On the ABC TVs show LOST, the writers are happy to explore all sorts of Urban Myths. The latest episode looks at a Hurley, a multi-millionaire when he wins a lottery because he uses a set of “cursed” numbers. But the more general Urban Legend being followed here is that great good fortune has to be balanced with great misfortune.
Well when I found the NetBeans IDE I thought – wow, good fortune, what a great tool. I have my general Java development envron. Here are some of its virtues:
-support for J2SE 1.3, 1.4 and the latest 1.5 editions plus J2ME and some J2EE 1.3 and 1.4
-support for desktop, Web, Web Services, mobile and embedded processing
-database connectivity and binding support simplifies SQL, XML, and other datafile access
-browser access to database tables and schema for MySQL, DB2, Derby, Oracle, SQLServer , etc
-uses Ant throughout for program control and task launching
-Visual Designer for layout of forms and simple reports for desktop or Web applications
-Web application deployment simplified with Tomcat 5.0 onboard and prebuilt Ant deployments
-one of the most powerful debuggers – voted by Syscon as best of 2004
-use of popular standrds like CSS, JavaScript, XML in novel ways throughout the system
-robust script editor with color code, hints, several refactorings, and built-in CVS
-platform support for scripting, XML, datafiles, and other APIs to make extensions easy
-over 100 estensions for an ample opportunity to customize and specialize your development
So, wow, lucky me I have finally adopted ahead of the curve one of the best Java IDEs. This seemed to be confirmed by Sun using Netbeans as the core for its Java Studio Creator (good, smaller learning curve) and then Developer.com confirming it with its 2005 Developer product of the Year Award. What a streak of good luck. Cue the Jaws theme music…..
Eclipse Blitz
But just as NetBeans seemed to be starting on a roll, IBMMM … err …. Eclipse intervened with a series of powerhouse announcements:
-IBM was giving away another small treasure chest of Websphere and other AlphaWorks goodies to shore up some of the lost ground to NetBeans;
-Borland announces that it will join Eclipse as strategic developer and take on the flagging UML and MDA extensions with OMGs blessing. This add $250,000 and 8 developers to Eclipse;
-BEA one-ups Borland signing on to the tune of $1.5M in persoonel, code, and direct dollars including combining AspectWorkz with Eclipse AspectJ, leading the Web Top Platform integration, plus broadening the JRockit JVM support to include Eclipse. This latter “contribution” tipped BEAs hand – they will be adopting the Eclipse framework as a key part of DayBreak, their next version of BEA Weblogic Workshop – the better to compete with IBM WebSphere on its own turf. BEA seems to be saying “All you WebSphere users its now a cinch to convert to BEA Weblogic – a better J2EE and SOA engine”.
-Sybase, already having contributed a Process Orchestrator, also moves to strategic developer, and takes on the tough task of developing a comprehensive data mangement tooling framework.
-Scapa, also a major contributor in the testing and performance tools arena, becomes a strategic developer and will lead the major Test Tool project at Eclipse.
So in one week, just my NetBeans starts to emerge as the the leading open Source java IDE, Eclipse pulls of the coup of getting four major java suppliers to work as strategic developers leading significant Eclipse projects with persoonel, dollars and even a few patents. Curses- my good fortune is spoiled again by the Urban Legend: Luck Needs to be Leveled and Leavened. Of course the big winners here are described in detail in the following story – Eclipsing Beans.
(c)JBSurveyer 2005