What is the best alternative to&#x20;Ninja IDE?

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. See More

232 45

score 434 · Answer 2

Neovim

Top Pro

Still Vim but with upgraded features and some issues fixed

Top Con

Limited cross platform support

Neovim is not available for many legacy platforms See More

Top 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. See More

Top Con

Poor feature discoverability

Top 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. See More

Top Con

High effort to customize

A lot of time and effort is put in to make it specific to your needs. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Built-in terminal emulator

This avoids the user having to make any installations. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Active development community

Top Con

Ambiguity in extensive documentation

Top Pro

Async plugin execution

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Opens a 3Gig Text File in a few seconds

Not many editors can open such a large text file so quickly. See More

Top Con

Poor support for external tooling

Top Pro

Comes with some good configurations out of the box

Some typical configurations most of VIM users make are default in Neovim. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Work in TUI (Tex User Interface)

Neovim can work on terminal, on a remote server over ssh. See More

Top Pro

Easier to pick-up than ever

Don't believe it? Try typing vimtutor in your command line right now. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Terminal mode is very convenient for testing code in a split window

Specs

Platforms:Linux, Windows, macOS, *nix, Android

434 77

score 290 · Answer 3

PyCharm Professional Edition

Top Pro

Version control integration

PyCharm has CVS, Git, Subversion and Mercurial integration. See More

Top Con

Very high memory usage

Memory usage is usually anywhere around 1-2GB and possibly larger with larger projects See More

Top Pro

One of the best autocompletion engines around

PyCharm has two types of autocompletion: structural completion and word expansion. Structural autocompletion makes predictions based on its understanding of Python and JavaScript objects, while the latter tries to predict the word currently being typed based on previously typed words. Word expansion also works in comments and docstrings and it's similar to vim's omnicompletion. Both types of autocompletion work extremely well, have little to no problems and are quite fast even when loading suggestions on the go. See More

Top Con

Not suitable to edit project's files written in other languages

There is a high variety of support for a lot of languages like markdown etc. Not for Java and so on, but it is a Python IDE. See More

Top Pro

Great pip support

PyCharm offers great pip integration. When opening a project it automatically checks for a requirements.txt file in the root of the project. If it's found, it checks if all the libraries are available in the interpreter. If one or more libraries are missing, it issues a warning and asks whether you want to install any missing libraries. See More

Top Con

Some relatively basic functionality requires paid license

JavaScript, CoffeeScript, TypeScript, HTML/CSS, SQL requires a paid license. Also, all Python frameworks require a paid license. See More

Top Pro

Free version available

There's a community edition (with limited features) that's free to use. You can also get a 30-day trial of the Professional edition. See More

Top Con

Odd Autosave "feature", can't be disabled fully

PyCharm automatically saves your files for you, always, without telling you. You can't disable this. There's a way to indicate if a file has been modified via an indicator in the tab (not enabled by default - why?). If you exit it won't ask you if you want to save the modified file. Totally unintuitive and contrary to all other established workflows. It's ok to try something new, but give users the option to have the "normal" behaviour of any other IDE/editor out there. Can be a deal breaker for those that need to know/have control over when they save their files. (PyCharm offers a history to undo the automatic save, but why force a user to undo something with extra steps that shouldn't have happened in the first place?) See More

Top Pro

Excellent integration with debugging tools

All the debugging can be done inside the IDE. Breakpoints in the code can be added using keyboard shortcuts or the mouse. When the code is executed through the debugger a toolbar pops up with all the relevant context needed for the debugging process. The whole process is smooth and painless and you don't even have to switch windows to do the debugging. See More

Top Con

It cannot reindex on the fly packages installed from git source

If you've installed a package with the command: pip install -e git+https://pass@github.com/me/package.git@0.0.3#egg=package you have two options available to make PyCharm update/see it: restart PyCharm invalidate caches See More

Top Pro

Excellent refactoring support

There are many refactoring options including renaming and changing signature across entire projects. It also includes the an ability to preview changes before committing and exclude anything unwanted. See More

Top Con

Asinine licensing scheme

JetBrains licensing, especially if you have multiple products, is a blocker. You just can't have a fixed line-item price (for departmental budgeting) for their licenses. See More

