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4.7 star rating
0
What is the best alternative to Microsoft Visual Studio?
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CodeLite
All
9
Experiences
Pros
7
Cons
1
Specs
Top
Pro
Rapid development cycle
CodeLite is actively developed with activity almost daily on Github.
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Con
Bland UI
The UI is fairly boring and has limited customization options. There is a dark theme available, however it only applies to the editor. The surrounding windows and borders remain light. You can see a collection of screenshots here.
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Pro
Cross platform
Works on Windows, OS-X and Linux.
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Pro
File Explorer-like workspace view
The workspace view, unlike other IDEs, is a reflection of the actual directory structure on the file system (with user filters applied).
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Pro
Easy to find installed compilers
The search for the installed compilers is quick, and it usually yields useful results on the very first atempt.
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Pro
Open source and free
CodeLite is licensed under GPL with source code available on GitHub.
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Pro
Modest memory footprint
CodeLite takes up about 50MB when loaded into memory with a workspace opened.
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Pro
A lot of useful plugins
CppCheck, DiffTool, Git, MemCheck (Valgrind support, Linux-only), SVN, and many other plugins extend the IDE functionality greatly!
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, Linux, Mac
License:
GPL
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Experiences
free
293
38
Code::Blocks
All
8
Experiences
Pros
5
Cons
2
Specs
Top
Con
It's hard to make the code readable
Due to the problems with indention, it's hard to make the code look nice.
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Pro
Free/Libre/Open Source
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Con
Poor code completion
The code completion for Code::Blocks is rather poor compared to other IDEs
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Pro
Cross platform
Code::Blocks is available for both Windows and Linux, allowing you to use the same IDE across both OSes if you use different machines.
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Pro
Easy to use
Easy to pick up, for example much easier to include libraries.
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Pro
Debugger multi-threading support
The debugger supports multi-threaded processes for faster debugging.
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Pro
Lets you choose the compiler
Code:Blocks lets the developer choose which compiler to use, giving you a higher level of control for on your development workflow.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, Linux, MacOS(outdated version)
License:
GPL
Auto Complete:
Yes
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Experiences
Free
268
45
CLion
All
5
Experiences
Pros
2
Cons
2
Specs
Top
Pro
Intelligent code completion
CLion has an intelligent autocompletion engine that tries to predict the symbol you are typing based on your previous history and the context in which it's being typed.
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Con
Proprietary
Clion is proprietary software which costs $199/1st year for a business license or $89/1st year for an individual license.
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Pro
Cross platform
Clion works on Windows, Linux and OSX.
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Top
Con
Build Tool Integration is messy/over complicated
I have a Jetbrains annual subscription so I can use this tool for free and I've used the Java IDE for years so I really want to like CLion. But it's just over complex to add 3rd party libraries etc. Netbeans/Eclipse etc are much better integrated with the build tools
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, Linux, Mac
License:
Proprietary
Auto Complete:
Yes
Hide
Paid
697
98
Qt Creator
All
11
Experiences
Pros
7
Cons
3
Specs
Top
Pro
Great syntax highlighting and auto-completion
Qt Creator has a code model which basically has the same information as the compiler. So it can do really nice syntax highlighting (e.g. of virtual methods or local variables) as well as provide great code completion.
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Top
Con
Poor refactoring
QtCreator has lack of refactoring features. It's not even close to Resharper++ or CLion.
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Top
Pro
Integrates well with non-IDE workflows
Qt Creator uses normal .pro-files, CMakeLists.txt, Makefiles.am, etc. for its projects and rarely needs special configuration for projects. Projects can be built on the command line as usual.
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Top
Con
Poor multi-window mode support
While multiple windows are supported, many operations will activate in the primary window (debug, goto-line... etc).
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Pro
Built-in Qt GUI editor
Allows for the creation of a window based UI in a graphical editor, no code required to build the UI.
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Con
Qt-focused
Qt Creator is focused on being an IDE for Qt, as a general purpose IDE it performs quite well, but there are areas which are lacking such as project file support (support for generic/CMake projects lags behind Qt projects).
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Pro
Fast and fully keyboard-navigatable
Responsive UI, no need to use the mouse for the power users.
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Pro
Supports CMake
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Pro
Very responsive when compared to similar software
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Pro
Much space dedicated to the code
Small and beautiful UI, almost all the space is dedicated to the text with hardly and toolbars. Can actually be used on a 1024x768 pixel screen.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, macOS, Linux
Auto Complete:
Yes
Integrated Debugger:
Yes
Code Templates:
Yes
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Experiences
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395
65
Vim
All
46
Experiences
Pros
30
Cons
15
Specs
Top
Pro
Lightweight and fast
When compared to modern graphical editors like Atom and Brackets (which have underlying HTML5 engines, browsers, Node, etc.), Vim uses a sliver of the system's memory and it loads instantly, all the while delivering the same features. Vim is also faster than Emacs.
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Top
Con
High effort to customize
A lot of time and effort is put in to make it specific to your needs.
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Top
Pro
Free and open-source software
Vim is open-source, GPL-compatible charityware.
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Con
Difficult learning curve
You'll spend a lot of time learning all the commands and modes supported in Vim. You'll then spend more time tuning settings to your needs. Although once it's tuned to your needs, you can take your .vimrc to any machine you need and have the same experience across all your computers.
