[Debate]Eclipse, Netbeans, and IntelliJ IDEA

I wanted to start a topic to help out new Java developers choose a IDE. The three most used are Eclipse, Netbeans, and IntelliJ. If you have the time, please post a response to this topic telling your opinion on which is best, and why. And remember to compare to others. For example:

 

What do you mean by Eclipse does not enable you to compile to Class files (automatically)?

 

I use eclipse, however I can't make an argument why it's the best. I use it because I'm used to it, and don't want to change around IDE's. I know this is more for helping new developers, but for me who has programmed using eclipse for about 4 years now, I can't even come up with a reason why I use it, or why I don't other than that was what was on the schools computers, and I've gotten used to it. I think many experienced devs are like that. One day someone told a new developer here use this IDE, i'll help you, then that developer got used to it, and never changed. Maybe i'm just completely lost though because I'm overtired

 

Yeah I was wondering about that. I haven't used Netbeans or IntelliJ so I won't comment on those one way or another. And by the same token, others need to avoid making false statements about IDE's that they don't use, because otherwise this thread will just degenerate into a flame war.

(And for what it's worth, I don't have any religious attachement to Eclipse - I use it because it was what I happened to learn, and I'm happy enough with it not to feel like learning another IDE).

 

i use EditRocket its just simple and easy

 

+1 for IntelliJ IDEA.

It's free and open source. It is really the best IDE out there.

I started with NetBeans/Eclipse pair, as NetBeans didn't like to compile my plugins (ant error, I fixed it).
Eclipse seems like the most Notepad-like IDE. Its support for auto-completion, etc. is really, really poor.

Then, I have used NetBeans only. It was fine, I liked it very much, however it seemed like it wasn't as productivity-and-user-friendly as I wanted it to.

Then, I have read about IntelliJ IDEA. I installed it and tried opening my existing plugin. Since I made it when I used both NB and Eclipse, I have just imported the project from Eclipse - everything (dependencies, etc.) was copied and I was very happy.

Then, I started programming. It is just unbelievable how fast it is. It didn't crash for me at all. In Help-Productivity tips you can find tips to program faster and it shows you how often did you use X function.
Auto-completion is a real dream. It thinks for me. It automatically sorts the things in the menu, so usually it's just "enter" - I don't even have to use arrow buttons! For compiling, I used my existing ANT project, however Idea can generate a new template, or even use its own compiler. Also, I love the integration with Git/many other services. Just one click and your project is uploaded.

OH! I forgot about the most important thing!
In IntelliJ IDEA, you can use code inspection. For example, to start with, check some of the boxes in the File-Settings-Incpections.
Then, just click Analyze-Inspect, whole project, and go.
Now, on the bottom of the screen, you will see a list of tips. They are REALLY helpful, and to most of them, you can just right-click and automatically fix the code. You can use this functionality in editor - if you use inefficent code, it will be highlighted with yellow color, and you can either
- click on it, and then click in the Light Bulb
- click on it, alt-enter
and select the preferred solution.

TL;DR - IntelliJ Idea is AWESOME, use it now.

 

Usually I'd go with Eclipse but you've really persuaded me, I'm going to take a look at Intelli J

 

Eclipse. Eclipse is purely free, does everything IDEA does just as good or better (at least I couldn't find anything that Eclipse doesn't have). Has powerful aids, analysing and navigating tools. Has proper plugin support with lots of plugins that are actually useful. For the rest, I will use Acrobot's post:

 

Real programmers use vim and javac.

Not that I actually do that.

 

@nickguletskii
Hmm...
I used Eclipse and didn't like it...
The two most important things for me is:
- far better auto-completion than any other IDE
- code inspection (with Performance, etc., and many more (500+ AFAIK))

And I meant Community Edition, which IS free and Open-Source.
Also I tried Eclipse, but it's auto-completion was really, really poor.
And the lighbulbs - believe me, it's not the same as IDEA's implementation, same for Problems tab - it just isn't the same, believe me.
It did just list all things applicable, not checking other code, but if you like Eclipse, I have nothing against it.

