Re: a modest proposal
Re: a modest proposal
- Subject: Re: a modest proposal
- From: Mark Lowe <email@hidden>
- Date: Sun, 13 Jun 2004 20:25:05 +0200
On 13 Jun 2004, at 18:25, joshua portway wrote:
I think providing an example of how to write plugins like the EJB and
servlet wizards would be open enough.
nope. I've got a bug in xcode 1.2 which stalled our development for
several days and made us have to move back to xcode 1.1. I would much
rather have had a look at the source and fixed it. Also, I'm not just
talking about Java development, I'm talking about other languages too.
My brother uses xcode for c development, but perhaps not the best
opinion in the world as he has a similar mind-set to be regarding
ide's.
I'd also like to add Subversion support for instance (which, btw, is
already there in netbeans along with support for pretty much every
other major version control system) - and how about integration with
our bug database, that would be nice (also in netbeans) ? The point
is that open projects like netbeans and eclipse have all these great
things because they're open and lots of people can contribute. And
while I'm ranting about openness (I'm in that kind of mood), what
about having an open bug database ? So we don't have to spend days
tracking down something that's already a known bug.
I don't disagree that perhaps xcode could benefit from being open, but
even having the pbplugin wizard would help, and i understand that apple
may have good reason to keep the xcode source closed.
Perhaps code sense that sort of thing would be a nice feature one
day, but then that stuff promotes random try and test developing that
I've sat and watched folks using IDE tools do.
I guess that you're not the target audience then :) Since you seem to
be philosophically opposed to using anything much beyond a vanilla
text editor, then you can keep using that, but in that case I presume
you wouldn't mind the XCode team concentrating their efforts in a more
productive direction.
Not opposed to IDE's just some developers take to them others don't.
I've tried all the available options but I really didn't get on with
them. XML is human readable , and is good (easier than make any day)
just how easy does it have to be? But as someone with text-editor
terminal type mind set, xcode does nice job of not abstracting things
to far, doesn't mean i don't like a nice interface to manage my
projects in.
Presumably XCode already has too many sissy features like it's
minimally functional debugger, which you'd much rather were removed
lest they tempt you from the path of righteousness. The rest of us
find ourselves rather more productive when we're spoilt with things
like code completion, refactoring, local version control, JUnit
integration, working debuggers, context sensitive documentation, bug
and code assistance lists, code browsers etc. etc. etc.
JUnit integration comes with ant, once you've written your tests what
else is needed? Refactoring is usually a matter of find and replace,
after that i imagine that these "re-factoring" tools have little to
offer. But if someone likes a tool I'd have no objection, I just
wouldn't like to be forced to work according to an IDE.
Again ant is the common point of reference. Someone using a monolithic
swing/awt app can fire up the same script.
Some swing based gui's are undeniably useful, but java bundler gives
you a way of running these as standalone apps, which certainly run
faster than having them as eclipse plugins.
So why don't we just go and use Netbeans or Eclipse ? Well, we do, I
guess. Except that the OSX experience with both of those tools is a
bit rough, and I would love if Apple could devote some resources to
helping out there. Also, our project has native code as well as Java
code, and for the native code we're forced to use XCode - and I can
tell you that we all dread having to go back to it after having got
used to using Netbeans or Eclipse for a while (2 of us use Netbeans,
one uses Eclipse). And again, I know that the XCode team have worked
really hard, and it IS getting better - it's just that the other tools
are getting better too, and at a faster rate than XCode, and XCode is
relentlessly slipping behind. My point is that by leveraging all that
work Apple could focus on the important, cool and OSX specific stuff
and stop having to reinvent the wheel. At the current rate I estimate
XCode might be roughly at the same point that the open IDEs are now in
about 2 or 3 years time - but by then of course they will most likely
be even better, and wouldn't those 2 or 3 years of talented engineers
time be better spent doing something new and unique instead of just
trying hopelessly to catch up ?
In terms of J2EE development I haven't noticed any leaps and bounds
since project builder, other than bundling ant and a couple of
containers there's not really difference. Before you bolted ant on as
an external build tool, and now there are a few examples with this
done. But what i like about what apple provide is that its organized. I
have somewhere to put my new version of ant, xdoclet et al and link it.
I don't think it has to keep up because I don't think its dancing to
the same fiddle.
My only gripe as i said before is the cvs support that's the same as it
was in project builder.
I could be out of order here and this bit can only be my opinion, but
the xcode mind set is a lot closer to that to developers used to
working on macs. The whole eclipse/netbeans et al thing is obviously a
windoze user tradition where its obsessed with whizz-bang, control the
world from one application type of mind set. Apple have always given a
nice transparent way of working on stuff. Its almost like the
difference between mail, ical and address book vs outlook. They do the
same thing but the separation of concepts is different.
Now i don't really care if someone reads my email in mail or outlook,
likewise developer tools that folk use is a choice also. Which is why
ant would have to be the common ground between them all.
Mark
_______________________________________________
xcode-users mailing list | email@hidden
Help/Unsubscribe/Archives: http://www.lists.apple.com/mailman/listinfo/xcode-users
Do not post admin requests to the list. They will be ignored.