Java Editors Comparison (netbeans Ide, Eclipse, Intellij Idea)

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Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse,   IntelliJ IDEA) Roman Hák

May 5, 2008

Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

Goal and purpose of test Purpose of this test is to compare three the most widely used IDEs (Integrated Development Environments) from the scope of usability its editors with focus on source code editing in Java language. Compared IDEs are NetBeans IDE, Eclipse and IntelliJ IDEA. Goal of this test is to find differences/similarities of tested editors. Analyze solutions from the scope of usability and decide which solution is the best. Based on the best solution give some advices and recommendations for NetBeans IDE.

Versions of tested IDEs ● ● ●

NetBeans IDE 6.1 (Sun Microsystems) Eclipse 3.3.2 (Eclipse contributors) IntelliJ IDEA 7.0.3 (JetBrains)

Target user The target user for this test is junior Java programmer with advanced knowledge of programming. He knows Java language and basic libraries from Java API. He has experience with creating small projects with few packages and classes. He expects from IDE to make his work easier, increase his productivity and gives him comfort for developing.

Cognitive walkthrough I choose a cognitive walkthrough as a usability inspection method. Every step made during test is evaluated by four main questions: ●

Will the user try to achieve the effect that the subtask has? Does the user understand that this subtask is needed to reach the user's goal?

●

Will the user notice that the correct action is available? E.g. is the button visible?

●

Will the user understand that the wanted subtask can be achieved by the action? E.g. the right button is visible but the user does not understand the text and will therefore not click on it.

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Does the user get feedback? Will the user know that he has done the right thing after performing the action?

Editors comparison is very specific type of test and some tasks could not be easily evaluated by this four questions. The most of actions and task are well designed and are proved by time. Keeping this in mind I will not answer on all of this questions in this work, but instead of that I will show good and bad designs used in IDEs and I will give recommendations and advices for NetBeans IDE.

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Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

1. Basic code editing 1.1 Code formating NetBeans IDE 6.1

IntelliJ IDEA 7.0

Eclipse 3.3.2

Format whole source

Yes

Yes

Yes

Format selected part only

Yes

Yes

Yes

User's specific formatting of code

Yes

Yes

Yes

All three IDEs support code formatting of whole source or of selected part only. They all allows user to set his specific formatting. Eclipse and NetBeans IDE There is no bad design found in Eclipse and NetBeans. All actions are available and the user clearly understand whole process and gets acceptable feedbacks. IntelliJ IDEA Every time the user of IntelliJ IDEA choose to reformat code the Reformat Code dialog appears on the screen. This dialog asks him if he want to reformat whole code or selected part only. This is not necessary, because editor can easily predict user's selection. If there is no selected part of source whole source should be reformatted. Otherwise the selected part should be reformatted.

1.1 Find/Replace NetBeans IDE 6.1

IntelliJ IDEA 7.0

Eclipse 3.3.2

Find

Yes

Yes

Yes

Replace

Yes

Yes

Yes

All IDEs supports finding and replacing with options like case matching, regular expressions etc. In functionality there are almost no differences between IDEs. Eclipse Eclipse has one common dialog window for both finding and replacing. With respect of fast accessibility of find function, this is not well designed. Another reason why this is not good to have finding dialog, is that the dialog itself overlaps editor and the user needs to move it outside first to see the code (see figure 1.1).

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Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

1.1 Find/Replace dialog in Eclipse

IntelliJ IDEA IntelliJ IDEA has fast pop-up top bar for finding and special dialog window for replacing. This is very well designed because finding is very frequently used and needs to be fast accessible. NetBeans IDE NetBeans uses similar approach to IntelliJ IDEA except the pop-up bar is not on the top of editor's window but on the bottom of it.

1.2 Code completion All IDEs have same design for code completion. When the user invokes the code completion feature, a code completion box will appear, displaying a list of words that can complete the text typed in the editor. This behavior is provided by many other source code editors and there is no need to change anything.

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Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

Anyway there is one special feature IntelliJ IDEA brings to code completion. You could use “CamelHump” for searching in list of words that can complete the text (see figure 1.2).

