Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

[Arthur Baldwin]

Now that I have perfected the KUbuntu InstantHobo installation script, it's time to install a good IDE.

I've read about other people's experience with IDEs for Ruby, Rails, etc. and I believe that NetBeans is my best bet.

However, in order to install NetBeans 7.x, I first must install Oracle's Java JDK 7.x and then run their 203 MB script file.

Their instructions for installing Java JDK 7.x are not complete.  I know that there is a particular directory that I need to use if I want the Java JDK to be available to all users on my system and that the installation directory must be in my path environment.

Can anybody advise me on the terminal statements I need to execute to get the thing working right?

Before I try to execute their install script?

Sincerely,

Arthur Baldwin

[Arthur Baldwin]

Well...I tried to use OpenJDK since the Ubuntu website recommends that as "the easiest way to install"...but even though the Oracle install script now runs...the first thing it says is "No compatible JDK found".  So I have to use Oracle's version.

Has anybody done this yet?

Sincerely,

Arthur Baldwin

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From: Arthur Baldwin <eeng...@yahoo.com>
To: Hobo Users <hobo...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, December 23, 2011 1:24 PM
Subject: [Hobo Users] Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

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[Bob Sleys]

A couple of things.

First Oracles JDK typicality just unpacks the files but doesn't do a full setup.  You'll need to make a link in /usr/bin to where ever you installed it.  Not on my Ubuntu machine ATM so I can't give you the exact paths etc.  but if you need help I'll post when I'm back on it.  You might want to just try OpenJDK.

As for IDE's you have a number of choices. 

Free:

Netbeans - Version 7 doesn't support ruby/rails any more so you are limited to 6.9

Aptana Studio 3 or Titanium both work great with rails apps.  Titanium adds lots of mobile support as well as web apps so nice if you plan to do any of that in the future. Both are based on Eclipse and can be installed as standalone apps or plugins to Eclipse.

Gedit plus plugins.  There are a number of plugins available for gedit to make it work better as a full fledged IDE.

There are a bunch of there text editor ones also but I generally don't consider then true IDE's though still very good for development work.

Pay:

Jetbrains RubyMine - a very good IDE but does cost a few $$.

Personally I've used RubyMine for the last year and liked it a lot however recently I've been playing around with Titanium and am liking it a lot also.  I've used Netbeans in the past but when they dropped ruby/rails I dropped it.

Bob

[Arthur Baldwin]

Well since NetBeans no longer supports Rails, I'll use either Aptana Studio 3 (most likely) or Titanium.  However, I still need to setup Oracle's Java JDK.  I did try OpenJDK and it does not come close to working with any of the Oracle Java dependent tools.

Arthur

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From: Bob Sleys <bsl...@gmail.com>
To: hobo...@googlegroups.com
Cc: Arthur Baldwin <eeng...@yahoo.com>
Sent: Friday, December 23, 2011 2:15 PM
Subject: Re: [Hobo Users] Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

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[Bob Sleys]

Ok I'm back on my Ubuntu machine so I can give you the specifics

I'm using Open JDK installed via Ubuntu software center.  I also have Oracle Java JDK installed but am using Open JDK with Titanium Studio just fine.

I know you've posted you don't like RVM, unless I'm confusing you with someone else, but I personally love it.  It makes setting up ruby/rails a snap and avoids the GEM conflicts if you work on different rails project that have different gem requirements.

Bob

[Arthur Baldwin]

Dear Bob,

What if I want the IDE mostly for desktop apps?  Should I still be using Titanium?  From the advertising, it looks like Titanium is mostly for smart phone apps.

What I really want to do is make desktop business management apps that have MDI forms with child forms and RDBMS tables galore to support them.  Is Titanium really the best option for this?

Sincerely,

Arthur Baldwin

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From: Bob Sleys <bsl...@gmail.com>
To: hobo...@googlegroups.com
Cc: Arthur Baldwin <eeng...@yahoo.com>

Sent: Sunday, December 25, 2011 10:17 AM

Subject: Re: [Hobo Users] Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

[Peter Booth]

Truly, no one can answer "which IDE?" questions for another. They couldn't do it with Visual C in 1990, with JBuilder in 1998, with Eclipse in 2005, Textmate in 2008 or RubyMine in 2011.

Best advice- download RubyMine, Slickedit, VIM, Titanium and try them all. For me what matters most is a 27" iMac with lots of pixels

Sent from my iPhone

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[Bob Sleys]

Peter makes some good points

A lot of it boils down to personal preference.  I've done a lot of the type of apps you mention in my 30 years of programming.  However I've primarily moved away from desktop development to web app development and for that I use Hobo.