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Pro
Works in terminal over SSH
Unlike other editors such as Sublime Text, Vim is a command line editor and hence can be used in remote development environments like Chromebooks via SSH.
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Top
Con
Difficult to copy, paste, and delete
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Pro
Extremely portable
Vi/vim exists on almost all Unix-like platforms. It's the de-facto Unix editor and is easily installed on Windows. All you need to make it work is a text-based connection, so it works well for remote machines with slow connections, or when you're too lazy to set up a VNC/Remote Desktop connection.
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Top
Con
Poor support for external tooling
Many plugins depend on optional Python and Lua features, which may or may not be included in whatever binaries are available for your system. And without platform-specific hacks, it is difficult for plugins to operate in the background or use external tooling.
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Pro
Keyboard-based, mouse-free interface, and trackpad support
There's no need to reach for the mouse or the Ctrl/Alt buttons again. Everything is a mere key press or two away with almost 200 functions specifically for text editing. Vim does support the mouse, but it's designed so you don't have to use it for greater efficiency. Versions of Vim, like gVim or MacVim, still allow you to use the mouse and familiar platform shortcuts. That can help ease the learning curve and you'll probably find you won't want to (or need to) use the mouse after a while.
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Top
Con
Poor feature discoverability
Though basic features like syntax checking, autocompletion, and file management are all available out of the box or with minimal configuration, this is not obvious to new users, who might get intimidated or assume they need to install complex plugins just so they can have this functionality. Other features new users might expect to find embedded in Vim, such as debugging, instead follow a UNIX-style model where they are called as external programs, the output of which might then be parsed by Vim so it can display results. Users not familiar with this paradigm will likely fault Vim for lacking those features as well.
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Pro
Great productivity
Vim's keyset is mainly restricted to the alphanumeric keys and the escape key. This is an enduring relic of its teletype heritage, but has the effect of making my ost of Vim's functionality accessible without frequent awkward finger reaches.
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Con
No smooth scrolling
Even with the GUI version, the lines jiggle line-by-line. If you are used to smooth scrolling, this is very annoying, especially when working with larger files.
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Pro
Macros increase productivity
Many text editors have programmable macros, but since Vim is keyboard-based, your programmed macros are usually far more predictable and easier to understand.
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Con
Doesn't play nice with the system cut/paste mechanisms
This can be worked around somewhat if you disable mouse for insert mode. You can then right-click your terminal and use paste like you would anywhere else in a terminal. But it still doesn't feel right when the rest of your system uses Ctrl-C/Ctrl-V, and you have a system clipboard manager, and so forth.
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Pro
Excellent performance
As it loads the whole file into RAM, replacing all string occurrences in 100 MB+ files is quick and easy. Every other editor has sort of died during that. It is extremely fast even for cold start. Vim is light-weight and very compact. In terminal, it only uses a small amount of memory and anytime you invoke Vim, it's extremely fast. It's immediate, so much so you can't even notice any time lag.
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Top
Con
Outdated UI
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Pro
Tons of plugins/add-ons
This makes Vim the definitive resource for every environment (Ruby/Rails, Python, C, etc.), or simply just provides more information in your view.
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Con
Requires Brain Mode Switching
When editing in vim, you have you use the vim keys; when editing in every other window on your PC, or in Word or Excel or other application, you need to use the standard system key combinations. Learning the vim combinations can actually make you SLOWER at everything else.
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Pro
Everything is mnemonic
No need to memorize different key combinations for things like deleting the text inside of a block or deleting the text inside of a pair of quotes. It's just a series of actions, or nouns and verbs, or however you prefer to think about it. If you want to delete, you select "d"; if you want it to happen inside something, you select "i"; and if you want the surrounding double-quotes, just select ". But if you were changing the text, or copying it, or anything else, you'd still use the same "i" and ". This makes it very easy to remember a large number of different extremely useful commands, without the effort it takes to remember all of the Emacs "magic incantations", for example.
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Top
Con
Slow when opening files with very long lines
A lot of very long lines can make Vim take up to a minute to open files, where a few other editors take only seconds to load the same file.
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Pro
Vimtutor
Vimtutor is an excellent interactive tutorial for people with no prior experience of Vim. It takes about 30 minutes to complete.
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Top
Con
Consume brain energy for editing that should be used for logic
Text editing in vim is awesome, but it requires thinking about combination of commands. In other editors, you don't have to think about how to delete this part of code. You just think about how to implement a feature, what is a good design for this code. Even after you get used to using vim, it still requires your brain for editing.
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Pro
Amazing extensibility
Vimscript provides a rich scripting functionality to build upon the core of Vim. When combined with things like Tim Pope's Pathogen plugin management system, it becomes easy to add support for syntax, debugging, build systems, git, and more.
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Top
Con
Foreign keyboards have a hard time on Vim out of the box
A lot of frequently-used keybinds are way harder to access on foreign keyboards because they use different layouts. For example, Germans use the QWERTZ layout, while French use the AZERTY.
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Pro
Usable from a Terminal or with a GUI (GVim, MacVim)
If you happen to be logged into SSH, you can use Vim in a terminal. It can also run with a GUI too.