1.2 "CamelHump" searching in IntelliJ IDEA 7.0

Recommendation for NetBeans IDE ●

add “CamelHump” support for searching

1.3 Use hints Eclipse While some use hint is available the bulb icon will appear on editor's left side bar with line numbers on appropriate line. When user moves mouse cursor on the bulb the text with hint explanation will pop-up. Clicking on the bulb list of solutions is shown. User can click on one of them to solve situation. During whole process the user clearly understands what is happening and knows what to do next. There is no design issue. IntelliJ IDEA In IntelliJ IDEA there is also the bulb icon on editor's left side bar while some hint is available. The user must click on the icon to see the hint text (see figure 1.3). Even clicking on the text will show the list with solutions. Again the user can click on one of them to perform action. It is not a good idea that the user need to click on bulb icon to see the hint text. The rest of the process is user friendly and there are no other design issues.

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Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

1.3 Use hint in IntelliJ IDEA

NetBeans IDE There is same design progress like in Eclipse. Like was written above this is designed very well and needs no change.

1.4 Macros NetBeans IDE 6.1

IntelliJ IDEA 7.0

Eclipse 3.3.2

Macros support

Yes

Yes

No

Macros editing

Yes

Yes

No

Eclipse Eclipse has no support for macros. IntelliJ IDEA IntelliJ IDEA starts (resp. stops) macro recording from menu Tools → Start Macro Recording (resp. Stop Macro Recording) . After recording is stopped the user is prompted by dialog to set the macro's name. Once the macro's name is set it is automatically added to menu Tools → “macro's name” and user can anytime call the macro from here. The user can edit macro in Edit Macros dialog where he can delete and rename macro or remove any action from macro. Edit Macros dialog is in menu Tools → Edit Macros. The bad design here is that the user cannot set the keyboard shortcut for the macro in this dialog. The only way to do this is to go to Settings → Keymap → Macros. NetBeans IDE There are two ways in NetBeans to start (resp. stop) macro recording. One way is from menu Edit → Start Macro Recording (resp. Stop Macro Recording). The second and very easy to use way are 6

Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

two icons in editor window's tool bar. After recording is done the user is prompted to set the macro's name and Editor Macros dialog is opened. The user can remove, rename, edit macro or set keyboard shortcut for it. There is another way to set shortcut for macro in menu Tools → Options → Keymap → Editor Macros. This is designed very well since the user can edit shortcut for a macro on every of two places where he could expect to. Bad thing is that there is no way to run macro without setting a shortcut for it and then use it. Macros' editor called Editor Macros is only accessible from menu Tools → Options → Editor → Macros. Good idea would be to add Editor Macros menu item to menu Edit and add Editor Macros icon to editor's window tool bar next to start and stop macro recording icons. Recommendation for NetBeans IDE ● ● ●

add Editor Macros menu item to menu Edit add Editor Macros icon to editor's window tool bar next to macro recording icons add Run Macros sub menu to menu Edit. This sub menu will contain list of all available macros to run

2. Syntax highlighting All three IDEs supports syntax highlighting on a very high level. All of them allows user to change predefined colors by the way he likes it. I did not find any bad designs in syntax highlighting. I have got only one recommendation for NetBeans IDE. Words TODO, FIXME etc. in to do tasks should have bold font face because they need to call user 's attention. Maybe there could be option to colorize to do tasks by a different color than other comments.

3. Code navigation 3.1 Navigator NetBeans IDE 6.1

IntelliJ IDEA 7.0

Eclipse 3.3.2

Structured view

Yes

Yes

Yes

Filters

Yes

Yes

Yes (inherited members filter missing)

Quick search

Yes

Yes

Yes

Pop-up navigator

No

No

Yes

All tested IDEs have very good navigator with structured view support and number of very useful filters. There are no issues in design.

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Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

Eclipse has a sort of pop-up navigator (see figure 3.1), which NetBeans and IDEA have not. This is very good idea because user could keep his eyes focused on editor window and could not focus on the side navigator window. This approach is faster and very comfortable, especially when user has small display and his navigator window is closed.

