IDE Choices
A journey through my choices of using various IDEs as a developer
Turbo C
In 2003, I wrote my first “Hello World” program in C language using the Turbo C IDE in CSC Computer Education center where I gained my first certification on Unix and C++ during my Standard X to XI spring break.
My eyes were glued on to this IDE for the next few month as we had programs in C and C++ in the Computer Science lab.
Microsoft Visual Studio
In 2004, thinks evolved and we got a drag and drop based IDE in the form of Microsoft Visual Basic. This was one of the first IDEs everyone loved — for the simplicity in dragging and dropping buttons and having to write minimal code with visual appeal. The most common program everyone wrote was form based submission which involved implementing an alert box if there were any validation errors in the form fields.
EditPlus
In 2005, EditPlus was one awesome editor which everyone in grad school used to be bragging about while editing files in Windows XP desktop.
NetBeans
Things evolved from C to Visual Basic to Java in subsequent years and there was this ultimate IDE which was a revolution — NetBeans. I still remember the time when I used to ditch EditPlus when NetBeans had the drag and drop feature for Swing based Java UIs. I thought it was the best IDE ever created in history and used it for the next few years until I joined my first corporate job and found the ultimate tool — Eclipse!
Macromedia Dreamweaver
I also had my hands dirty with Macromedia Dreamweaver (got acquired by Adobe later) which I used to use for designing websites as a hobby. Yes, all my hobbies were tied up to technology and computers ;)
Eclipse
In 2010, when I started my first job, Eclipse was the go-to for everyone since it was suggested by every Architect in the team. My team members thought that was the bible for every problem in the Java ecosystem. However, I thought otherwise. I installed NetBeans and used both Eclipse and NetBeans in my desktop for some of my Swing based side projects since I got bored with the not-so-great backend only project which lacked a UI.
Adobe Flex Builder
In 2011, things got upgraded from Java to Adobe Flex (Adobe Air) in my project and I was hooked on to the new IDE — Adobe Flex Builder which only a few got to use in my project. The UI was appealing, the code was intriguing and I always wanted to work on ActionScript to create some blazing UI in Adobe Flex. And I did get my hands dirty at home by getting my own version in my personal desktop. Hell Yeah! I used to explore every possible stuff back then too…! :)
I always hated Eclipse — no offense Eclipse fans. I disliked the fact that every new version of Eclipse was heavy and forced me to not to upgrade to the latest version of the IDE. This is when I joined my second job where everyone was using an unknown IDE called — IntelliJ IDEA
IntelliJ IDEA
Ever since I started using IntelliJ IDEA in 2012, I have never looked back! That’s how much the IDE has changed the way I write and navigate code. Period. It was the best keyboard centric and developer friendly IDE available during that time.
I used the IntelliJ IDEA 12 Ultimate which was released in December 2012 and I have used every single version of IntelliJ IDEA Community and Ultimate till date. It’s my swiss army knife for my code quality and productivity.
Some of the other IDEs which I use are Atom and VS Code for non-Java related programming languages, eg., Javascript, Typescript and Python. Many people ask me why I don’t prefer Eclipse and use only IntelliJ IDEA. Most of them don’t know the fact that I test almost every IDE and I never stick to one. If I feel I need to move to a better one, I always do. After all change is the only constant.
