Is it possible to work on remote files in Eclipse?

Question

I'm looking into using Eclipse as a dev environment for PHP projects, but it's pretty huge and I'm not sure where to look for answers. I want to be able to work on remote files from within the client - i.e., rather than using an FTP client to download copies from our remote development server, working on them locally, and then having to upload them to test, I want to be able to work directly on the remote files. I know many development environments allow this - my colleagues who work on Macs use Coda, which allows them to define sites and access all files via an explorer tree. I'm currently running Bluefish on Ubuntu, and it also allows this.

I've downloaded and installed Helios, but can't seem to find an obvious menu entry for handling remote files. Can anyone point me in the right direction?

Edited to add: we don't use version control at this point, so I'm not looking for any kind of Subversion tie-in.

Answer 1

Since you are working on Ubuntu, you can have a look over here

Answer 2

Perhaps this will be of some help

http://www.jcraft.com/eclipse-sftp/

I've never used it myself but it seems to do what you're looking for syncing and editing files over SFTP.

Answer 3

The RSE (Remote System Explorer) may be what you're looking for. It's an implementation of the Eclipse File System framework which allows resources in your workspace to be backed in reality by remote resources.

Answer 4

I usually develop using remote Eclipse. Use ssh -Y user@server to login and try executing eclipse on that shell, it should open on your computer if you have X properly configured.

Of course, this Eclipse instance will have access to the remote server files.