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Top
Con
Unintuitive mode switching
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Pro
Has been supported for a long time
And will be supported for many years to come.
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Con
Extensibility isn't that great
While it has gotten better and some projects are slowly starting to build proper extension support, it still can't and by design never will achieve the extensibility of another editor like emacs.
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Pro
Once learned, it's very hard to forget
Vim's somewhat steep learning curve is more than made up for once you've mastered a few basic concepts and learned the tricks that allow you to program faster with fewer cut/paste mistakes.
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Top
Con
Works poorly out of the box with right-to-left
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Pro
Can never outgrow it
The fact that very few, if any, people claim to be a "Vim Master" is a testament to the breadth and depth of Vim. There is always something new to learn - a new, perhaps more efficient, way to use it. This prevents Vim from ever feeling stale. It's always fresh.
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Pro
Flexible feature-set
Vim allows users to include many features found in IDEs and competing editors, but does not force them all on the user. This not only helps keep it lighter in weight than a lot of other options, but it also helps ensure that some unused features will not get in the way.
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Pro
Has multiple distinct editing modes
Interaction with Vim is centered around several "modes", where purpose and keybindings differ in each. Insert mode is for entering text. This mode most resembles traditional text entry in most editors. Normal mode (the default) is entered by hitting ESC and converts all keybindings to center around movement within the file, search, pane selection, etc. Command mode is entered by hitting ":" in Normal mode and allows you to execute Vim commands and scripts similar in fashion to a shell. Visual mode is for selecting lines, blocks, and characters of code. Those are the major modes, and several more exist depending on what one defines as a "mode" in Vim.
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Pro
By default in Linux
All Linux distributions out there will have Vim built into them, which is highly convenient!
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Pro
Vim encourages discipline
If you use Vim long enough, it will rewire your brain to be more efficient.
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Pro
Useful undo features
Vim does not only offer unlimited undo levels, later releases support an undo tree. It eventually gives the editor VCS-like features. You can undo the current file to any point in the past, even if a change was already undone again. Another neat feature is persistent undo, which enables to undo changes after the file was closed and reopened again.
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Pro
Donations and support to Vim.org helps children in Uganda through ICCF Holland
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Top
Pro
Built-in package management
Starting with Vim 8, a package manager has been built into Vim. The package manager helps keep track of installed plugins, their versions and also only loads the needed plugins on startup depending on the file type.
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Pro
If you can use Vim you can also use vi
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Pro
Works on Android
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Pro
Productivity enhancing modal paradigm
As with all vi-like editors, Vim provides a modal paradigm for text editing and processing that provides a rich syntax and semantic model for composing succinct, powerful commands. While this requires some initial investment in learning how it works in order to take full advantage of its capabilities, it rewards the user well in the long run. This modal interface paradigm also lends itself surprisingly well to many other types of applications that can be controlled by vi-like keybindings, such as browsers, image viewers, media players, network clients (for email and other communication media), and window managers. Even shells (including zsh, tcsh, mksh, and bash, among others) come with vi-like keybinding features that can greatly enhance user comfort and efficiency when the user is familiar with the vi modal editing paradigm.
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Pro
Asynchronous I/O support
Since Vim 8, Vim can exchange characters with background processes asynchronously. This avoids the problem of the text editor getting stuck when a plugin that had to communicate with a server was running. Now plugins can send and receive data from external scripts without forcing Vim to freeze.
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Pro
Can set up keymapping
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Pro
Multiple clipboards
It is called "registers".
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Pro
Status Booster
Using vim not just increase your productivity, but helps you flex.
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Specs
Platforms:
Linux, macOS, Windows, Cygwin
License:
Vim License
Price:
0
Extension language:
Vim
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Experiences
free
2402
445
Visual Studio Code
All
39
Experiences
Pros
24
Cons
14
Specs
Top
Pro
Extendable through plug-ins
Visual Studio Code comes fairly complete out of the box, but there are many plug-ins available to extend its functionality.
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Top
Con
Embedded Git isn't powerful enough
You can do nothing but to track changes, stage them and commit. No history, visualization, rebasing or cherry-picking – these things are left to git console or external git client.
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Pro
TypeScript integration
There is very solid TypeScript integration in Visual Studio Code. Both are developed by Microsoft and VSC itself is written in TypeScript.
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Top
Con
The autocomplete and code check is not as powerful as the one on WebStorm
Sometimes it doesn't tell you if you made a typo in a method name or if a method is not used and several other important features.
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Top
Pro
Integrated debugging
VSC includes debugging tools for Node.js, TypeScript, and JavaScript.
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Top
Con
File search is extremely slow
It's absolutely not possible to use this tool with big projects given how long it takes to search for files.
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Pro
Ready to use out of the box
You don't need to configure and add plugins before being productive. However, you can add plugins if needed but for the basics you're well covered.
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Con
Project search limits results
Because file search is so slow your results are limited in order to simulate a faster search.
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Pro
Integrated terminal
There's no need to press alt+tab to go to a terminal: it is directly integrated into the editor. Shift+~ is a handy hotkey to toggle the integrated terminal.
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Con
Very bad auto import
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Pro
Great performance
For a 'wrapped' web-based application, Visual Studio Code performs very well.