Top Pro

Great for navigating large codebases

PyCharm has amazing code navigation implementations. It supports both goto symbol and goto declaration. The former finds classes, variables, functions, etc by name. While the latter is used by moving the cursor on top of a symbol and by using the mouse or a keyboard combination it finds the declaration of that symbol and takes you there. Both of these features are extremely helpful when consulting large code-bases and when trying to understand an API written by someone else. See More

Top Con

Vim mode is limited

Top Pro

Catches run-time information when running the code

PyCharm can leverage run-time information when running your application with the built-in debugger to figure out what types can possibly be passed to which functions, etc. See More

Top Con

Rendering is awful

Top Pro

Automatically figures out what test to run based on the method the cursor rests at a given time

PyCharm, based on what method or class the cursor rests, can figure out what tests to run and perform them with a keyboard shortcut or two, without breaking up the flow and need to switch to a command line interface. See More

Top Con

Little native desktop integration

If you use Linux with Gnome or KDE, PyCharm does relatively little to integrate into your local desktop environment See More

Top Pro

Remote debugging over ssh coupled with automatic deployment creates a streamlined workflow

The professional version allows remote debugging over ssh, which together with automatic deployment creates a streamlined workflow. See More

Top Con

Not possible to run scripts in a single console

Top Pro

Built-in Django support

Pycharm has excellent django support, from templating to management commands, it has it all. See More

Top Con

Sometimes all autocomplete stuff dies with over 9k Java exceptions with no visible reason

Top Pro

Free student access to Professional Edition

With a valid .edu address students can register to use the Professional edition and enjoy all the perks of the full paid version for free. Though it should be mentioned that the with the free student acess you cannot use PyCharm for any commercial purposes, even accepting donations for an open source project. See More

Top Pro

Supports installing third party libraries

No need to go to the command line to download a new package, PyCharm has an easy system to browse, download, and update third party packages. See More

Top Pro

Has a lot of plugins

PyCharm offers a high variety of plugins like Pylin, Mypy etc. covering all the above mentioned. Plus it has a built-in support to detect wrong formatted/named things (inspection). See More

Top Pro

Amazing direct database integration

Pycharm supports SQLlite, PostgresQL, Mysql, etc out of the box and is integrated very nicely with Pycharm. Making database modifications could never have been easier as changing a cell value and committing the changes straight from pycharm. See More

Top Pro

Vim mode for people used to Vim commands

IdeaVim supports motion keys, insert mode commands, marks, registers, visual mode commands, vim regexps, key mapping, macros, digraphs, some ex and :set commands. You can find a full comparison in the IdeaVim reference manual. See More

Top Pro

Sophisticated static analysis tools

Top Pro

Easy to optimize code with built-in profiling tools

If you have a yappi profiler installed on your interpreter, PyCharm starts the profiling session with it by default, otherwise it uses the standard cProfile profiler. See More

Specs

Price:$200/years

Cross Platform:Windows, macOS, Linux, FreeBSD

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. See More

290 65

score 2069 · Answer 4

Vim

Top Pro

Lightweight and fast

Top Con

High effort to customize

A lot of time and effort is put in to make it specific to your needs. See More

Top Pro

Free and open-source software

Vim is open-source, GPL-compatible charityware. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Con

Difficult to copy, paste, and delete

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Con

User must remember commands instead of point at them in a menu

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Con

Unintuitive mode switching

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Vimtutor

Vimtutor is an excellent interactive tutorial for people with no prior experience of Vim. It takes about 30 minutes to complete. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Con

Outdated UI

Top 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. See More

Top Con

Works poorly out of the box with right-to-left

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

By default in Linux

All Linux distributions out there will have Vim built into them, which is highly convenient! See More

Top Pro

Has been supported for a long time and will be supported for many years to come

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Donations and support to Vim.org helps children in Uganda through ICCF Holland

Top Pro

Works on Android

Top Pro

If you can use Vim you can also use vi

Top Pro

Can set up keymapping

Top Pro

Vim encourages discipline

If you use Vim long enough, it will rewire your brain to be more efficient. See More

Top Pro

Status Booster

Using vim not just increase your productivity, but helps you flex. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Multiple clipboards

It is called "registers". See More

Specs

Platforms:Linux, macOS, Windows

Visual Studio Code comes fairly complete out of the box, but there are many plug-ins available to extend its functionality. See More

