Java Development Environments for Macintosh?

spacecowboy420 asks: "My company (with my persuasion) has decided to move from a Windows platform to a Macintosh. The issue that is slowing this move is one of software solutions - more specifically a Jave IDE and Sales Contact Management software. We have been using JBuilder and Act!. Jbuilder is available for mac but is pricey, but the real rub is we need an IDE that supports the JClass Libraries (which Jbuilder does, but we would like to consider an alternative). Act! also doesn't have a mac version, so I am in new territory when it comes to mac contact solutions. What solutions have the Slashdot community found to be the best? What are the thoughts on Power Builder (although I know it doesn't support the JClass Libraries)?."

Comments

Why is JBuilder Pricey?

[fm6]

Because it doesn't have any real competition.

Think about this. You're spending thousands to license JClass. Apparently you're doing some heavy-duty enterprise applications, so you're spending tens, maybe hundreds, of thousands on hardware, bandwidth, etc. Plus you're spending similar amounts on programmer time.

Yet now you want to skimp on the one tool you use to tie all these expensive pieces together. At most this will save you $3K per programmer. Probably a lot less. If using a less effective tool delays your project just one week, you do not come out ahead. Does this strategy make sense?

Re:Shouldn't you have thought of this first?

[BitGeek]

The only ego here is yours.

Apple's VM tracks sun fairly closely... but they also have a lot of optimization that they do beyond what sun ships. Thus, Apple's releases will not coincide with Suns. And this is a Good Thing.

Its not like not using 1.4 is bad-- 1.4 is a minor update, and anyone developing java software right now really should not be requiring 1.4.

Furthermore, Apples 1.4 will likely be out soon, and will likely, once again, be the best VM on the market.

You should be happy he's leaving windows, rather than let your ego flame him for choosing mac.

Re:Learn VIM or Emacs

[bwt]

Both are far more powerful development environments than ANY IDE or any editor (sorry JEdit) and can interoperate with ANY SYSTEM YOU CAN THINK OF.

People say this kind of thing all the time. I use vi when all I have is a shell, but I do not understand why you would call them a "more powerful development" environment that something like JEdit or an IDE. How do you justify this statement?

C'mon. IDE's are important for productivity.

[Paradox]

Emacs and VI are quite powerful, both offer a rich variety of features. However, while they are suitable for IDE's they are not really ideal in this area without a lot of customization, tinkering, knoweldge of eLisp, and time.

Time isn't cheap. Time is expensive and precious. It's the one resource you or I can't replenish. I'd rather use an expensive IDE that saves me time rather than a potentially better editor that requires weeks to learn (yes, I already know them both quite well, but that's because I've used them for about 4 years now).

This is the reason I use Apple's IDE. It's easy to set up, it's very professional, has a nice debugging feature and class browser, and gives you lots of useful feedback. Sure, I can't program an MP3 encoder in LISP and have it run from my text editor, and sure, I might have to use the mouse periodically with it. So what? It saves time compared to the slow process of getting emacs set up just the way I like it or setting up a series of scripts to automate tasks I'd run from VI.

Interoperability isn't really an excuse. Source is saved as ascii text. The only area you could possibly have trouble is line breaks. They're all interoperable.

In a real dev environment, time saving dev tools such as an IDE are essential.

CodeGuide

[Jammerlappen]

Look at CodeGuide from OmniCore. Nice IDE, nice MacOS X integration. We've been using it for six months now.

Re:Shouldn't you have thought of this first?

[Daniel Dvorkin]

The Mac ships with Java 1.3 but not yet 1.4 (afaik), and for that reason is not an ideal platform for Java development. Linux, Windows and Solaris are ideal platforms -- shouldn't you look at them first?

This is obviously just an ideology game on your part, and you aren't putting your company's business needs first. You should not be in charge of IT decisions.

He doesn't say what else his business does, or what other reasons they may have for moving to Macs. It's entirely possible that Macs suit their business better than any other platform in most ways, and that this problem is one of the few downsides.

I love Macs, too, but if you have to Ask Slashdot, you are not a professional.

[yawn] I'm really sick of people ripping on Ask Slashdot. Here's a clue: if you think the people who post questions to Ask Slashdot are idiots, don't read it. I goddamn well am a professional, and you're full of shit if you think otherwise -- and while A.S. is far from the only resource I use when I have tricky questions, or even the first, it has in the past provided me with a whole lot of immensely valuable information. One of the things I like best about IT is having a wide network of knowledgeable peers who are generally very willing to share the benefits of their experience. Attitudes like yours do nothing but harm to the field as a whole.