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Con
Generalized
VS Code is a general code/scripting IDE built to be lightweight and for people familiar with their language of choice, not directly comparable to Visual Studio in power or scope.
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Pro
Libre/open source
Released under the MIT License.
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Con
Memory hog
Allegedly, VS Code is "lightweight". Yet, running multiple instances of it at once, you may get many "out of memory" messages from Windows despite 16 GB RAM. (While of course also running other things. The point is the comparison with some other IDEs/editors where running them alongside the same number of other applications doesn't cause Windows to run out of memory)
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Pro
Fast and powerful
VS-Code has the speed of Sublime and the power of WebStorm. Perhaps this is the best software that Microsoft has ever created.
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Con
Poor error fix suggestions
Error detection and suggestions/fixes are poor compared to IntelliJ platforms
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Pro
JavaScript IntelliSense support
JavaScript IntelliSense allows Visual Studio Code to provide you with useful hints and auto-completion features while you code.
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Con
A "me too" offering from MS, far behind other well established editors that it attempts to clone
Other IDEs specific to a language often offer better tools for deep programming.
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Pro
Embedded Git control
Visual Studio Code has integrated Git control, guaranteeing speed, data integrity, and support for distributed, non-linear workflows.
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Con
Slow launch time
Slower than it's competitors, e.g. Sublime Text.
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Pro
Updated frequently
There's a new release of Visual Studio Code every month. If you are one of the insiders then releases are daily.
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Con
Emmet plugin often fails on even simple p tags
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Pro
ESLint integration
ESLint integrates great. You can define your rules trough .eslintrc.* as usual and vs code will autofix your code on save. So your code is always in style.
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Con
Have no good default js style analyzer
In WebStorm there is analyzer that checks for warnings and highlight this in yellow, here you cannot find or add it even with plugins. It is possible to have it as errors with linter but while you are actively changing file that's not very nice.
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Pro
Extensions (aka plugins) are written in JavaScript
Extensions are written in either Typescript or JavaScript.
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Con
.sass linting is terrible
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Pro
Active development
It's really nice to see how the code editor evolves. Every month there is a new version with great communication of new features and changes.
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Con
Is not an IDE, is a text editor
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Pro
Integrated task runners
Task runners display lists of available tasks and performing these tasks is as simple as a click of the mouse.
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Pro
It has gotten really good
All it takes is one stop for all the features many people need.
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Pro
Custom snippets support
Snippets are templates that will insert text for you and adapt it to their context, and in VSC they are highly customizable.
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Pro
Huge community behind it
The ease of getting assistance and finding tutorials is increasing as the community grows.
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Pro
JS typechecking
It leverages TypeScript compiler functionality to statically type check JS (type inference, JSDoc types) with "javascript.implicitProjectConfig.checkJs": true option.
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Pro
Python support
Excellent Python plugin, originally created by Don Jayamanne, now hired by Microsoft to extend and maintain the extension.
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Pro
Good support for new Emmet syntax
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Pro
High fidelity C# plugin
The Omnisharp plugin is very powerful providing full sln, csproj, and project.json support.
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Pro
Support RTL languages
It supports pretty web rtl languages like arabic languages when most of other editors don't support it.
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Pro
Inline definition picking and usages finding
These features allow you to have a glance at code without opening it as a whole in a separate tab. Moreover, editing is allowed.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, macOS, Linux
License:
MIT, Proprietary (official builds)
Multi Language Support:
Yes
Auto Complete:
Yes
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Experiences
FREE
4160
832
C++Builder
All
10
Experiences
Pros
6
Cons
3
Specs
Top
Pro
Windows UI framework
The Windows framework, called VCL, wraps native WinAPI controls. It's far more powerful than something like MFC, including its visual design and the library of available first- and third-party controls.
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Con
Too focused on adding IDE features developers don't want
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Pro
Free community edition
Features are the same as Professional Edition.
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Con
IDE has long lasting bugs that Embarcadero won't fix
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Pro
Cross-platform UI framework
FireMonkey (FMX) is a cross-platform UI framework, GPU-accelerated, supporting native controls on some platforms, and native feel everywhere else.
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Top
Con
Expensive
€1,719.00+ (or $1971.61+) (on 01/2019).
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Pro
Drag and Drop Functionality
C++Builder allows. you to drag and drop components on the design form which makes the development process simple.
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Pro
Cross-platform targeting
Can build targeting Windows, iOS, macOS, and Android.
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Pro
Clang-based compilers
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, Linux, Mac, Android
Cross Platform:
Yes
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Experiences
Free / paid
39
3
EDX
All
5
Experiences
Pros
4
Cons
1
Top
Pro
One-click remote development
You can build/debug remotely with one click. What you shoud do is just add your remote toolset.
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Con
Windows only
Only supports Windows for now.
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Pro
Supports CMake/XMake projects
You can open CMake/XMake projects directly with EDX.
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Pro
Easy to integrate with MSYS2 packages
It's easy to integrate with MSYS2 packages, even if you have no MSYS2 installed EDX can download/update/install/setup MSYS2 packages automatically.
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Pro
Very fast
Fast startup, quickly opens files, fast search in files, etc..