2069 407

score 3498 · Answer 5

Visual Studio Code

Top Pro

Extendable through plug-ins

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. See More

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Embedded Git control

Visual Studio Code has integrated Git control, guaranteeing speed, data integrity, and support for distributed, non-linear workflows. See More

Top Con

Project search limits results

Because file search is so slow your results are limited in order to simulate a faster search. See More

Top Pro

JavaScript IntelliSense support

JavaScript IntelliSense allows Visual Studio Code to provide you with useful hints and auto-completion features while you code. See More

Top Con

Very bad auto import

Top Pro

Integrated debugging

VSC includes debugging tools for Node.js, TypeScript, and JavaScript. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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) See More

Top 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. See More

Top Con

Poor error fix suggestions

Error detection and suggestions/fixes are poor compared to IntelliJ platforms See More

Top Pro

Great performance

For a 'wrapped' web-based application, Visual Studio Code performs very well. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Con

Slow launch time

Than it's competitors, e.g. Sublime Text. See More

Top Pro

Extensions (aka plugins) are written in JavaScript

Extensions are written in either Typescript or JavaScript. See More

Top Con

Emmet plugin often fails on even simple p tags

Top Pro

Integrated task runners

Task runners display lists of available tasks and performing these tasks is as simple as a click of the mouse. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Con

.sass linting is terrible

Top Pro

Libre/open source

Released under the MIT License. See More

Top Con

Is not an IDE, is a text editor

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Huge community behind it

The ease of getting assistance and finding tutorials is increasing as the community grows. See More

Top Pro

It has gotten really good

All it takes is one stop for all the features many people need. See More

Top Pro

Python support

Excellent Python plugin, originally created by Don Jayamanne, now hired by Microsoft to extend and maintain the extension. See More

Top Pro

JS typechecking

It leverages TypeScript compiler functionality to statically type check JS (type inference, JSDoc types) with "javascript.implicitProjectConfig.checkJs": true option. See More

Top Pro

Good support for new Emmet syntax

Top Pro

High fidelity C# plugin

The Omnisharp plugin is very powerful providing full sln, csproj, and project.json support. See More

Top Pro

Support RTL languages

It supports pretty web rtl languages like arabic languages when most of other editors don't support it. See More

Top 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. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, macOS, Linux

License:MIT

Atom was built from the ground up with the community in mind. Package management is therefore a first class feature. See More

3498 685

score 1391 · Answer 6

Atom

Top Pro

Built-in package management

Top Con

Very slow startup time

Atom is very slow to startup, which is a big disadvantage if you are accustomed to using it to make quick changes on your files. See More

Top Pro

Multiplatform

Atom can run on Mac, Windows, and Linux. See More

Top Con

High memory usage

Atom has a relatively high memory usage, especially when compared to some other text editors not based on Electron. For those who develop on the go, this also tends to mean shorter battery life. See More

Top Pro

Extendable

Due to its modular design, almost any aspect of the editor can be changed. Even seemingly core packages, like those taking care of search and replace functionality, can be forked on GitHub, and changed and replaced in the editor. The documentation for creating new plugins is also great, making it easier for developers to jump in and create plugins for Atom. See More

Top Con

Slows down exponentially with plugins

Extending it needs sacrificing responsiveness. See More

Top Pro

Free and open source

Atom is free, open source, and written in C++, LESS, and CoffeeScript. See More

Top Con

Has difficulty with large text files

Tends to crash or hang with large >(10MB) text files, making it less useful as a general text editor. See More

Top Pro

Beginner friendly

One of the goals of Atom is to be a text editor for both experienced and beginner programmers. You can add keyboard shortcuts, change themes, install plugins, and change core settings by clicking through a GUI, or by manually editing config files the old-fashioned way. It has the added advantage of being built using the same engine that powers Google Chrome, so actions like opening and closing tabs feel familiar, even to new or non-programmers. See More

Top Con

Doesn't handle RTL (right-to-left text) well

Text can't be highlighted and manipulated properly, cursor isn't displayed visually according to where it is logically (you have to type to find out), and similar issues. See More

Top Pro

Embedded Git control

Atom will highlight folders, files, and lines that have any uncommitted edits made. It also integrates really well with GitHub. See More