When it comes to desktop development a lot of the equation comes down to what desktop are you developing for and what language you are working in.

If you are developing for Windows than C# and Microsoft development studio is very hard to beat.

If you are working in Java than I'd go with Eclipse especially if you also want to do Rails development since Titanium and Aptana Studio both work as plugins to Eclipse.  Eclipse is a great multipurpose muli-language IDE.  It's very flexible and powerful.

Bob

[Arthur Baldwin]

Dear Bob,

I've been developing MS Access apps for business management since 1996 and have had some success.  But I've found that MS Access is not capable of supporting more than one or two simultaneous users without significant delays.  And that the .mdb files are too easily corrupted.  Since 1998 I have been looking for a way to replace MS Access as a development tool with tools designed by and for the Linux community.  IMHO Hobo is the only practical solution within the Linux community at this time.  If I felt that I could learn enough about QT Creator, then I might go for using that tool, but for some reason they don't "believe" in MDI forms...so the support in the form of tutorials about MDI is practically non-existent.  My goal is to eliminate Windows from my life...forever.  And to begin using Linux exclusively both for myself and for as many of my computer consulting clients as possible.  I have tried using NetBeans, Eclipse (with RadRails plugin), and some plain old editors.  My complaint about Eclipse is that it's too hard to figure out how to enter the right URL's when trying to install plugins.  I found that NetBeans made installation easier...but now that you told me they are not supporting rails anymore...well...that's that.  If I could actually learn what I need to know in order to setup Eclipse with RadRails...and do the job right....then I might consider using that...but so fat I have run into nothing but roadblocks.

Sincerely,

Arthur Baldwin

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From: Bob Sleys <bsl...@gmail.com>
To: hobo...@googlegroups.com
Cc: Arthur Baldwin <eeng...@yahoo.com>

Sent: Sunday, December 25, 2011 10:15 PM

Subject: Re: [Hobo Users] Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

[Bob Sleys]

MS Access, been there done that,  ya it's a single user environment.  However I wasn't talking about Access when I mentioned MS Developer.  I was talking about MS Visual Studio.  I know most here on this forum arn't gong to be big fans of MS products however IF what you customers want is desktop MDI apps then they are using Windows and Visual Studio really is your best choice.  Note the big IF.  Personally I've had limited success with moving clients away from Windows on their desktops but I've had great success moving away from desktop apps to web apps.  Linux is the server environment has always been king no matter what MS fans have been trying to tell the world.  MS may own the desktop for now but Linux owns servers.  By moving to web apps over desktop apps you no longer care what OS they use on their desktops since everything is run in side the browser.

So to summarize IMHO IF your clients want/need desktop apps, windows desktop apps, I'd go with MS Visual Studio written in C# with MS SQL server or really any real DB back-end but most defiantly NOT MS Access. I know it's expensive but if forced into that environment it's really they only choice IMHO.

IF you can move to web apps then I'd go with RubyMine, RadRails or Titanium.  I'd use the standalone versions of each not the plugins.  It avoids all those plugin problems with Eclipse. I've used all 3 including Netbeans and other "text" editors in the past.  Currently my favorite is Titanium but only because of the potential to do mobile apps.  Titanium is essentially RadRails with the mobile app development thrown in for free.  If I wasn't thinking about some mobile apps in the near future I'd stick with RubyMine it beats RadRals and Titanium in pure ruby/rails development by a slight margin IMHO.

To setup any of the above 3 just install OpenJDK from the Ubuntu software center. Download the packages for the IDE's and untar/unzip them in a dir of you home dir.  Then simply create a menu item pointing to the startup script.  None of the 3 include an install but simply unpack and run from the unpacked dirs no setup required.

Bob

[Arthur Baldwin]

Hi Bob,

Well I've decided to use Aptana Studio 3 with the RadRails plugin already included as a "Stand Alone" package.  Although it starts up kinda slow (very much like Eclipse...wonder if they're using it?) it does work rather well.  I especially appreciate the fact that unlike previous versions of Aptana, the terminal window now works for all of the normal hobo commands.  I really like the fact that the terminal window "defaults" to the directory used as the project directory for the "last loaded project".  Very nice!  Anyway...I'm currently going through the latest Rapid Rails Beta book and actually doing all of the practice apps in the book as part of my education.  Although Aptana Studio 3 seems to work ok with OpenJDK, there is a warning on their website that it won't work with OpenJDK...only with Sun's Java JDK.  So, if I run into trouble I might try Sun's version.  Thanks for your help.

