the installer.

The future of VS.Php standalone edition

Sun, 14 Jun 2009 20:30:57 EDT

VS.Php standalone edition is a great tool for PHP developers who don't own Visual Studio. It comes with the Visual Studio shell and provides all the features you find in the other editions of VS.Php.

I'll like to share a bit of history on the standalone edition, where we are today and where we are going tomorrow.

History of VS.Php Standalone Edition

Improving Built-in web server

Thu, 11 Jun 2009 23:12:15 EDT

In VS.Php 2.7 we have added extra functionality to the built-in Apache web server. First, you will no longer see a console Apache window showing up when you start the debug session. Instead, you will see a nice icon showing up in the traybar.

Second, if the Apache process crashes, it will recover and will let you continue debug your application. In previous versions, if the Apache process crashes, it would stop the debug session.

Finally, it also informs you if Apache failed to start. Any errors Apache reports to the stderr, will be presented in a message box.

VS.Php 2.7 (beta) + IIS 7 Integration

Sun, 31 May 2009 21:16:29 EDT

We have redone our IIS integration in VS.Php 2.7. The new level of integration is more powerful and flexible.

You can now use IIS with any local project instead of having a specific project type for IIS. That means you can use the project wizard to create project from existing folder and then use IIS.

IIS7 is now one more option in the debug mode settings.

When you select the IIS7 debug mode, a wizard will walk you through the process of getting IIS7 configured to run your project.

VS.Php 2.6.4 released

Sun, 26 Apr 2009 13:55:13 EDT

This is another minor update to the 2.6 branch. The following are some of the key changes in this release:

- Fix indentation issues when using "else if"
- Fix reconnection issues on remote server projects. When the connection goes down, it will reconnect silently. It also has the ability to force a reconnection.
- Fix issue on remote project servers that allows to create new folders.
- Fix problem detecting if a remote folder existed
- Fix issue with saving credentials for remote server projects.

Is it time to get rid of bundling PHP 4 runtime in VS.Php?

Sun, 12 Apr 2009 18:30:24 EDT

Until now, we have been including both PHP 5 and PHP 4 runtimes with VS.Php. In an attempt to simplify things, I was wondering if we could get rid of the PHP 4 runtime. Afterall, I think everyone has moved to PHP 5 by now since PHP 4 is no longer supported.

What if I get rid of PHP 4 in the next release of VS.Php 2.7? Any issues with that? Please speak up before I get rid of it.

Happy Easters!

Juan

Older downloads

Mon, 06 Apr 2009 22:29:35 EDT

New server

Thu, 26 Mar 2009 07:03:31 EDT

We are finally using a new server. After a few weeks of instability on the website due to the increase in traffic we have moved to a more powerful server. If you see something not working quite right please let me know. I'd appreciate the feedback.

Thanks,

Juan

VS.Php 2.7 (beta) and Silverlight 3 (beta)

Tue, 17 Mar 2009 10:43:31 EDT

Check out the new integration between VS.Php 2.7 (beta) and Silverlight 3 (beta):

http://screencast.com/t/i0qyiGi3yZ

VS.Php 2.7 is available for download here:

http://www.jcxsoftware.com/jcx/vsphp/beta

Silverlight 3 beta will probably be available soon as well. I'm going to fix a few issues so it works ok with Silverlight 2 but there will be a few things that aren't going to work quite well as in Silverlight 3.

Juan

localhost no longer works with Apache

Fri, 13 Mar 2009 07:10:23 EDT

In the past few days there was a change in Vista (I'm guessing) in which localhost resolves to the IPv6 loopback address instead of the IPv4 address. The problem is that VS.Php's apache server only supports IPv4 and therefore when you start your debug session you get an error saying the page can not be displayed.

I uploaded a new version of VS.Php that explicitly uses 127.0.0.1 instead of localhost in the url when starting a debug session in built-in mode. This solves this problem.

http://www.jcxsoftware.com/download.php

VS.Php 2.6 (Japanese) Released

Thu, 26 Feb 2009 19:32:03 EST

I'm proud to announce that we have released VS.Php 2.6 Japanese Edition.

http://www.asial.co.jp/vsphp/release.php

This build release for the Japanese market has a few bug fixes that aren't in our current release. I plan to release a new minor English release tomorrow.

Mix 2009

Mon, 16 Feb 2009 22:57:29 EST

I was invited by Microsoft to attend the Mix 2009 event. I'm trying to get the Silverlight integration done by then but has had two false starts with it. I need SL3 to get the integration working.

In any case, if you are going to Mix, please send me an email, I'd love to chat with you about VS.Php.

Regards,

Juan

Minor update

Mon, 16 Feb 2009 01:04:11 EST

I'm posting another minor updates to the VS.Php 2.6 release. This release includes the following:

Fixed issue that prevented VS.Php to start debug session
Updated FTP, SFTP engine
Fixed PEAR help docs
Fix PHP doc formatting

Updated VS.Php 2.6

Tue, 03 Feb 2009 22:51:48 EST

I just updated VS.Php 2.6 with a new version that fixes a few problems including:

GoToReference not working well on deep inherited classes.
Fix issue with static methods not showing up in intellisense.
Fix bug launching debug session where you get message box saying: Operation completed.
Fix issue when opening files from user referenced that could break intellisense.
Prevent the project-wide intellisense from parsing Smarty files.
Fix issue that prevented you to drop a class or function from the class view into the editor.

