Netbeans over Eclipse

[Saurabh Dhande]

Netbeans over Eclipse

Even though Eclipse is surely the dominant Java IDE in the market,
there are some reasons that make me prefer Netbeans over it :

* Netbeans is a coherent IDE : you don’t have to check the
dependencies for a plugin and the right version for every dependency
to get it work (check GMF version, WTP version etc..). Plugins in
Netbeans are supervised by the development team and integrate easily
and very well in the current Netbeans version.

* Netbeans works out of the box : The functionalities provided by
Netbeans are available from the plugins manager. You just have to
install/activate them and begin working. In Eclipse, there is the
update center, but it is tougher to get a stabilized IDE with a set of
complementary tools. Moreover, many valuable Eclipse plugins aren’t in
the Eclipse update site, but belong to independent enterprises.

* Netbeans is free : Well, I know eclipse is free too, but a lot of
the valuable plugins are commercial (UML, GUI design..). Even if free
components in Netbeans don’t offer all the functionalities the
commercial plugins in Eclipse do, I prefer having an IDE dealing
mainly with free plugins.

* Netbeans is actively supported : Sun makes a lot of efforts to
market Netbeans, so we have all kinds of tutorials, videos etc
(Netbeans TV, Netbeans Magazine, Netbeans tutorials..) that are made
by Sun. Eclipse tutorials and screencasts are numerous but they aren’t
supported by IBM so they are less coherent and less ‘Enterprise
quality’ documents.

*Netbeans is made by Sun, the Java inventor : Netbeans has recently
been on the edge concerning innovative Java technologies (JSF, Java
FX..). It is easily understandable as Sun is creating those
technologies.

*Netbeans integrates some nice productivity tools : Eclipse has better
refactoring, but is beaten in other aspects by Netbeans who integrates
GUI Builder Matisse, advanced JSF Web design, JUnit testing, Ant
compiling and a Profiler in a user friendly manner.

I know the debate is very heated about this topic. You can leave your
opinions and comments either you prefer Eclipse, Netbeans or any other
IDE.

Edit in 1st March 2008 : After three months of heavily using Netbeans
and then three others with Eclipse, I completely changed my mind. I
currently consider Eclipse to be way more productive and feature-rich
than Netbeans. Maybe I will write a new post to explain in detail what
makes Eclipse superior to Netbeans in my opinion.



By Jihed Amine Maaref