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Re: IDEs

The real difference between IntelliJ IDEA and Eclipse or Netbeans isn't in the list of features. It's that each one of those features is so much better implemented in IDEA than in the others. I've used all three, and found there simply is no comparison between them.
Suppose you right-click on an interface in IDEA and select "Find Usages". A window pops up asking exactly what you want to find: usages of the interface, usages of its methods, usages of its fields, implementing classes, or derived interfaces. Check the ones you want, then click OK. A tree appears with the line of code containing every usage, organized hierarchically. You can click different icons to change how it organizes them - group by package, group by method, group by type of usage (field declaration, local variable declaration, method return type, use in import, etc.).
Try the same thing in Eclipse. You get no options about what to search for. It has one search it can do based on one definition of what a "usage of an interface" is. The list of results doesn't display the source code containing each usage, so you have to actually click on each one to figure out whether it's what you're looking for. It isn't even really a list of usages. It's a list of methods that contain usages. So if there are three usages in one method, you have to click on it to jump to the method, then scroll through the source code looking for the three usages.
Or try the autocompletion. IDEA is just so much more intelligent. If I type a method name followed by a ( then hit ctrl-shift-space, it will figure out that I'm passing an argument to a method, figure out the type of argument required, and pop up a list of every variable of that type defined in the local scope. In comparison, the autocompletion in Eclipse and Netbeans is incredibly primitive.
This isn't meant as criticism of Eclipse and Netbeans - they're free after all, and an incredible deal at the price. :) But there's a good reason so many people choose to pay for IDEA.

Peter
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References: 
 >IDEs (From: "Scott Posey" <email@hidden>)
 >Re: IDEs (From: Henry Story <email@hidden>)



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