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Jedit, Jext & J: Java-based Editors Compared
An anonymous reader writes "There are times when I want a lean, mean editor and times when I enjoy a good, bloated editor packed with wizards. We compare the programming editors Jext and J to Jedit and offer a revised opinion of the best Java for Linux."
I was reluctant to try out a java based editor (I'm a C++-er all the way :), but nedit was acting strangely as packaged in Mandrake 9.0, so I gave it a shot.
I really like the hyper-searching and the tabbed windows. There are a few annoyances such as the order it uses when you switch to the next buffer (uses opened order rather than Z order), but my main complaint lately has been speed. It has become quite a hog, probably due to too many cool plugins. I'm using the latest java from Sun. Perhaps I'll try one mentioned in the article.
All in all, I've been using it for about a month and I don't think I'll give it up.
...there are NUMEROUS plug-ins for ANT, JUnit console, editing macros, and even EMACS emulation. YOU should know what your are talking about before you open your fingers. JEdit is well one its way to being a fantastic programmers editor. The editor is EXACTLY the same on a MAC, Linux box (any type), or Windows. Just get the latest version and try for your self. It is especially snappy with the 1.4_01 jvm, and go to the plug-in manager and BAM, tons of stuff. Have fun!
It's not java based, so you either have to go through no end of hassle to make it work on your windows box, or get used to "one editor for *nix, one editor for *blows".
JEdit, on the other hand, runs fine and exactly identically on both linux and winblows. No need to get used to having one set of feature under one OS and another under the other.
Daniel
Carpe Diem
Ummm, you can get Vim for Win32. I use it all the time just as in Linux. It's not a cygwin port, either, it's a legitimate Windows program. See here.
To highlight a few things:
Understandably, people are biased against java client software. However, Jedit is worth the 10 seconds it takes to launch it. Aside from emacs, I don't think there are many editors which are that extensible and have that many extensions.
Jilles
For my meager and small perl programs, I've switched from vim to jEdit. Just a really nice program. Syntax highlighting is very good but not quite up to par with vim. Little things are still missing, like coloring newlines/tabs differently than text. Bracket auto-completion/auto-formatting that highlights which bracket is being closed lets me work more efficiently. There's a nifty collapsable blocks setting that will 'minimize' a block, enabling me to get a better overview of what is happening.
jEdit also has a plugin-architecture with quite a library of plugins, including a mini-console, CVS integration, save over FTP, and a slew of Java-centric ones that look as though they would be useful.
In short, jEdit isn't an IDE but it will help you out in terms of "CVS integration, code style enforcement, and automation of repetitive build tasks." And it's not just for Java.
> Little things are still missing, like coloring newlines/tabs differently than text.
Get the WhiteSpace plugin through the plugin manager. It lets you pick separate colors for spaces, tabs, other whitespace, space from folds, and paragraph separators.
A 'Hello World' applet run using appletviewer. Ok cpu usage is at 0.0% which is to be expected since the applet doesn't do anything once it's painted the display, but look at RSIZE. 13.4M.
Yeah, that's the VM overhead, so?
And you can expect that number to blow out pretty quickly as the code is extended to make it do something useful.
I assume that adding features in your favorite language actually causes memory use to shrink?
Hello World in C has a resident size of 304K. Granted that's just using printf to output to a console but it's still a dramatic difference.
Actually, 304K seems like a hell of a lot of memory to lose for a Hello World in C.