Java IDEs vs Microsoft IDEs

Question

I come from a strong Java background and in recent years have been also developing in C#.

What I can never understand is how far behind (Personal Opinion) the Visual Studio IDE's are in compared with Intelli-J IDEA and Eclipse (Java).

There have been improvements by Microsoft from VS 2005 to VS 2008, but I feel they are not quite there in terms of taking the development experience to the next level.

What I want to know is, is VS 2010 any different?

Why is it that the tools and syntax editors are so much more "evolved" in the Java IDE's.

Just to name a few:

• Code Completion (Much more advance in Java IDE's)
• Ant Integration (Eclipse and IDEA) vs Visual Studio Build Events
• Lack of Code Repository integration in VS (Subversion and CVS) out of the box.
• Lack of Advance Re-factoring Tools in Visual Studio.

Thanks.

Solution 1

A few points…

• People tend to like what they know.

• It is quicker to get up-to-speed in C# as the IDE and most of the tools / docs come from a single source.

• In the Java world you have a lot more chooses, this is great for expert that spend times learning about them all, but does also lead to its own problems.

• Adding ReSharper or Refactor to Visual Studio may give you what you want.

• The Visual Studio debugging is great.

• Visual Studio tries to make life easy for you by trying to find missing dlls etc and then storing where they are in the registry. This may be great for a 1 man project, but can often lead to build problems across developer’s machines if you are not careful. In the Java world you have to edit more config file by hand, but at least you can put these files under source code control.

• There is not a small command line tool that works well on a build server that will build all types of Visual Studio projects. However in day to day usage you don’t need to learn how to use command tools, as Visual Studio hides them form you.

I think these days most programmers are just happier with the IDE they know best.

---

Note I wrote this over 6 years ago, since then C#/.Net has got a lot more complex, with lots of open source projects. Microsoft has also open sourced a lot of the .net framework. For web and server side development I expect there is now little to choose between the Java world and the .Net world. For “smart clients” .net still have a lot to offer including the new support from cross device phone development.

For multi-threaded IO, I think c# is years ahead of Java, but that could change as C# and Java keeps learning from each other...

Solution 2

Visual Studio has definitely been coming on over the last few years - although many of the improvements have basically been things that Eclipse has had for ages (I haven't used IDEA myself).

You may well want to look at ReSharper, which brings more goodness to Visual Studio, along with the VS2010 Productivity PowerTools.

Also, have a look at Scott Guthrie's blog series about improvements in VS2010. Lots of goodies in there.

All tools have their strengths and weaknesses - these days I'm about as happy in Visual Studio as in Eclipse... although I'm much happier writing C# than Java :) One area where Visual Studio really shines is debugging though... I find things like the VS Watch window to be much better than Eclipse's equivalent.

Solution 3

Visual studio 2017 is still far far behind Intellij IDEA. I'm using both and i can say that even VS2017 with ReSharper is not comparable with IDEA.

Biggest problem for me is that VS still doesn't offer usable hot reload debugging experience. I'm crying every time i have to rebuild my .NET MVC project (it is +- fast, but IIS Express load time ~ 15s EVERY time you make even the smallest change in your code).

If you want to argue with "Edit and continue" so so hotreload function - it is absolutely useless, you can't do almost any change in code without rebuilding (and everytime you have to manually break code and close opened tab with useless information).

So i'm really looking forward for full version of IntelliJ Rider bringing all super user friendly possibilities of IntelliJ IDEA to the .NET world!

Solution 4

I don't agree with you. I think VS is much more easy to use. For example, when i need to create a web application. I open VS and create a new project (Web Application). After the project created, i press f5 and tadda!... But if want to create my web application with Java, i need to install a server or some frameworks. Still i don't know how can i create a web application?

Or, Windows Application. At VS, you don't need do any thing to create a windows based application like web application. but if i want to create windows based application with Java, i had to do something.

I think VS IDE is more user friendly than Java IDE's.

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Comments

[goenning]

Agree. I do more C# than Java and find VS better than Eclipse. I think that's exactly what Ian said, people tend to like what they know more.

[Koekiebox]

I agree that there are features in VS that are easier/better, like for instance the GUI Building is a nightmare in Java. I haven't seen a lot of IDE's that get the GUI building and WebApp deployment right in Java. I also agree that the initial set-up of a Web-App is easier using the Visual Studio Wizard's than configuring XML files (Ant, web.xml and vendor specific configs) in Java. But then again I prefer editing a single XML file than IIS configurations. Ian Ringrose might be stating a very valid point.

[Ian Ringrose]

The problem with VS is that is does not scale well to large teams or systems, as it become very hard to track what changes everyone is making to the VS settings. A easy GUI does have a cost..

[bahadir arslan]

@Ian Ringrose, sorry i can't understand, especially "what changes everyone is making to the VS settings". is this about team projects?

[Ian Ringrose]

Are there any type of project other the team projects with many dev and testers working on them?

[bahadir arslan]

No :) I said i couldn't understand because of my English, i didn't want to metaphor.

[Admin]

Debugging in VS perfect!

[Hicham Bouchilkhi]

You can make a hot reload in .NET MVC PROJECT

[masm64]

VS2017 + ReSharper is as smart as IntelliJ imho and I've used both for longer periods of time.

[Luke Garrigan]

This was written some years ago, I wonder if you've used IDEA now, I'd love to hear your thoughts and comparisons!

[Jon Skeet]

@LukeGarrigan: Nope, I haven't I'm afraid - and I barely use Java any more.

[Luke Garrigan]

ahh, that's a shame!