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FREE
1
0
Neovim
All
27
Experiences
Pros
18
Cons
8
Specs
Top
Pro
Still Vim but with upgraded features and some issues fixed
NeoVim was a complete rewrite of Vim, with new features added and underlying issues resolved thanks to the Vim code base. The keybindings and configuration are the same as Vim, so the switch can be pretty simple.
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Top
Con
Poor feature discoverability
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Pro
Better integration with external tools
The core text editor is "headless", meaning it's detached from the user-interface so other programs can hook into it. This enables better integration with IDEs and browsers, where "Vim mode" has typically been a poor substitute because it was a partial rewrite or a partial port at best. One of the advantages of Vim has always been ubiquity and Neovim makes it even more ubiquitous.
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Con
High effort to customize
A lot of time and effort is put in to make it specific to your needs.
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Pro
Powerful plugin model
Vim plugins have always been useful, but tied to specific languages. Neovim's architecture provides better separation between plugins and the core product, so that plugins are completely flexible and can be written in any language.
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Con
Requires Brain Mode Switching
When editing in vim, you have you use the vim keys; when editing in every other window on your PC, or in Word or Excel or other application, you need to use the standard system key combinations. Learning the vim combinations can actually make you SLOWER at everything else.
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Top
Pro
Built-in terminal emulator
This avoids the user having to make any installations.
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Con
Consume brain energy for editing that should be used for logic
Text editing in vim can be great once you've learned it, but it requires thinking about combination of commands. In other editors, you don't have to think about how to delete this part of code. You just think about how to implement a feature, what is a good design for this code. Even after you get used to using vim, it still requires your brain for editing.
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Pro
UI Agnostic
The core functionality is handled apart from the UI, meaning that Neovim can be embedded into any other GUI system, such as Atom.
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Top
Con
Ambiguity in extensive documentation
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Pro
Async plugin execution
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Con
Limited cross platform support
Neovim is not available for many legacy platforms
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Pro
Active development community
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Con
Split the VIM community
Moolenaar to be blamed for. If he opened up the development for vim to other bright minds, no fork would have happened. As it is mostly compatible with vim, it is not such a big issue.
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Pro
Opens a 3Gig Text File in a few seconds
Not many editors can open such a large text file so quickly.
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Con
Poor support for external tooling
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Pro
Fast and light on memory usage
New neovim editor instance starts instantly and you can have multiple editors open at the same time, because id does not require a lot of memory to run.
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Pro
Easier to pick-up than ever
Don't believe it? Try typing vimtutor in your command line right now.
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Pro
Work in TUI (Text User Interface)
Neovim can work on terminal, on a remote server over ssh.
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Pro
Modern code base
As a refactor over Vim, Neovim has greatly improved its code base. For example, some functionality is handled by libuv, the same code base that powers Node.js.
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Pro
Comes with some good configurations out of the box
Some typical configurations most of VIM users make are default in Neovim.
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Pro
Even more powerful since 2019, because of additions such as vim-coc, TabNine, fzf, skim
Vim gets stronger every time command-line tools get stronger. This isn't even it's the final form.
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Pro
Config file is where it should be
I don't like having dotfiles or dotdirs in my homefolder unless they're needed. Configs should be in the .config dir in their respective folder.
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Top
Pro
Built-in file-explorer and ability to make splits and edit multiple things simutaneously.
This makes editing multiple files at once, moving code around so easy.
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Pro
Treesitter and LSP
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Top
Pro
Terminal mode is very convenient for testing code in a split window
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Specs
Platforms:
Linux, Windows, macOS, *nix, Android
License:
Apache
Bracket Matching:
Yes
Error Markup:
Yes
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Experiences
Free
598
90
Geany
All
14
Experiences
Pros
10
Cons
3
Specs
Top
Pro
Light and fast
Geany is very lightweight thanks to the smaller offering of features.
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Top
Con
Not very advanced
Although it has some IDE features, it is not as advanced as some other text editors that can be extended to contain IDE functionality.
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Top
Pro
Built-in plugin manager
Geany has a built-in plugin manager which can be used to install plugins and add new powerful features to the editor.
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Top
Con
Windows installer not digitally signed
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Top
Pro
Quick search on large files
In Geany you technically search once for a whole search query, unlike Gedit, where once you start typing, the file is searched for in accordance with each substring of what you're typing, all the while leading to terribly annoying lag.
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Top
Con
Not many third-party plugins
Geany is not as popular as some other text editors with plugin support. As such it's understandable that it's missing lots of powerful plugins available in other editors.
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Top
Pro
Cross platform
Geany is a cross platform editor, very similar to Notepad++ in Windows.
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Top
Pro
Build in terminal
Press F5 and code will run without the need to switch between windows.
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Top
Pro
Actively developed Free (as in freedom) Software
This software respects your freedom.
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Top
Pro
Real syntax parsing (not just coloring)
Hence it is capable of showing the methods and inner classes of, e.g., a Java source file.
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Top
Pro
Simple project management
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Top
Pro
Native
It is a real app and not another frankenstein web/electron app. This means it runs great and doesn't extraordinary amounts of RAM.
