Recommended Tools
For development with n2n we recommend the following tools. We are well aware, that there are great alternatives for some of the tools. Please take notice, that we develop on Windows. Most of the tools are available as well on Linux or MacOS.
Windows Options
We recommend the display of file extenstions and hidden system files and folders.
Browser
We recommend Firefox for webdevelopment. There is also a developer edition. You might want to look into this!
Java JDK
If your IDE is Eclipse, you need an installation of Java SE JDK.
IDE
When developing with n2n, you want an IDE with good autocomplete and source code features. We recommend using Eclipse PDT.
Remember: set all file encodings to UTF-8! To do that go into preferences and search for "encoding". Put all the values on UTF-8:
- General -> Workspace -> Text file encoding
- Web -> CSS Files -> Encoding
- HTML Files -> Encoding
Webserver
In order to test your applications on your computer we recommend XAMPP. Select a package with at least PHP 8.1 support. You do not need the FTP Server, Perl Support or Tomcat.
We usually develop on a drive, that we use exclusive for development purpuses. In our case, we use drive d:
. We install all the needed apps into d:\apps
- Apache settings: We do change the path to htdocs within the
httpd.conf
tod:\htdocs
You need to change that at two different places. Check that .htaccess can be rewritten in each directory:AllowOverride ALL
- SSL settings: You also need to change the htdocs file within
httpd-ssl.conf
- Database settings: Within
my.ini
we changecollation_server=utf8mb4_unicode_ci
andcharacter_set_server=utf8mb4
. This way, your standard database settings are set on UTF-8 - PHP settings: You also want to add internationalization within php.ini: remove the comment before
extension=intl
. remove also the comment beforeextension=gd
for Image support. If you use Hangar, we recommend, that you increasemax_input_vars
to 10000. Check, that the timezone is correct:date.timezone = "Europe/Zurich"
Database Management
For local database management you can use SQLyog. Some of us prefere HeidiSQL.
Frontend development
We turned not so happy with SASS development on Eclipse. That's why we decided to develop our CSS with Visual Studio Code. We recommend the Extension Live Sass Compiler. You find it, when you search for plugins.
PHP Package Manager
In order to install n2n and other great modules and extentions, you want to install Composer.
Source Code Management
You find all of n2n as open source on Github. We use GIT for Source Code Management.
For easy checkout you need an SSH Key. This is how you can create one:
- Open GitBash (right click in windows explorer)
- Type:
ssh-keygen -t rsa -b 4096 -C "your_email@example.com"
- Confirm questions. You can confirm (all) with just hitting <enter>
By the way, you want to adapt your "Default repository folder" in Eclipse to your workspace directory. Open Preferences and Search for "Git".
Visualstudio Code
We use Visualstudio Code to edit SCSS files. We recommend to install the following extension:
- Press ctrl + P
- run: ext install glenn2223.live-sass
If you want to autorun the tool, add the following options to your settings.json file:
"liveSassCompile.settings.watchOnLaunch": true,
"liveSassCompile.settings.showOutputWindowOn": "Information",
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