Top Con

Not suitable for older computers

Atom requires a lot of system resources to run, so it will most probably be painfully slow on an older machine. See More

Top Pro

Multi-line select and edit

Multiple cursors and column selection allow for versatile ways of editing. ctrl + d will select the current word and each time the command is repeated, it adds the next occurrence of the word to the selection. ctrl + click or middle-mouse click will place another cursor in the place that's clicked. Cursors can then be controlled together. This also allows for selecting vertically. See More

Top Con

Indent errors

Sometimes, especially when given a file that has different indentation that the current setting, the programm seems to get confused. See More

Top Pro

Command Palette support

The Command Palette permits fuzzy searching all available functions, settings, snippets, etc. See More

Top Con

Not known when a new window will open

It's not really clear why and when a new window is opened when you open a file out of the tree view. See More

Top Pro

Extensive list of packages

Atom has a built-in package manager and an extensive list of packages. See More

Top Con

No text UI

Top Pro

Themes

You can theme and customize Atom to your liking. See More

Top Con

Bloated - too many packages, too little productivity

Unable to use package to even convert a C file to PDF. See More

Top Pro

Allows for instant file switching

By pressing Ctrl or Command + T and using fuzzy search, you can look for a file in your project. See More

Top Con

Slow because of Electron

Atom is not a native application. As such performance is subpar and the lag is especially noticeable on larger projects. It also opens a surprising amount of sub-processes and leaks a considerable amount of memory. See More

Top Pro

Command line integration out of the box

Installing Atom adds two command line commands - atom and apm. The first one runs the application itself while the second is the Atom Package Manager that's used to add and remove various components from the package listing. While these features can be set up with other editors as well, Atom takes care of them out of the box. See More

Top Con

Crash and data loss

Repeated data loss when the app crashes. A bugreport about that was closed automatically after some time, nobody cares. https://github.com/atom/atom/issues/12245 See More

Top Pro

HiDPI support

Atom has built-in HiDPI support with zero scaling issues. See More

Top Con

Missing additional touches

As Atom is still relatively new, it's missing nice little touches that other text editors have implemented over the years. From simple ease-of-use items like middle-mouse button multi-cursor select, to the ways pasted information from a spreadsheet is interpreted in multi-select situations. See More

Top Pro

Modern feel and very customizable and extendable

Top Con

Doesn't recognize some keyboards

Top Pro

Vim plugin turns Atom into a modernized vim

Top Pro

Could also be used as an IDE

Atom qualifies to be a good IDE because of the packages like linters, atom browser and hydrogen. See More

Top Pro

Best support for Arduino with Platformio

Arduino is the most important platform for developing embedded systems. See More

Specs

Platforms:Microsoft Windows®, macOS, Linux

License:MIT

Dev platforms:Microsoft Windows®; macOS; Linux

Provides fast editing with autocompletion. See More

1391 419

score 8 · Answer 7

juCi++

Top Pro

Lightweight

Top Con

Not really feature rich

Has not as much features as most other IDEs. See More

Top Pro

Licensed under MIT

Open source and free of any charges. Hosted on Github. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, MacOS, Linux

8 0

score 17 · Answer 8

Eric Python IDE

Top Con

Complex interface

Eric has a very complex UI. It overwhelms you with sections and windows and doesn't let you focus on code. Every tool is displayed on the top bars (there are 3) with no logical grouping or structure whatsoever. See More

Top Pro

Integrated python debugger

Eric has a python debugger built-in. See More

Top Con

Auto completion is not very good

The auto completion is not top-notch compared to other IDEs and text editors. In fact, many people recommend installing a third-party plugin to improve the auto completion found in Eric. See More

Top Pro

Integration with version control software

Integrates with various VCS. See More

Top Pro

Integrated class browser

With Eric you can easily browse all classes in your current Python project and display the methods for a given class. See More

Top Pro

Good project management

Specs

Multi Language Support:No

17 2

score 30 · Answer 9

PyScripter

Top Pro

Superb for interactively developing scripts

When you run a program, the context is automatically available in the Python interpreter afterwards, without having to set breakpoints. See More

Top Con

Refactoring is not that easy

In Pyscripter, refactoring pretty much leans on traditional dumb find-and-replace. See More

