Eclipse, Netbeans, Android

[Dirk Bruere at NeoPax]

I normally write Java using Netbeans.
What would people here recommend for doing Android stuff?
We have decided to develop for Android now that it looks to be the
future ie iPad is dumped.

Bear in mind that I have a lot of apps already written in Java (for PC)
using Netbeans and would like to port them with minimal hassle.

 

[Lew]

I normally write Java using Netbeans.
What would people here recommend for doing Android stuff?

I plan to use NetBeans.

Eclipse, emacs and vi are some other options.

We have decided to develop for Android now that it looks to be the
future ie iPad is dumped.

Bear in mind that I have a lot of apps already written in Java (for PC)
using Netbeans and would like to port them with minimal hassle.

The IDE has no effect on porting as such, although your comfort level with one
temporarily affects velocity until the learning curve kicks in. Neither Java
nor Dalvik depend on your IDE.

I'd start here:
<http://developer.android.com/>
particularly
<http://developer.android.com/guide/developing/eclipse-adt.html>
<http://developer.android.com/guide/developing/other-ide.html>

since it is perfectly amazing what the project documents can tell you.

Also,
<http://lmgtfy.com/?q=IDEs+for+Android+development>

 

[Arne Vajhøj]

I normally write Java using Netbeans.
What would people here recommend for doing Android stuff?
We have decided to develop for Android now that it looks to be the
future ie iPad is dumped.

Bear in mind that I have a lot of apps already written in Java (for PC)
using Netbeans and would like to port them with minimal hassle.

Android suggest Eclipse themselves:
http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html
so that will probably be the easiest.

In the end it is just Java code, so you can use any IDE incl. NB.

Arne

 

[Screamin' Lord Byron]

Android suggest Eclipse themselves:
http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html
so that will probably be the easiest.

It is. And it's all hassle-free. Get Android SDK and install Eclipse
plug in, tell it where the SDK is and you're good to go. Build, run and
debug, emulate, view logcat, all straight from Eclipse.

It's much easier than using some other IDE, especially if one uses
declarative approach, ie. xml descriptors for defining resources (and
that's the recommended way to write Android apps), because of that nifty
auto-generated R class.

 

[Dirk Bruere at NeoPax]

It is. And it's all hassle-free. Get Android SDK and install Eclipse
plug in, tell it where the SDK is and you're good to go. Build, run and
debug, emulate, view logcat, all straight from Eclipse.

It's much easier than using some other IDE, especially if one uses
declarative approach, ie. xml descriptors for defining resources (and
that's the recommended way to write Android apps), because of that nifty
auto-generated R class.

OK - done it.
Eclipse it is from now on.
Pity about Netbeans, as I had got quite used to it.
Now another PITA learning curve...

 

[Arne Vajhøj]

I'll second that suggestion. I'm just starting to develop Android apps and Eclipse has made it easy to do

Note that this does not imply that Eclipse is "better"
than NetBeans.

It just means that Google chose Eclipse as their standard for Android
and it is usually easier to go with the providers standard. It is
better tested and better documented.

Arne

 

[Lew]

OK - done it.
Eclipse it is from now on.
Pity about Netbeans, as I had got quite used to it.
Now another PITA learning curve...

Tell me again why you aren't using NetBeans, then? It's not like anyone's
*forcing* you to use Eclipse.

I just brought up a NetBeans Android project in twenty minutes from looking up
the instructions to new project up and running, including downloading the plugin.

 

[Arne Vajhøj]

Tell me again why you aren't using NetBeans, then? It's not like
anyone's *forcing* you to use Eclipse.

I just brought up a NetBeans Android project in twenty minutes from
looking up the instructions to new project up and running, including
downloading the plugin.

He can use anything.

But it can be practical especially for a beginner to
go with the crowd.

Quote from:

http://developer.android.com/resources/tutorials/hello-world.html

"This tutorial assumes that you're using Eclipse. If you're not, see
Developing in Other IDEs. You can then return to this tutorial and
ignore anything about Eclipse."

Arne

 

[Lew]

He can use anything.

But it can be practical especially for a beginner to
go with the crowd.

Quote from:

http://developer.android.com/resources/tutorials/hello-world.html

"This tutorial assumes that you're using Eclipse. If you're not, see
Developing in Other IDEs. You can then return to this tutorial and
ignore anything about Eclipse."

