Slashdot Mirror
ActiveState Discontinues VisualPerl/Python
Noiser writes "ActiveState discontinues VisualPerl and VisualPython for Windows. Demand doesn't justify further development, they say. No, they don't mean to open-source these products, due to licensing problems with the inseparable MS Visual Studio integration code. Back to vi/Notepad/Komodo, then..."
Maybe for shell scripting, but for software/web development, I couldn't imagine life without a good IDE.
Don't get me wrong. I could hand-code everything in notepad if I so desired. I make sure to never become so dependent on the IDE that I lose the ability to think for myself.
But IDEs are just tools that make development so much quicker. They list all project files for easy opening, and keep them organized. They allow for compilation without having to write your own batch file. And - especially with VS.NET 2003 and 2005 - intellisense of some sort is simply inseperable from yours truely.
Intellisense saves me - easily - thousands of key-strokes per day. Being able to type two or three letters and hit tab or ctrl-space-tab to complete keywords or object names makes coding a line incredibly fast. Hitting . and having immediate keystroke access to an object's entire interface is a huge time saver. Anyone who thinks they can code at the same speed in notepad/emacs/vi is just plain nuts. Seriously. Nuts. Mod me down if you must but... Still nuts.
Excuse my speling.
Making The Bar Project
That's nice, but you really should be able to build your project with one step outside your IDE. Most Makefiles, ant build files, jam files, or god knows what else you use to build are 99% the same anyway. Make a single template and it might take you 15 seconds to customize it for projects that aren't too weird. As easy as starting a new project in VS.net, for sure.
There's not a decent programmer's editor around that doesn't have similar functionality available. Vim and Emacs are just two. No fancy trademark, same great taste.
Anybody who would make generalizations like this while obviously not knowing anything about what life is like outside VS is a complete idiot. We don't get the pretty widgets, but most of the shit you think is so nifty about Visual Studio was available several years prior to people in the know.
Broaden your horizons, newbie. Delusions to the contrary aside, you obviously have lost the ability to think for yourself.
The lack of demand is unsurprising.
1. Before you can use the plugin you have to buy MS Visual Studio, which costs $arm+leg.
2. In competition is an abundance good Python IDEs for Windows, both free and the pay-for-it kind.
Now, this is somewhat OT, but if they offered a Python plugin for Xcode on OS X, I would pay lots of real money for that. And Xcode is free, so the only cost to the user would be the cost of plugin. There is still no Python IDE on OS X which combines the following features.
1. Integration with Interface Builder.
2. A debugger.
3. Aqua interface.
Those seem like basic requirements for a professional Python development IDE on OS X but no such thing exists. The best available gives you two out of the three; Wing is nice, but runs in and Xterm on OS X with non-native widgets; dog-slow and but-ugly user interface. There is a nice optional package to support Python in Xcode, really cool, except it has no debugger.
I use Objective C on OS X, it's ok, but would switch to Python in an instant if I had a Python IDE on OS X as good as is Xcode for Objective C.
Ceci n'est pas une signature.
Komodo is a decent product, but needs improvement (like adding working templates for Perl/Tk *yay*), code analysis instead of basic syntax checking, real template libraries, etc. Tossing MS overboard is probably a great move for them if it frees up some of their time.
Ok open your c++ code from VS in to eclipse or other IDE.. It looks really nice in there doesn't it.
Perl plus VisualStudio - I can see why this does not really sell. ActiveState's Perl is an excellent product however and it is surprising how well applications run on it between Windows and UNIX.
An IDE typically reflects a programming environment where coding must be spread across a multitude of small files. In it's extreme, I'm not a big fan of this style as I don't think it documents the code well. An IDE often kicks in a build system, a debugger, a configuration management system, perhaps even a work management system. Integrated into one product none of these components is going to be ideal compared to dedicated tools. It much like an integrated stereo system - yes it does everything, but it will never sounds as good as discrete audio components.
I'm hard pressed to why one needs something more than emacs (a rabid few might argue it is the only application one would ever need!). Admittedly customizing emacs in Lisp is not exactly easy to learn...
The bottom line is that Microsoft fans (who would shell out big bucks for VisualStudio) are typically not going program in Perl. Similarly, those of us more familiar with the UNIX world aren't going to program in VisualBasic whatever its possible merits might be. The two worlds just don't cross much, we don't read the same web pages, we don't go to the same conferences.