NetBeans IDE's work flow is based on projects. In the case of PHP, a project includes source files, the include path, and all NetBeans IDE metadata.
The Projects window is the main entry point to your project sources. It shows a logical view of important project contents. You can open the Projects window by choosing Window > Projects (Ctrl-1).
Right-click either a PHP project or an individual file to open its context actions. Project context actions are an easy way to access much of the IDE's functionality. The context actions available for a project include:
The context menu for individual PHP files includes:
Whenever you have multiple projects open, one should always be set as the main project. The main project is usually the project that contains an application's main class. The IDE provides shortcut commands to quickly build, run, and debug the main project. In the Projects window, the main project is shown in bold. You can set any project as the main project by right-clicking its project node and choosing Set as Main Project.