Flow
Flow is a static type checker that brings type annotations to JavaScript. PhpStorm recognizes Flow structures and provides syntax highlighting for them on all operating systems.
Installing Flow
- Open the built-in PhpStorm Terminal (Alt+F12) and at the command prompt, type:
npm install --global flow-bin
to install Flow globally.npm install --save-dev flow-bin
to install Flow as a development dependency.
Configuring Flow in PhpStorm
To have PhpStorm recognize Flow structures, provide correct syntax highlighting, report errors properly, and avoid false-positive error highlighting, change the JavaScript language level to Flow, add a .flowconfig
configuration file to your project, and supply every file to be checked with a // @flow
comment on top.
To change the language level to Flow
In the Settings/Preferences dialog (Ctrl+Alt+S), click JavaScript under Languages and Frameworks. The JavaScript page opens.
From the JavaScript Language Version drop-down list, choose Flow.
In the Flow package or executable field, specify the path to the
node_modules\flow-bin
package or the Flow binary executable file. To usenode_modules\.bin\flow
make sure the path to Node.js is added to thePATH
environment variable.- In the Use Flow server for: area, specify the basis for coding assistance by selecting or clearing the following checkboxes:
Type checking: When this checkbox is selected, syntax and error highlighting is provided based on the data received from the Flow server. When the checkbox is cleared, only the basic internal PhpStorm highlighting is available.
Navigation, code completion, and type hinting: When this checkbox is selected, suggestion lists for reference resolution and code completiong contain both suggestions retrieved from integration with Flow and suggestions calculated by PhpStorm. When the checkbox is cleared, references are resolved through PhpStorm calculation only.
Keep the Save all modified files automatically checkbox selected to ensure that Flow is applied continuously because Flow checks the current files only after all the other modified files are saved.
To generate a .flowconfig configuration file in your project
Open the embedded Terminal (Alt+F12) and type
flow init
at the command prompt.
To enable Flow in a file
Add a
// @flow
comment at the top of it: just typeflow
, press Tab, and PhpStorm will expand it into// @flow
.