Top Pro

Lightweight

PyScripter is a lightweight Python IDE. See More

Top Con

Windows only

Available for Windows only. See More

Top Pro

Easy to use

Covers the needs of advanced users (thread debugging, unit testing etc.) See More

Specs

Cross Platform:No

Bracket Matching:Yes

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. See More

30 4

score 125 · Answer 10

Code::Blocks

Top Pro

Easy to use

Top Con

Not very feature rich

Top Pro

Lightweight

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. See More

Top Pro

Simple Library import

Top Con

Can get quite slow and doesn't look all that good

Top Con

Setting up dark theme requires using system's own gui toolkit

Top Con

Lots of functionality is encountered only in plugins

You can't change keyboard shortcuts, neither share themes with vanilla codeblocks, for example. See More

If you want to develop JavaScript or TypeScript or use other front-end technologies, support for non-Python languages is minimal See More

125 13

score 35 · Answer 11

Wing Python IDE

Top Pro

Exceptionally responsive support

Top Con

Little support for other languages

Top Pro

Built-in debugger

Wing IDE provides local and remote debugging. See More

Top Con

High entry price

Price is starting from $39 per user for the most basic configuration. See More

Top Pro

Checks for errors in the source code

Pylint has a static analysis tool integrated which checks the source code for any potential errors and bugs. See More

Top Pro

Totally programmable keystroke shortcuts

Top Pro

Debugging in threads

Top Pro

Totally worth the price -- it's a steal, in fact

Top Pro

Customizable plug-ins if desired

Top Pro

VI and Emacs editor modes

Top Pro

Advanced debugging features (multi-process, remote, recursive)

Top Pro

Super-flexible macro capabilities

Specs

Platforms:Linux, Windows, macOS

License:Commercial (with paid and free editions)

Price:US $69-179 annual or US $95-245 perpetual (and 2 free options)

Dev platforms:Windows, Mac, Linux, Raspberry Pi

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 to easily manage configuration dependencies between hundreds of packages. Layers for other languages can be found here. See More

35 5

score 58 · Answer 12

Spacemacs with Python layer

Top Pro

Support for different languages with layers

Top Con

Configured in Emacs Lisp

Most developers don't know Lisp all that well, and of those, the subset that knows elisp is even smaller. Thankfully, it's not that difficult to get a basic Spacemacs configuration together without knowing elisp (thanks to Spacemacs's spectacular documentation), but if you need to alter, fix, or customize a plugin/layer in non-trivial ways, this can become a major hindrance. See More

Top Pro

Easy to remember keybindings

Key bindings are organized in mnemonic namespaces. For instance buffer actions are under b, file actions under f, project actions under p, search actions under s etc... Key bindings are consistent across the whole distribution thanks to a set of conventions. See More

Top Con

Not an IDE

For users that aren't familiar with Vim or Emacs, Spacemacs will have a steep learning curve since everything is based on keyboard shortcuts and IDE-based users (or even users coming from editors like SublimeText or Atom) may have trouble finding things and adjusting to a new editing style. See More

Top Pro

Great support from the community

The community is very active and there is a welcoming gitter chat to ask for questions. See More

Top Con

Slow startup time

Although configuration is heavily lazy loaded, the starting time of Spacemacs is usually between two and five seconds. Emacs can be run as a daemon though which reduces the clients startup time to a few milliseconds. See More

Top Pro

Free/Libre/Open

Top Pro

Easy to manage configuration dependencies

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 to easily manage configuration dependencies between hundreds of packages. See More

Top Pro

Gradual learning curve

Evil package is a first class citizen, 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. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

It includes org-mode

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Unix, Mac

License:GPLv3

PaizaCloud launches new development environment server just in 3 seconds. So, you can casually create or destroy server. See More

58 8

score 35 · Answer 13

PaizaCloud IDE

Top Pro

3 seconds instant launch

Top Pro

Floating window manager

PaizaCloud provides Floating window manager like Windows or Mac by default. It makes the environment more flexible. PaizaCloud also provides Tab window mode when you want to use the full screen for one purpose. See More

