Java programming language and IDEs

IDE: Integrated Development Environment

Integrated development environment, in short IDE is a convenient environment to write, execute and  debug the code or programs on a single platform. IDEs support not only writing code smoothly but also provides a provision to write scripts, XML files, simple text files and build scripts like Ant, Maven are few among others.

In short IDEs are development environments to execute complete development activities using one application.

IDEs and Editors

IDEs and Editors fulfills the same purpose. That is writing code. But IDEs are glued or closely works with respective programming language's compilers, runtime environments, profilers and other language specific tools to put developer in a comfortable zone. 

Some of the features of IDE:

1. Auto completion
2. Syntax Highlighting
3. Code debugger
4. Profilers
5. Multipage editors

Auto completion:

Auto completion feature suggests APIs [methods, classes and interfaces] and keywords etc as we start typing in the editor. This helps in not spending much time on typing APIs.

Syntax Highlighting:

Syntax is a structure of arranging APIs, operators and keywords to make computer instructions, subsequently which becomes executables.

Class names, method names, operators and Keywords are highlighted with different colors and formats to differentiate them and to increase the readability. Syntax highlighting helps importantly when single program or file has thousands of statements or lines.

Code Debugger:

Debugger is a feature to identify bugs, errors and shows intermittent results of set of programming instructions or statements and subsequently helps in correcting and developing a bug free computer programs

Profilers:

Profiler is the tool usually shipped along with JDK [if it is a Java] and helps in understanding the memory usage of a computer application graphically. These graphics includes different charts and GUI controls. 

Profilers gives information about

•  Memory usage,
•  details of Threads being used,
•  Heap dumps,
•  CPU utilization etc

Multipage Editors:

Multipage editors shows the same file content in multiple perceptions. For example XML file content can be viewed in different views. 1. Hierarchical view 2. Simple text format and 3. Graphical view etc

  

Few more notable points about IDEs and Editors:

1. IDEs are scalable to support multiple programming languages
2. Editors can not be glued to a programming language's compiler
3. Editors does not support Auto completion
4. Editors does not support code debugging

 

IDEs for Java and IDEs built using Java

Usually IDEs are developed using different programming languages where, few of them are open source and few are commercial. Few of the industry endorsed IDEs are:

• Eclipse

• Netbeans

The above listed IDEs are developed using Java programming language and also used to develop Java applications and programs. It is little tricky to understand for beginners. 
And both IDEs share common features like scalability, modularity, code completion etc.
You can download Eclipse and Netbeans distributions from their respective sites.

Happy Coding! :)

Java IDE for Learners:

           Simple editors like Notepad, Gedit, edit+  definitely allows us to write a program, but it is always difficult to code, debug and manage even smaller applications. and profession IDEs like Eclipse, Netbeans JDeveloper are definitely not suitable for beginners.[They are pretty advanced to students]

           What if we have an IDE which allows the learners to understand the basic coding principles of java, Fundamentals of Object Oriented Programming[OOP] with the pictorial representation along with syntax highlighting, scope highlighting and other cool features?.. sounds good right.
         

                   
           BlueJ is a simple Java based IDE developed by Kent university for the beginners and students of Java programming language. The coolest thing about BlueJ is it not only allows us to interact[compile, execute] with complete application or program but also single objects.Hence we can create Objects and execute its methods graphically.

Important features are:

• Create classes and interfaces through wizards and diagrams
• Create directly object of a class and execute its methods rather than executing complete application.
• Debugger, Terminal etc

Editor Features:

•      Syntax Highlighting
•      Scope Highlighting
•      Code completion
•      Navigation View
•      Switch between source code and Documentation 

  Link to Download the latest version of BlueJ