What's under your hood?

2005-06-19

I've read couple of blogs recently on Planet PHPdiscussing what tools you use for PHP development. I quite like the idea of what's under your hood, so I decided to write what's under my hood ;-).

I started with PHP sometimes in 1998, which was also year when I started with HTML and start working for a web development/marketing company. Year of new beginnings. Heh.

I am using Linux. I started with Slackware, then I spent some time with RedHatand went back to Slackware. Three years ago I bought ASUS T9400laptop and installed there Linux From Scratch(twice). To be able to easy maintain from source compiled linux distribution I switched to Gentooand since then never wanted to have anything else ;-).

In the beginning I used joe editorand I also gave a try to Macromedia Dreamweaver, Eclipse, Quanta and some other projects.

Now I am solely with VIM. VIM is just a perfect choice for me. I can use the same development environment everywhere without changing almost anything. I use projectplugin for managing all projects I work on. Here's an example of project utility in action:

I have also some helpful addons to VIM to help me writing PHP/DocBook code. It'll be maybe worth to write about VIM something more is a special VIM related log. Next time.

For version control I use Subversion. It has more feature than CVS and I found it more handy for controlling my sometime too often changing project's architecture ;-).

For database driven apps PostgreSQLis my database of choice, however I'm currently playing with SQLitewhich is another lightweight choice on my way to minimalism.

The GIMPalong with ImageMagickand gThumbare my image processing tools of choice. gThumb has very nice features for managing huge amounts of pictures and helping you to have libraries and catalogs withing libraries. All data about libraries/catalogs are stored in XML so it makes things even easier.

I am very happy user of PHPversion 5.0.4 and PEARversion 1.4.0a12. XML/XSL support in PHP5 is just great and latest features of PEAR make deployment of packages easier. You have option now to have your own channel and deploy your own packages.

My usual development environment is a fluxboxwith six desktop. On the first one is Atermwith screenrunning with many VIMs with projects, Midnight Commander, and other stuff, desktop with Mozilla, desktop for Skypeand Centericq, dektop for The GIMPand gThumband sometimes dektop for GnoTimeif I need to track the time I spent on projects. Advantage of GnoTime is that it stores data in XML.

I think that would be all of my tools of choice I use for fun & profit ;-).

So, what's under your hood?