Top Pro

HTTP/HTTPS access to any ports

PaizaCloud allow you to access almost all ports for HTTP/HTTPs access. See More

Top Pro

No credit card required

No credit card is required for FREE plan. See More

Top Pro

Internationalization

PaizaCloud's Editor or Terminal fully support non-ASCII languages like Japanese, Chinese, European languages. See More

Top Pro

Extensible PaizaCloud app

PaizaCloud provides standard application like File manager, Editor, Terminal. But, PaizaCloud also provides the possibility to add or even create new App-for-PaizaCloud using HTML/CSS. See More

Top Pro

Terminal with root

In PaizaCloud, you can sudo to root. So, you can install packages, or run service freely. See More

Top Pro

Supports Jupyter notebook

PaizaCloud has Jupyter Notebook support with Python libraries like NumPy, SciPy, Pandas, or matplotlib built-in. See More

Top Pro

Google Home / Google Assistant development in the browser

As PaizaCloud runs in the cloud, you can develop and run the Google Home / Google Assistant application, without deploying to another server. See More

Specs

CodeLite is actively developed with activity almost daily on Github. See More

35 7

score 220 · Answer 14

CodeLite

Top Pro

Rapid development cycle

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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Open source and free

CodeLite is licensed under GPL with source code available on GitHub. See More

Top Pro

Cross platform

Works on Windows, OS-X and Linux. See More

Top Pro

Modest memory footprint

CodeLite takes up about 50MB when loaded into memory with a workspace opened. See More

Top Pro

A lot of useful plugins

CppCheck, DiffTool, Git, MemCheck (Valgrind support, Linux-only), SVN, and many other plugins extend the IDE functionality greatly! See More

Top 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). See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, OS-X and Linux

License:GPL

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. See More

220 33

score 545 · Answer 15

Spacemacs

Top Pro

Combines the best parts of Vi and Emacs

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. See More

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. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Cross-platform

Emacs runs on Gnu/Linux, Mac OS X, and Windows. See More

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. See More

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. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Community-driven configuration

Spacemacs is the biggest community-driven Emacs starter-kit. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Completely configured out of the box

Stuff like version control, file management, good default theme are all configured out of the box. See More

Top 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. See More

Top 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. See More

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. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Fast-paced development

New functionalities and fixes are added to Spacemacs every day, while release cycles are short. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Manage many code bases easily

Top Pro

Remote file editing

Files can be edited in Spacemacs remotely. See More

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Offers a number of practical features

Spacemacs has some great features for taking notes, tracking to-do lists, and tracking time. See More

Top Pro

LaTeX support

LaTeX allows for auto-completion, syncing, and more. See More

Top Pro

Can work in terminal mode

Sometimes you only have terminal access, over ssh or something. See More

Top Pro

Works well with Common Lisp

Top Pro

Daemon support

Has great daemon support, which can mitigate the issue of slow startup. See More

Top Pro

Easily extended with community plugins

Top Pro

Great CFEngine support

Syntax highlighting and org-babel extensions. See More

Top Pro

Manage R files easily

Top Pro

Great Clojure support

Top Pro

Excellent support for Elixir programming language

Elixir layer which uses the Alchemist package is the best way to edit Elixir code out there. See More

Specs

Platforms:Windows, MacOS, Linux

License:GPLv3

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). See More

545 70

score 42 · Answer 16

GNU Emacs

Top Pro

Infinitely customisable

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. See More

Top Pro

Completely free

Licensed under GNU GPL. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Keyboard-focused, mouse-free editing

Emacs can be controlled entirely with the keyboard. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Works in terminal

You can use Emacs' command line interface or graphical user interface. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Self documenting

Emacs has extensive help support built-in as well as a tutorial accessed with C-h t. See More

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. See More

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. See More

Top Pro

Has Vim emulation

Evil-mode makes Emacs actually usable as an editor. See More

Top Pro

Works over SSH

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. See More

Specs

Cross Platform:yes

PyCharm includes sophisticated heuristics for determining what each variable type is and providing autocompletion suggestions for them. See More

42 10

score 184 · Answer 17

PyCharm Community Edition

Top Pro

Sophisticated autocompletion

Top Con

Memory-hungry

Can use a lot of memory (several GBs), especially when dealing with large projects. See More

Top Pro

Excellent refactoring support

There are many refactoring options including renaming and changing signature across entire projects. It also includes the an ability to preview changes before committing and exclude anything unwanted. See More