Recommendations for NetBeans IDE ●

add pop-up navigator with quick search

3.1 Pop-up navigator in Eclipse 3.3.2

3.2 Tasks management NetBeans IDE 6.1

IntelliJ IDEA 7.0

Eclipse 3.3.2

List of tasks in active source file

Yes

Yes

No

List of tasks in project

Yes

Yes

Yes

Filtering

Yes

Yes

Yes

New task definition

Yes

Yes

Yes

In tasks management there are two different approaches – tree view and list view.

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Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

Eclipse Eclipse has classic list view of tasks. It allows the user to sort tasks by any of available fields ('description', 'resource', 'path', 'location' and 'priority'). Eclipse is the only IDE which offers to define priority to every type of task. It is more accurate to sort tasks by its priority then sort it, for example by description. IntelliJ IDEA IntelliJ IDEA shows tasks as a tree view. Nodes are files (or you can switch to packages view) and leaves of the tree are tasks. It is good idea to see tasks grouped by files/packages but tree view is not good approach since when a project has many files with tasks, it is hard to move from one task to another. Another bad thing about IDEA is that there is only TODO task predefined in default settings. NetBeans IDE NetBeans has very similar approach to Eclipse, but unfortunately it does not support task priority. Unlike other two IDEs NetBeans shows syntax errors as an error tasks in task window. This is very good idea since you can see errors and other tasks altogether not in different window.

Recommendations for NetBeans ● ●

add option for defining priority to a type of task add field with package information (could be more useful than information about path)

4. Refactoring NetBeans IDE 6.1

IntelliJ IDEA 7.0

Eclipse 3.3.2

Find usages

Yes

Yes

Yes

Rename

Yes

Yes

Yes

Move

Yes

Yes

Yes

Safe delete

Yes

Yes

No

Eclipse When the user selects to rename some method (or class, attribute etc.) the identifier will be highlighted and the user can change its name. There is pop-up text “Enter new name, press Enter to refactor” and small arrow next to it. Clicking on this arrow invokes the pop-up menu with list of available actions like Refactor and Preview. Pressing enter key or choosing Refactor action will instantly perform refactoring. Clicking on preview will open new window with list of changes 9

Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

which needs to be done to perform refactoring and two code listings (original code and refactored code) with highlighted changes. The user can see all changes and then confirm or cancel refactoring. The bad design here is that after renaming the user is prompted with text to press enter. He don't know that clicking on the small arrow will give him the chance to see the preview first.

4.1 Refactoring in Eclipse 3.3.2

IntelliJ IDEA After the user selects to rename the Rename dialog with input text field for new name and Refactor, Preview and Cancel button will be displayed. Refactor button will immediately perform refactoring. Preview button will open dialog with tree view of all changes need to be done. Clicking on any change will shows it in editor. Unlike in Eclipse there is no code listings with highlighted differences. I'd recommend the approach from Eclipse because the user has better view what will the refactoring affect. NetBeans IDE NetBeans offers the same Rename dialog. Preview is designed in very similar way as in Eclipse. It is good approach, but the Preview window is displayed as a part of the bottom panel in NetBeans IDE. This is wrong because this panel is very small to display it (see figure 4.2). Because of this the user needs to resize the panel every time before he can continue.

4.2 Refactoring in NetBeans

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Editors Comparison (NetBeans IDE, Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA)

Roman Hák

Recommendation for NetBeans IDE ●

move Preview window to separate dialog or as a tab in editor's window

5. Automatic code generation NetBeans IDE 6.1

IntelliJ IDEA 7.0

Eclipse 3.3.2

Constructor

Yes

Yes

Yes

Setters/Getters

Yes

Yes

Yes

NetBeans IDE and IntelliJ IDEA has absolutely same design of automatic code generation. It is well designed and there is probably nothing to change. Eclipse has very similar design. It has a few more setting like insertion point where the code will be generated to and access modifiers. But these options are not so important and there is no need to implement them.

6. Conclusion Eclipse, IntelliJ IDEA and NetBeans IDE are the most widely used IDEs for Java. Their editors, one of the most important part, have very high quality, however, there is still a few issues in their design with respect to usability. I tried to find the most of them in this work and I gave recommendations how to solve them.

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