cakephp success is red?

"Why is all setFlash red? Can't we do a success in green?"

Well, yes, just change the successful to look like this.
 $this->Session->setFlash(__('The information has been saved'), 'default', array('class' => 'success'));

This assumes you're using cake's default css.

If, incidentally, you want to bake it ...
copy lib/Cake/Console/Templates/default/actions/controller_actions.ctp to app/Console/Templates/default/actions/controller_actions.ctp and make similar changes to "has been saved" entries (there are two?)

$this->Session->setFlash(__('The has been saved'), 'default', array('class' => 'success'));

incidentally, setting up this custom will break other bakes. If you want to keep the functionality, you can either copy "default/classes" and default/views" or 

ln -s /path/to/lib/Cake/Console/Templates/default/classes app/Console/Templates/default/classes

ln -s /path/to/lib/Cake/Console/Templates/default/views app/Console/Templates/default/views

(I recommend symlinks if possible just in case updates in the templates from source need to trickle down.) 

YMMV, hope it helps someone.

What's your preferred IDE?

Currently, still, it appears to be screen/byobu plus vim.

Probably I am missing all the niceties of something like netbeans, but here's how I set up a cakephp environment:

create a file that contains paths to sections...
---BEGIN FILE ---
cd /path/to/app/Controller
screen -t Controller
cd /path/to/app/Model
screen -t Model
cd /path/to/app/View
screen -t View
cd /path/to/app
screen -t app
cd /path/to/app/webroot/js
screen -t js
cd /path/to/app/webroot/css
screen -t css
cd /path/to/app/webroot/tmp/logs
screen -t logs
---END FILE ---

If you're using tmux instead of screen:
---BEGIN FILE---
cd /path/to/app/Controller
tmux new-window -n Controller
cd /path/to/app/Model
tmux new-window -n Model
cd /path/to/app/View
tmux new-window -n View
cd /path/to/app/
tmux new-window -n approot
cd /path/to/app/webroot/js
tmux new-window -n js
cd /path/to/app/webroot/css
tmux new-window -n css
cd /path/to/app/tmp/logs
tmux new-window -n log

---END FILE---

then simply source the file when you want create the screens for our application
To change between screens, the default mappings of ctrl-a, number will get you there.

I also use :split within vim to work on multiple documents within a given structure. I find this *generally* gives me a quick and easy way to handle the substructures I need and keeps me organized. The few other things most IDEs also have (like class trees and completion) I haven't yet had to use, but I figure I could also macro that as I need. On the logs screen, I can tail -f debug.log.

CakePHP helper to suggest input

What's it do?
makes it easier to make a gray suggest input box. Just use drop it as InputHelper.pm in View/Helper/ and call it where and how you need it. call it just like Form->input but add a sample text for the box.
$this->Input->input(fieldname, options array, 'sample text');

As an example, see what happens when you click in , click out, and change the content this box.

<?php App::uses('FormHelper', 'View/Helper');
    /* helper to make default input help that disappears when clicked */
    /* usage: $this--->Input-&gt;input */
class InputHelper extends FormHelper {
  public function input($fieldname, $options=array(null), $fill) {
     $options['class'] = ' dimmed';
     $options['value'] = $fill;
     $options['onClick'] = "if (this.value=='".$fill."') {this.value='';this.style.color='black'}";
     $options['onBlur'] = "if (this.value=='') {this.value = '".$fill."'; this.style.color='gray'}";
     $out = parent::input($fieldname, $options);
     $out .= parent::hidden($fieldname . "_hidden", array('value' =&gt; $fill));
     return $out;
  }
}
?>

What's with the hidden? If you want to know what the original content was, you can test against this in your Controller to see if fieldname value is equal to fieldname_hidden value and don't store if it matches.