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Top
Pro
Options in the menu are easy to find
For example, there is an easy way to change the font and theme in the View menu. No need to search through several syntax styles like in Notepad++ just to be able to change the used font.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, macOS, Linux
License:
GPL-2.0-only
Multi Language Support:
Yes
Auto Complete:
Yes
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Experiences
Free
325
63
SlickEdit
All
16
Experiences
Pros
14
Cons
2
Top
Pro
Extensive support for programming languages
SlickEdit supports over 50 programming languages on nine platforms.
See More
Top
Con
No command line option
This is a visual only editor
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Top
Pro
Built-in beautifier
The beautifier formats code as you type to help improve readability and consistency.
See More
Top
Con
It's kinda slow
If you have a very large project or tag database, it can hang the UI.
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Top
Pro
Compiler tools
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Top
Pro
Scriptable
Write custom macro commands, functions, dialogs and tool windows.
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Top
Pro
Over 13 emulations
Choose from fifteen keyboard emulations, containing the key bindings and behaviors necessary to emulate other editors (e.g., CUA, Vim, GNU Emacs, etc.)
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Top
Pro
Extensive configuration options
See More
Top
Pro
Easy access to Visual Studio workspace
SlickEdit opens Visual Studio workspace with no conversions needed.
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Top
Pro
Symbol analysis support
There are powerful symbol analysis features in SlickEdit, including context tagging and references.
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Top
Pro
Integrated debuggers for multiple languages
Integrated debuggers for GNU C++, Java, Python, Perl, Ruby, and PHP.
See More
Top
Pro
Multi-Platform
Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, AIX, HP-UX, Solaris SPARC, Solaris x86
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Top
Pro
Portable mode
Possibility to set up a portable installation, to run on a USB drive for example.
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Top
Pro
Easy access to XCode projects
SlickEdit opens XCode projects with no conversions needed.
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Top
Pro
Third party tool integration
See More
Top
Pro
Popular version control system
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Experiences
99$
63
17
Ultimate++
All
10
Experiences
Pros
7
Cons
2
Specs
Top
Pro
Visual designer
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Top
Con
Strictly C++
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Top
Pro
Simple to use
The whole framework is easy to use.
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Top
Con
This is an application development framework not simply a GUI toolkit / library API
It is designed for you to develop your whole application using it, not just your GUI. Most people probably are not really looking for that.
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Top
Pro
Documentation and help tool
See More
Top
Pro
Code analyzer
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Top
Pro
Easy to learn
The whole framework is easy to learn thanks to multiple tutorials.
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Top
Pro
Free
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Top
Pro
Helpful community
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, Linux, Mac
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Experiences
Free
48
14
Eclipse CDT
All
8
Experiences
Pros
5
Cons
2
Specs
Top
Pro
Nice Mouse Hover assist during debugging
View values of variables on mouse hover during debugging.
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Top
Con
Plugins can be unstable
Though there are plenty of plugins to choose from, they aren't always reliable. Some aren't maintained, bug fixes can be slow, and you may need to download plugins from multiple sources.
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Top
Pro
Free and open source
Eclipse is an open source project and free to use.
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Top
Con
UI can be confusing
There's an overly abundant presence of menus, this forces you to constantly click around the different menu structures.
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Top
Pro
Good font rendering
Because Eclipse is based on SWT, it uses the native font rendering and thus looks better than other IDEs on some Linux systems, where the Java font rendering is not optimal.
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Top
Pro
Highly customizable
Thanks to the large variety of plugins and various configuration options, Eclipse is very customizable.
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Top
Pro
Macro definition browser
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Specs
Platforms:
Linux, Windows, MacOS X
License:
EPL (Open Source)
Cross Platform:
Yes
Auto Complete:
yes
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Experiences
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137
50
juCi++
All
4
Experiences
Pros
2
Cons
1
Specs
Top
Pro
Lightweight
Provides fast editing with autocompletion.
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Top
Con
Not really feature rich
Has not as much features as most other IDEs.
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Top
Pro
Licensed under MIT
Open source and free of any charges. Hosted on Github.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, MacOS, Linux
License:
MIT
Price:
Free
Cross Platform:
Yes
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10
0
CodeRunner
All
4
Experiences
Pros
2
Cons
1
Specs
Top
Con
Working with very very large projects
Code runner is fantastic for shorter projects, although it can handle very large projects. It stops code completion when the program gets to be several thousands of lines long.
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Top
Pro
Fast and efficient
You can have multiple tabs open with multiple languages in at the same time and Code Runner still performs excellently. Searching through code is always instant and executing code is fast.
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Top
Pro
Supports many different languages
Code Runner comes preinstalled with over 20 languages built in, and it's super easy to run simple programs.
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Specs
Platforms:
Mac
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21
1
Code::Blocks
All
9
Experiences
Pros
3
Cons
6
Top
Pro
Lightweight
See More
Top
Con
Hard to set up
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Top
Pro
Easy to use
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Top
Con
Not very feature rich
By default it's not much more than "What if Gedit had a compiler and a terminal built in?" (or: "What if Notepad had colour coding, auto indents, file structure, a compiler and a terminal built in?") There are far more professional IDEs out there. This one is much too basic for any efficient use.
