When comparing Google Cloud Shell vs PaizaCloud IDE, the Slant community recommends PaizaCloud IDE for most people. In the question“What are the best cloud IDEs?” PaizaCloud IDE is ranked 9th while Google Cloud Shell is ranked 10th. The most important reason people chose PaizaCloud IDE is:
PaizaCloud launches new development environment server just in 3 seconds. So, you can casually create or destroy server.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Inexpensive
Google Cloud Shell is free for Google Cloud Platform customers.
Pro Already has Google Cloud SDK and other tooling installed
Thus eliminating a setup step for interacting with Google Cloud.
Pro Already provisioned with Google Application Default Credentials
This makes it easier to run/test code that interacts with Google APIs.
Pro VM is always up-to-date, making it more secure
Because the VM image is managed by Google and either provided entirely by Google or configured by a Dockerfile (which is regularly rebuilt), packages are far more likely to be kept up-to-date with the last patches and security fixes compared with Cloud IDEs that give you your own VM and make you, yourself, in charge of applying updates.
Pro Supports multiple open files at the same time
One can split the screen and edit two files at once, making it easy to edit one file while consulting the contents of some other file.
Pro Supports editor and terminal in the same screen
This makes it easy to run commands while editing files at the same time.
Pro Built-in integration with tmux
Pro Supports "Boost Mode"
Allowing you to provision a more powerful instance when necessary.
Pro Supports custom software packages via a Dockerfile configuring the Cloud Shell image
With Cloud Shell custom environments (an early access feature), it is possible to specify a "Dockerfile" to specify a custom VM image to use for the Cloud Shell environment. This Dockerfile can be used to install packages with apt-get, npm, pip, etc. globally.
Pro Includes Eclipse Orion IDE already configured
Eclipse Orion can be difficult to setup/configure if creating a do-it-yourself VM running Eclipse. This makes it easier to have a working IDE.
Pro 3 seconds instant launch
PaizaCloud launches new development environment server just in 3 seconds. So, you can casually create or destroy server.
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.
Pro HTTP/HTTPS access to any ports
PaizaCloud allow you to access almost all ports for HTTP/HTTPs access.
Pro No credit card required
No credit card is required for FREE plan.
Pro Internationalization
PaizaCloud's Editor or Terminal fully support non-ASCII languages like Japanese, Chinese, European languages.
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.
Pro Terminal with root
In PaizaCloud, you can sudo to root. So, you can install packages, or run service freely.
Pro Supports Jupyter notebook
PaizaCloud has Jupyter Notebook support with Python libraries like NumPy, SciPy, Pandas, or matplotlib built-in.
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.
Cons
Con Ephemeral Disk
Software installed globally as root (such as via "sudo apt-get install..." ) can be lost when restarting Cloud Shell; any software that needs to be persistent has to be installed in the user directory (or made part of the Docker image for the custom Cloud Shell image).
Con Minimal UI
Cloud Shell's editor is not as featureful as some alternatives.