VS.Php 2.6 release focuses on the enterprise developer

Tue, 03 Feb 2009 08:23:35 EST

Miami, FL, January 26, 2009: Jcx.Software announced today the release of VS.Php 2.6 for Microsoft Visual Studio 2008. VS.Php is the PHP integrated development environment (IDE) for Visual Studio developers. This version includes a number of features for the enterprise developer including:

Seamless integration with Microsoft Internet Information Services 7.0 (IIS 7), which allows developers to host their PHP project on their local IIS server. VS.Php configures PHP, Fast CGI and XDebug automatically. It also provides unique configuration for each Php project hosted in IIS, allowing developers to utilize custom settings in the php.ini for each project.
Support for very large projects with over 10000+ files. VS.Php is now optimized to load large projects quickly.
Project-wide IntelliSense, providing the developer with quick access to all classes, functions, methods and constants defined in the project. VS.Php provides two tabs in the IntelliSense pop-up, one for frequently used entries and another for project wide entries.
The ability to drag and drop files within the solution view, which allows the user to quickly copy or move files within the project. Also, the user can drag files to the references node for quick access in IntelliSense for the symbols defined in the file.
The latest version of Zend Framework, Php 5 and XDebug.

Custom php.ini file for your project

Sun, 01 Feb 2009 22:37:49 EST

I posted a short tutorial explaining how you can customize the php.ini file for your local web project.

View Tutorial

I hope you find it useful. If you have other suggestions on topics you would like me to cover in online tutorials, please let me know.

Juan

VS.Php 2.6 is out but there is more

Mon, 26 Jan 2009 20:49:39 EST

Wow, it's been quite a ride... VS.Php 2.6 was quite a challenge. It took over six months to build the new features, fix some old features and try a few things that didn't make the cut. I'd wish there were a few more fixes and a few more features in the release but at some point I had to release it :) I really hope you guys like the new release and find it more useful and make you more productive.

VS.Php 2.6 release focuses on the enterprise developer

Sun, 25 Jan 2009 19:49:33 EST

Disconnected files

Sat, 24 Jan 2009 15:12:26 EST

One new feature in VS.Php 2.6 is the ability to know on a remote server project about which files you have a local cache copy and which you don't. For performance reasons, when you work on a remote server project, only the files you open get downloaded locally. But after a while you may not know which files you have locally and which you don't. Files that aren't locally can not participate on intellisense for obvious reasons.

Screencast on IIS7 Suppport in VS.Php

Sat, 24 Jan 2009 09:30:28 EST

In VS.Php 2.6 we added support for IIS7 projects. The idea is to allow you to use your local IIS7 webserver instead of the built-in apache server. The new project wizard does the following:

Creates a virtual directory on IIS that points to the project location
Set the permissions so that IIS can server on that location (usually in the user's projects directory)
Configure PHP for FastCGI
PHP configuration is per project so each project contains its own PHP configuration with its own unique php.ini file.
XDebug is configured by default.

VS.Php 2.6 release date

Sun, 18 Jan 2009 15:05:12 EST

I was hoping to release VS.Php 2.6 tomorrow but after some delays due to personal reasons and a few extra bugs we found, we will delay until next Monday. Thanks all for your patience as we fix a few more bugs into this release.

Thanks,

Juan

Improved VS.Php 2.6 build

Tue, 06 Jan 2009 07:44:49 EST

Here is a build with bunch of fixes. Also includes XDebug 2.0.4

Please, please give it a try and let me know if you run into issues.

Here are the links:

English:

VS.Php 2.6 for Visual Studio 2008
VS.Php 2.6 Standalone Edition
VS.Php 2.6 for Visual Studio 2005

German:

Faster, better, VS.Php (build 2.6.2.5267)

Wed, 24 Dec 2008 14:20:33 EST

A new build is available for testing. This build improves significantly how we handle large projects.

Please, please give it a try and let me know if you run into issues.

Here are the links:

English:

VS.Php 2.6 for Visual Studio 2008
VS.Php 2.6 Standalone Edition
VS.Php 2.6 for Visual Studio 2005

German:

Follow me on Twitter

Mon, 22 Dec 2008 19:22:47 EST

If you want to follow more closely the development of VS.Php, you can follow me on Twitter:

http://twitter.com/vsphp

An update on where we are...

Mon, 08 Dec 2008 16:18:48 EST

I apologize for not posting on the blog lately. A few updates I want to share with you.

First, a few weeks ago, I was invited to MS to show VS.Php to some of the key leaders of the Php community. Microsoft organized a web dev summit every year where they share with the community what they are doing and how they can help support the community. It is amazing how much Microsoft has changed in regards to open source and Php. I'm gald VS.Php is been part of the mix in helping them build a better story of Php in Windows. I think they are on the right track.