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Top
Pro
Simple Library import
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Top
Con
Slow navigation using mouse
In most IDE's, you can "goto declaration"/"implementation" by holding CTRL and left-clicking on an identifier or include directory. This does not work in Code::Blocks no matter what settings you have. Right-clicking will bring-up a menu that includes these "goto" options, but it's not instant and you'll be slowed down immensely depending on how often you have to do it.
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Top
Con
Can get quite slow and doesn't look all that good
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Top
Con
Setting up dark theme requires using system's own gui toolkit
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Top
Con
Lots of functionality is encountered only in plugins
You can't change keyboard shortcuts, neither share themes with vanilla codeblocks, for example.
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Experiences
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176
19
GNU Emacs
All
15
Experiences
Pros
9
Cons
5
Specs
Top
Pro
Infinitely customisable
Customizations can be made to a wide range of Emacs' functions through a Lisp dialect. A robust list of existing Lisp extensions include the practical (git integration, syntax highlighting, etc) to the utilitarian (calculators, calendars) to the sublime (chess, Eliza).
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Top
Con
Non-standard keyboard commands
I'm editing this in Chrome, but I could be using Firefox, Edge, or any other browser, or Notepad, or even Libreoffice or Microsoft Word, and in ALL of those cases, keys would work exactly the same way, including how to jump around by word, select words, cut/copy/paste, etc. Pretty much all modern editors share the same basic key combinations, from Visual Studio to Sublime to Atom to VS Code to Xcode. Becoming an Emacs expert means you need to mode-shift between code editing and editing in your browser; adding Emacs modes to SOME apps means you need to remember which key bindings to use where. The cognitive load added by switching between Emacs and other text editors is not worth it, especially since all the advantages of Emacs are now available in free editors elsewhere.
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Top
Pro
Completely free
Licensed under GNU GPL.
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Top
Con
Not set up as an IDE by default
Requires customization to get IDE-like features. Luckily a few features such as compilation, debugging, and syntax highlighting are included.
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Top
Pro
Keyboard-focused, mouse-free editing
Emacs can be controlled entirely with the keyboard.
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Top
Con
Learning curve is steep
While it's better than it used to be, with most functions being possible through the menu, Emacs is still quite a bit different from your standard editor. You'll need to learn new keyboard shortcuts.
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Top
Pro
Works in terminal
You can use Emacs' command line interface or graphical user interface.
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Top
Con
A UI designed before anyone had a clue about UI design
Emacs is positively NOT a well-designed user interface. Its design dates back to the time when all microwaves still needed instructions and VCRs universally displayed a flashing 12:00 because no one could figure out how to operate them. Many modern editors have 100% of the power of Emacs with none of the hassle.
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Top
Pro
Self documenting
Emacs has extensive help support built-in as well as a tutorial accessed with C-h t.
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Top
Con
Chorded keyboard combinations can be baffling
For example, for navigation it uses the b, n, p, l keys. Which for some people may seem strange.
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Top
Pro
Has turn-key packages for IDE work
Packs like spacemacs make it easy to get started and bring the learning curve down from an infinitely regressing spiral to something more manageable.
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Top
Pro
Works over SSH
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Top
Pro
Great Integration
Emacs has modes for nearly every use case, even ones like mail and internet browsing. It has often been said that Emacs is essentially an operating system on its own.
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Top
Pro
Has Vim emulation
Evil-mode makes Emacs actually usable as an editor.
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Specs
Platforms:
GNU/Linux, BSD-like, Windows, MacOS
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Experiences
Free
60
11
Spacemacs
All
31
Experiences
Pros
25
Cons
5
Specs
Top
Pro
Combines the best parts of Vi and Emacs
Spacemacs combines the Emacs platform (with the full power of the Emacs plugin ecosystem) and the Vi keybindings (via EViL), all in the same box.
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Top
Con
Can be quite glitchy at times
Spacemacs combines many packages from many different authors that were never designed to work together. Sometimes they interact in unexpected ways, and things randomly break as one package interferes with another's features. This combined with frequent package updates and necessary customization by selection of layers and packages, can make these glitches hard to reproduce. It takes a lot of emacs know-how to fix these problems. Fortunately there is a very active community willing to help with these problems, but it might take a while.
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Top
Pro
Simple but powerful configuration architecture
At the heart of Spacemacs, the configuration layers group packages configuration into semantic units that can be toggled on and off. The architecture is simple but powerful, allowing the user to easily manage configuration dependencies between hundreds of packages.
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Top
Con
Complex learning difficulty
You must be familiar with either Vim or Emacs. In addition, you should be familiar with the unique features of Spacemacs. The Layer concept of replacing Emacs settings is still difficult and abstract compared to modern editors.
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Top
Pro
Community-driven configuration
Spacemacs is the biggest community-driven Emacs starter-kit.
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Top
Con
Functionality layers of complicated configuration
To configure Spacemacs, settings for Emacs/Evil/Spacemacs may need editing. It's not always clear which need to be changed or how to change settings globally: sometimes hooks are needed, other times Spacemacs provides options.
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Top
Pro
Above average documentation quality
Documentation is mandatory for each new configuration layer and can be accessed directly within the editor in Org format.
