Back in the 1990s and 2000s, I was using C++ a lot and was very used to the -> operator for accessing class instance members.

Then I switched over to C# and really loved (and still do love) that I simply could use the . operator to access class and instance members.

Having to use PHP every now and then, I get (unhappy) flashbacks to the 1990s when having to use -> again.

While you cannot change the language, I suggest a new editor feature:

When pressing the . key next to a variable pointing to a class instance, PHP Tools should insert a -> instead.
When pressing the . key next to a class type, PHP Tools should insert a :: instead.

This would save me so much time when typing.

Some example:

class A
{
    public static function foo() : string { return 'foo'; }
    public function bar() : string { return 'bar'; }
}

$a = new A();

In the above code, when adding a new line $a and then the text cursor (caret) is right to the $a and the user presses the . dot key, PHP Tools should insert a -> string instead so that it writes $a-> and open the autocomplete list popup just as it would if the user would have entered -> manually.

Also in the above code, when adding a new line A and then the text cursor (caret) is right to the A and the users presses the . key, PHP Tools should insert a :: and open the autocomplete list popup just as it would if the user would have entered :: manually.

Of course when undoing the auto-inserted code (by pressing CTRL+Z), the replacement with -> or :: should simply be undone again and the actual dot . that I just hit on the keyword, will be present again.

I do know that the . is also the string concatenation operator (that I hate using) but one could design my suggested feature to only do the replacement of . to -> or :: if there is no space between the class instance variable or class type name and omit the replacement if there is a white space before the .. Then, one could still concatenate string like $a . $b.

Also the text replacement should not take place in any other cases like e.g. when entering floating point constants like $pi = 3.141;.