 

@Acrobot I might be retarded, but how do you add an external Library to an IntelliJ project? I finally managed to accidentally add the folder where I stored cb 1000 and a few other important .jars, but how am I supposed to do it?
And yeah @nickguletskii the auto complete on IntelliJ is unnecessarily in your face, it shows up for every single thing you type, which imo is just annoying.

 

I actually only had a glance at the features of IDEA, I never used it for my projects. But after reading this page: http://www.jetbrains.com/idea/documentation/static_code_analysis.html I came to the conclusion that it is more of an IDE for beginners than a professional IDE. An experienced programmer would not even commit these mistakes. If you have common sense, you will not have dead code and code that calls something that might be null without checking if it is null before that. The distinguishing features revolve about being friendly to the programmer, which in my opinion, is just pushing it too much. It is friendly enough - look at C++, where a single mistake might cause thousands of errors.

Disclaimer: My plugins were actually little tests, I never thought they would become so popular, so I didn't actually spend time handling every case, leading to "bugs" related to user doing something incorrectly.

 

@captainawesome7
File-Project Structure-Modules-Dependencies

@nickguletskii Hmm... Is it IDE for beginners?
I don't really think so, this is just one of very many functions. (By the way, it's useful, even for non-beginners - it's even commonly used in companies)
It's not only null checking.
The aim of IntelliJ IDEA is to make work as productive as possible - you may think that it's only for begginers, who make mistakes - nope.
To be honest, when I moved from NetBeans to IDEA - I was working at least twice as fast as I did.
You can also look here: http://www.jetbrains.com/idea/features/code_assistance.html, and this video: http://tv.jetbrains.net/videocontent/autocompletion-in-intellij-idea-x shows you how fast you can develop with this code completion.

 

Before watching the video: maybe I should try using IDEA for one of my projects, as a test... After watching the video: no thanks, I will stay with Eclipse.

Reason: stop running ahead of me, I can type that out myself, I can press Ctrl+ Space myself, I can press the down arrow myself, I can press Enter myself. It won't save me time, it will just waste it by selecting wrong things.

 

@nickguletskii
Hmm...
That's your opinion.
In my opinion, it's better, because you can choose things you want, but they're sorted from most suitable to least - it usually is the first option.

 

R

Real programmers use IntelliJ...

You should be able to disable that in the settings...

EDIT by Moderator: merged posts, please use the edit button instead of double posting.

 

Coming from a vimmer I use vim + eclimd + mvn. Also use Eclipse if I want to use an IDE.

I find if i'm doing something slightly experimental/new an IDE is better, however if i know exactly what i want a basic text editor is sometimes faster.

@Acrobot
! I have to try IntelliJ now that's absolutely fantastic. I've had it installed on a recommendation and never actually used it.

 

What's the difference between eclipse indigo and eclipse helios or galileo
Personally I prefer Eclipse over Netbeans, I didn't like the layout of netbeans. As for IntelliJ, I tried it out, but I was so use to Eclipse I didn't really give it a fair chance, because I didn't want to learn the new layout.
Plus Eclipse is where I began learning Java, so it's easier to use it instead of learning how to use a new program

 

I tried out Intellij for some days now and I gotta say after getting used to some UI Changes when converting from Eclipse: it is just AWESOME

The built in git and maven functions are really easy to use and a lot less complicated than in eclipse.
Also the autocompleation and code inspection are a nice thing to have to improve code performance.
But what I totally fell in love with is the IDETalk which lets you easly discuss code via an integrated IM with your co devs.

I used eclipse for over 2 years and I can just say : at least give it a try you wont regret it =)

 

Those are just different versions of eclipse, if I remember correctly galileo was eclipse 5

 

Any really big difference between them? or should I just stick with indigo

 

I love indigo

 

I use notepad...



just kidding. I use eclipse simply because I was told to =|

 

I MUCH preferred it's layout to netbeans

 

yeah theres no major difference that I've noticed between versions. The difference is probably backend, but I don't know about it.

 

Eclipse because of saros.