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Con
High CPU and unresponsive at times
There are occasions when Spacemacs would suddenly consume a LOT of CPU and then other times would become completely unresponsive. This instability took place only 6 months or so ago. Restarting Spacemacs can fix it for a while but perhaps this issue is already fixed in newer versions.
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Top
Pro
Cross-platform
Emacs runs on Gnu/Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows.
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Con
Relative low startup time
Although configuration is heavily loaded, the starting time of Spacemacs is usually between two and five seconds. Emacs can be run as a daemon though which reduces the client's startup time to a few milliseconds. Still not as bad as other editors though, especially Electron based ones like VSCode or Atom.
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Pro
Completely configured out of the box
Stuff like version control, file management, good default theme are all configured out of the box.
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Pro
Mnemonic and consistent keybindings
Space-lead key bindings are organized in mnemonic namespaces. For instance, buffer actions are under SPC b, file actions are under SPC f, project actions are under SPC p, search actions are under SPC s, and so on. Keybindings are consistent across the whole distribution thanks to a set of conventions.
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Top
Pro
Can be controlled fully with the keyboard
There's no need to reach for the mouse again since Spacemacs can be fully controlled with keyboard.
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Top
Pro
Gradual learning curve
Evil package is a first class citizen and Spacemacs embraces it from day one. Evil package allows Vim users to be productive very quickly while still allowing regular Emacs users to use Spacemacs.
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Pro
Remote file editing
Files can be edited in Spacemacs remotely.
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Pro
Great note-taking and agenda mode built-in
Allows for great organization applications that can be saved in future-proof format, plain text, can be integrated with org, LaTeX, markdown, HTML, Literate Programming and be committed to source control.
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Pro
Offers a number of practical features
Spacemacs has some great features for taking notes, tracking to-do lists, and tracking time.
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Pro
LaTeX support
LaTeX allows for auto-completion, syncing, and more.
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Top
Pro
Manage many code bases easily
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Pro
Daemon support
Has great daemon support, which can mitigate the issue of slow startup.
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Top
Pro
Can work in terminal mode
Sometimes you only have terminal access, over ssh or something.
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Top
Pro
Great CFEngine support
Syntax highlighting and org-babel extensions.
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Pro
Great support from the community
The community surrounding Spacemacs is very active and there is a welcoming gitter chat for users to ask questions.
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Pro
Lowers the risk of RSI by using the spacebar as leader
Spacemacs got its name from the fact that it is uses the space bar as a default leader key. The key was chosen because it is easy to press and to hopefully lower the risk of RSI.
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Pro
Fast-paced development
New functionalities and fixes are added to Spacemacs every day, while release cycles are short.
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Pro
Easily extended with community plugins
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Top
Pro
Works well with Common Lisp
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Pro
Manage R files easily
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Pro
Great Clojure support
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Pro
Excellent support for Elixir programming language
Elixir layer which uses the Alchemist package is the best way to edit Elixir code out there.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, macOS, Linux, BSD
License:
GPL-3.0-or-later
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Experiences
FREE
602
74
CodeLite IDE
All
9
Experiences
Pros
8
Cons
1
Top
Pro
Advanced support for all popular framework
Including Laravel, WordPress, Drupal, jQuery, Bootstrap and so on
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Top
Con
Bland UI
The UI is fairly boring and has limited customization options. There is a dark theme available; however it only applies to the editor. The surrounding windows and borders remain light. You can see a collection of screenshots here.
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Top
Pro
Modest memory footprint
CodeLite takes up about 50 MB when loaded into memory with a workspace opened.
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Top
Pro
Open source and free
CodeLite is licensed under GPL with source code available on GitHub.
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Top
Pro
Extensive plugin support
Git, SFTP, Subversion, and many more plugins are fully supported in CodeLite IDE.
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Top
Pro
Rapid development cycle
CodeLite is actively developed with activity almost daily on Github.
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Top
Pro
Workspace view reminiscent of File Explorer
The workspace view, unlike other IDEs, is a reflection of the actual directory structure on the file system (with user filters applied).
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Pro
Excellent Node.js debugger
This makes fixing issues more efficiently and debugging code less painful.
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Pro
Intelligent code completion
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$0
15
4
NetBeans IDE
All
11
Experiences
Pros
8
Cons
2
Specs
Top
Con
Little support for UML
Unless you load extensions.
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Top
Pro
Cross-platform
NetBeans is a free, GPL-licensed IDE. It can run on any computer with a Java virtual machine. If a computer has a Java virtual machine (JVM), Netbeans can run on it. Netbeans can, therefore, run on a variety of operating systems such as Windows, *nix, and Mac OS.
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Con
Slow
The Netbeans IDE is known to take a large memory as compared to other lighter IDE's available on the market. The slowdown can decrease productivity and frustrate programmers.
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Pro
Fantastic Maven support
NetBeans has out-of-the-box support for Maven (NetBeans 6.7 and newer), which includes a repository browser.
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Top
Pro
Good refactoring
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Top
Pro
Easy to learn
Very easy to learn, unlike e.g. Eclipse (which is probably the most flexible).
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Top
Pro
Good support for integrated Database e Servers (E.g. Tomcat)
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Top
Pro
Multiple revision control system integration
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Pro
Customizable theme
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Pro
Take less memory
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, Linux, Mac, BSD
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