Sincerely,

Arthur Baldwin

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From: Bob Sleys <bsl...@gmail.com>
To: hobo...@googlegroups.com
Cc: Arthur Baldwin <eeng...@yahoo.com>

Sent: Monday, December 26, 2011 6:40 AM

Subject: Re: [Hobo Users] Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

[Peter Booth]

Just curious about how snappy you have found these IDEs? I own a copy of RubyMine, have used Eclipse since version 0.9, but inevitably do most of my work in Textmate or vim because I find the IDEs sluggish, even on fast, high spec laptops and desktops. Perhaps my expectations are unreasonable?

What has your experience been?

Peter

Sent from my iPhone

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[Bob Sleys]

Arthur,

Yes it indeed uses Eclipse it just all bundled together making setting it up much easier.  As for OpenJDK vs Oracle JDK, Sun JDK is dead, I haven't run into any problems yet.  I imagine its more of they doon't want to deal with OpenJDK jet and older versions weren't as compatible with Sun JDK. I've found OpenJDK to work fine.

Peter,

I've found starting up the IDE to be rather slow but like the continence it provides once running.  They are especially good when it comes to running in debug mode and debugging an app.  I'm no linux so no textmate but I've tried the addons to gedit that add much of the same functionality to gedit but they slow gedit down too much for me.  Again its the startup and I like for gedit to be nice and fast for quick editing of text files.  I can live with the slow start up for development work but also like to have a fast text editor for the simpler tasks.  Once the IDE's are running they seem to run very well at least for me.

Bob

[Arthur Baldwin]

Well guys, I found my first bug in Aptana Studio 3 and it's pretty much a "show stopper".  I've tried using both Open JDK and Oracle's JDK, but it makes no difference.  The trouble is that after I use "Import from Existing Folder as New Project" the first time, the second time it won't correctly identify the desired directory.  I have tried many, many ways to "work around" this bug but as yet no "work around" appears possible.  If I don't find a solution soon...I probably will go back to the Kate editor (basic editor for KUbuntu) and my little terminal window.

Sincerely,

Arthur Baldwin

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From: Bob Sleys <bsl...@gmail.com>
To: hobo...@googlegroups.com

Sent: Thursday, December 29, 2011 7:51 AM

Subject: Re: [Hobo Users] Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

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[Bob Sleys]

I sorry but I don't quite understand the problem.  I have done the import many times without problem but most recently I've just opened the existing folder directly.  If you import an existing folder you end up with a second copy of the project so I just open the dir directly so I work out of the same copy of the project.

[Arthur Baldwin]

I also tried opening from the Project Explorer tab from the "File System", right clicked for the menu and selected "promote to project", but had the same exact problem.  It creates the correct folder name, but in the wrong directory!  And it does not display ANY of the proper files in the App Explorer tab.

I'm quite certain that this bug is also present in the Windows and Apple versions of Aptana Studio 3 and that it has to do with the logic involved in generating the path for project creation.  Part of the problem is that the contents of the .project file does not include any path related information.  This means that the design of Aptana Studio is FAR from complete...still needs a Lot of work.

Sincerely,

Arthur Baldwin

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From: Bob Sleys <bsl...@gmail.com>
To: hobo...@googlegroups.com

Cc: Arthur Baldwin <eeng...@yahoo.com>
Sent: Friday, December 30, 2011 6:23 AM

Subject: Re: [Hobo Users] Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

I sorry but I don't quite understand the problem.  I have done the import many times without problem but most recently I've just opened the existing folder directly.  If you import an existing folder you end up with a second copy of the project so I just open the dir directly so I work out of the same copy of the project. --

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[Arthur Baldwin]

Perhaps this will help you understand.  The first time I use "Import Existing Folder as New Project" after a fresh install of Aptana...it works perfectly!  No extra folder is created and all my existing files appear in the App Explorer tab.  But the second time...it creates a new folder in the wrong place and the App Explorer tab shows an empty project with the right project name!  What makes it so frustrating is that it works the first time...but NEVER again!  It is clearly a logic problem either with Eclipse (which forms the foundation of Aptana) or with the code in the Aptana Studio project.

Sincerely,

Arthur Baldwin

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From: Arthur Baldwin <eeng...@yahoo.com>
To: "hobo...@googlegroups.com" <hobo...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, December 30, 2011 12:18 PM

Subject: Re: [Hobo Users] Need an IDE for Hobo & Rails

[Arthur Baldwin]

In fact I can tell you pretty much where to look for the logic problem ...it's probably a variable of type string that is not being reset to a "blank string" for each subsequent use of "Import Existing Folder as New Project".

Arthur Baldwin

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From: Arthur Baldwin <eeng...@yahoo.com>
To: "hobo...@googlegroups.com" <hobo...@googlegroups.com>

Sent: Friday, December 30, 2011 12:59 PM