Top Con

Can sometimes become very slow, freeze, and become unresponsive

It becomes extremely frustrating when you have to wait for the text you've typed to appear in your editor. Furthermore, during these freezes the editor does not always queue what your're typing, so you might have to wait > 15 seconds before you can continue your editing. This quickly affects the concentration of a developer, causing flow interruption and general performance degradation. See More

Top Pro

Excellent debugger

PyCharm can leverage run-time information when running your application with the built-in debugger to figure out what types can possibly be passed to which functions, etc. See More

Top Con

Feature incomplete

Some features are locked behind a paywall. Although if you are a student, you can apply for the Student Pack. See More

Top Pro

Version control integration

PyCharm has CVS, Git, Subversion and Mercurial integration. See More

Top Pro

Framework support

PyCharm supports cefpython and electron.js (with c bindings). See More

Top Pro

Pro features Free for students

JetBrains offers a Student Pack, which gives you a student license and access to the pro features of selected products such as PyCharm, IntelliJ IDEA and Php Storm. See More

Clion works on Windows, Linux and OSX. See More

184 34

score 517 · Answer 18

CLion

Top Pro

Cross platform

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 See More

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. See More

Top Con

Proprietary

Clion is proprietary software which costs $199/1st year for a business license or $89/1st year for an individual license. See More

Specs

License:Proprietary

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. See More

517 80

score 301 · Answer 19

Qt Creator

Top Pro

Great syntax highlighting and auto-completion

Top Con

Poor refactoring

QtCreator has lack of refactoring features. It's not even close to Resharper++ or CLion. See More

Top Pro

Fast and fully keyboard-navigatable

Responsive UI, no need to use the mouse for the power users. See More

Top 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). See More

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. See More

Top Con

Poor multi-window mode support

While multiple windows are supported, many operations will activate in the primary window (debug, goto-line... etc). See More

Top Pro

Supports CMake

Top 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. See More

Top Pro

Very responsive when compared to similar software

Top 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. See More

Specs

Platforms:Linux; Windows; MacOS

Auto Complete:yes

Integrated Debugger:yes

The Community Edition of Visual Studios and the Unity add-on can be downloaded and used free of charge. See More

301 57

score 222 · Answer 20

Microsoft Visual Studio

Top Pro

Free Community Edition

Top Con

It's very large

The most basic Visual Studio installation will take up 5GB of disk space. See More

Top Pro

IntelliSense

IntelliSense is the general term for a number of features: List Members, Parameter Info, Quick Info, and Complete Word. These features help you to learn more about the code you are using, keep track of the parameters you are typing, and add calls to properties and methods with only a few keystrokes. See More

Top Con

Sluggish

Horribly slow on low-end machines due to bulky size, they should modularize it instead of trying to do everything. See More

Top Pro

One of the few bearable C++ debuggers available

Top Con

Non native window frame

IDE main window lacks standard window frame (titlebar/borders) - a custom solution is in use where custom titlebar contains numerous application-specific controls. This results in inconsistent UX and can also be problematic when you're using shell replacements or other various window-management software (such as bbLean). See More

Top Pro

There's a huge library of plugins

Visual Studio has a massive library of plugins to choose from. See More

Top Pro

Extensions

Top Pro

Modern language support

The recently released 15.7 branch provides competitive modern language support. See More

Top Pro

Product backlog

In agile development teams, one really needs features such as product backlogs where you can assign features to team mates and track their progress on them. VS provides a web based interface for you to track your team's complete progress on the project. See More

Top Pro

GitHub integration

Makes production faster especially if git is used. One can see changed files at the go and commit (with push possibility) when ever one so desires. See More

Top Pro

More modular installer

Visual Studio 2017 supports a much more modern and modular installer. You no longer have to install many gigabytes of stuff you don't need. Everything is broken down into much smaller pieces and it's much more apparent which pieces you need. See More

Top Pro

Embedded cloud storage

Your Visual Studio Online account gives you a place to store your code, backlog, and other project data with no servers to deploy, configure, or manage. See More

Top Pro

Friendly UI

Top Pro

Comes With A Windows Framework

Specs

Platforms:Windows, Mac OS X

License:Proprietary