VSCode Setup

Visual Studio Code is the recommended editor for Cresenity Framework development. The framework ships with workspace configuration files and has a dedicated extension for enhanced IDE support.

PHP CF Extension

Install the official Cresenity Framework extension from the VS Code Marketplace:

PHP CF

This extension provides:

  • Class name autocompletion for CF's underscore-to-directory naming convention (e.g. CApp_Base resolves to system/libraries/CApp/Base.php)
  • Go-to-definition support for CF classes
  • Code snippets for common CF patterns

Installation

  1. Open VS Code
  2. Press Ctrl+Shift+X (or Cmd+Shift+X on macOS) to open the Extensions panel
  3. Search for "PHP CF"
  4. Click Install

Or install via the command line:

code --install-extension cresenity.php-cf

The following extensions work well with the configuration files included in the framework:

Extension Purpose
PHP CS Fixer Automatic code formatting using .php-cs-fixer.dist.php
PHPStan Static analysis using phpstan.neon
PHP Intelephense PHP language server for autocompletion and diagnostics
EditorConfig Consistent formatting using .editorconfig

Included Configuration Files

The framework root includes several configuration files that VS Code and its extensions will automatically pick up:

.php-cs-fixer.dist.php

Defines the code style rules for the project. When the PHP CS Fixer extension is installed, it will automatically use this file to format your PHP code on save.

Key rules enforced:

  • Short array syntax ([] instead of array())
  • Single quotes for strings
  • Opening braces on the same line for classes and functions
  • Ordered imports by length
  • PHPDoc alignment and formatting

.editorconfig

Ensures consistent editor settings across all contributors:

  • UTF-8 charset
  • LF line endings
  • 4-space indentation
  • Trailing whitespace trimming

phpstan.neon

Configuration for PHPStan static analysis. Run analysis from the command line:

./system/vendor/PHPStan/phpstan analyse

phpcs.xml

Code sniffer rules based on the PEAR standard with CF-specific customizations (same-line braces, relaxed commenting rules).

IDE Helper

The framework includes a _ide_helper.php file in the root directory. This file provides additional type hints for classes that use dynamic methods (such as CApp), improving autocompletion in VS Code and other IDEs.

This file is loaded automatically by Intelephense and similar language servers — no additional configuration is required.

Workspace Snippets

The framework includes VS Code snippets in .vscode/cf.json.code-snippets. Currently available:

Prefix Snippet
phpstan-ignore-next-line Adds a @phpstan-ignore-next-line comment

You can add your own project-specific snippets to this file.