I needed a decent development sandbox for PHP/PostgreSQL and didn't want to muck up my desktop install, so I made one in VirtualBox. Here's how I did it.

New VM with Ubuntu 14.04 server (8GB RAM/120GB HDD/NAT, with Port-forwarding)
Port-forwarding set up with 2 rules (note that you may need to adjust the IP to whatever IP the VM gets).
Rule 1
Protocol: TCP
Host IP: 127.0.0.1
Host Port: 8888
Guest IP: 10.0.2.15
Guest Port: 80

Rule 2
Protocol: TCP
Host IP: 127.0.0.1
Host Port: 2222
Guest IP: 10.0.2.15
Guest Port: 22

Take snapshot of VM!

Once the OS is installed you should be able to ssh in to it like this:
ssh myusername@127.0.0.1 -p 2222
and we can install PostgreSQL 9.4, PHP5.6, and PHPpgAdmin

Add repos
PG 9.4: add 'deb http://apt.postgresql.org/pub/repos/apt/ trusty-pgdg main' to /etc/apt/sources.list
PHP5.6: add-apt-repository ppa:ondrej/php5-5.6

Import PG signing key
wget --quiet -O - https://www.postgresql.org/media/keys/ACCC4CF8.asc | sudo apt-key add -

Install everything
apt-get update && apt-get install postgresql-9.4 phppgadmin php5 php5-curl
** note that installing php5 installs apache as well

Set up PostgreSQL
Set “postgres” user password
============================
Login to postgresql prompt:
sudo -u postgres psql postgres

and set postgres password with following command:
postgres=# \password postgres
Enter new password:
Enter it again:
postgres=# \q

To install PostgreSQL Adminpack, enter the command in postgresql prompt:
==============================================
sudo -u postgres psql postgres
postgres=# CREATE EXTENSION adminpack;
CREATE EXTENSION
Type \q in the psql prompt to exit from posgresql prompt, and return back to the Terminal.

Create New User and Database
============================
To create a new user called “kahuna” with password “bigwheel”, and database called “mydb”.

sudo -u postgres
postgres=# psql template1
template1=# CREATE USER kahuna WITH PASSWORD 'bigwheel';
template1=# CREATE DATABASE mydb;
template1=# GRANT ALL PRIVILEGES ON DATABASE "mydb" to kahuna;
template1=# \q

Configure PHPpgAdmin
====================
Edit /etc/apache2/apache2.conf and add the following line to it:
Include /etc/apache2/conf.d/phppgadmin

To access phppgadmin remotely:
sudo nano /etc/apache2/conf.d/phppgadmin
Comment out the line "allow from 127.0.0.0/255.0.0.0 ::1/128" and uncomment the line below it, "allow from all".
sudo apache2ctl restart

Should now be able to access phppgadmin on host OS at http://127.0.0.1:8888/phppgadmin

Take snapshot of VM!

I'm trying out PHPStorm as an IDE. Here's how I'm configuring my environment:
* install same version of php on my local machine as on the VM (5.6) along with xdebug.
* follow excellent docs on JetBrains website for getting IDE talking to underlying php/xdebug
* use 'new project' wizard to connect to vm over ssh
* check that debugging works (ctrl+f5)