You heard the man. He's complained about Eclipse. He expressed a preference
for NetBeans. Don't you want to help him have what he wants? Why not give
him the information that fulfills his preference and let him decide?

 

[Screamin' Lord Byron]

Tell me again why you aren't using NetBeans, then? It's not like
anyone's *forcing* you to use Eclipse.

I just brought up a NetBeans Android project in twenty minutes from
looking up the instructions to new project up and running, including
downloading the plugin.

Of course you can do that, but then you're missing the goodies of the
Eclipse plugin, such as visual xml editor (with room for improvement,
though, but still), autocomplete for xml resource descriptors (along
with docs), resource templates, AVD management (creating or starting
AVDs), auto (re)generation of the R class (upon xml file save), and few
other Android-specific tools that can make life a bit easier.

The bottom line is, like you said, no one is forcing anyone. We're just
saying that it's a little bit easier to go with Eclipse and official
Android plugin, especially if you're just starting out.

I would encourage OP to try both, and see if the advantages of the
Eclipse plugin are really worth the time of adapting to Eclipse for him.

 

[Arne Vajhøj]

You heard the man. He's complained about Eclipse. He expressed a
preference for NetBeans. Don't you want to help him have what he wants?
Why not give him the information that fulfills his preference and let
him decide?

He asked "What would people here recommend for doing Android stuff?".

There is huge benefits by using the IDE that the official
Android tutorial and examples uses.

So he got good recommendations for the question he asked.

It is not very realistic to consider a single tools best for
all usages.

Arne

 

[Lew]

He asked "What would people here recommend for doing Android stuff?".

There is huge benefits by using the IDE that the official
Android tutorial and examples uses.

So he got good recommendations for the question he asked.

It is not very realistic to consider a single tools best for
all usages.

No one is denying what people suggest about Eclipse. I responded to the OP's
explicit concern that it would be a "PITA" to learn Eclipse, and his express
desire to figure out how to use NetBeans. So I provided the information the
OP requested. You apparently feel that that freedom of choice should be
suppressed, and contradict your own suggestion that "It is not very realistic
to consider a single tools best for all usages." If you truly believed that,
you'd allow the comparison and let the OP make up their own mind.

 

[Arved Sandstrom]

Arne Vajhøj wrote:
[ SNIP ]

He asked "What would people here recommend for doing Android stuff?".

There is huge benefits by using the IDE that the official
Android tutorial and examples uses.

So he got good recommendations for the question he asked.

It is not very realistic to consider a single tools best for
all usages.

Arne

I agree. You can do all things Java in every Java-capable IDE, but they all
have different pain thresholds for different tasks. Reworded, how
comprehensive and reliable and intuitive is the IDE's support for feature X?
That's one factor - feature support. So we know Android development is
oriented on Eclipse.

A second factor is uniformity of work environment, which figures for team
development. It can be important for individuals too if you have lots of
projects on the go. You want your team to be using the same stuff and be
configured the same way.

A third factor is individual developer familiarity: what do they use the
most? Eclipse, NB, IDEA, etc?

I usually rank the factors in this order: 1. feature support, 2. uniformity,
3. developer preferences.

It's not good for a developer to _require_ a specific IDE (*).

AHS

* I'm minded of that right now. I'm spending 3 days a week on one client
site doing J2EE in Eclipse 3.5, with occasional support for an auxiliary
program in NB, 2 days a week doing custom Java workflow for FileNet in
Eclipse for another client, _this_ weekend I have to finish writing a custom
FileNet Capture component in VB 6, _and_ I'm supporting POCs that we're
doing using GWT and jQuery. Not much room for getting comfortable with
IDEs here, is my point.

 

[Arne Vajhøj]

No one is denying what people suggest about Eclipse. I responded to the
OP's explicit concern that it would be a "PITA" to learn Eclipse, and
his express desire to figure out how to use NetBeans. So I provided the
information the OP requested. You apparently feel that that freedom of
choice should be suppressed, and contradict your own suggestion that "It
is not very realistic to consider a single tools best for all usages."
If you truly believed that, you'd allow the comparison and let the OP
make up their own mind.

If you think that recommending Eclipse because Android recommends
is suppressing his freedom of choice, then I strongly suspect
that you must have bumped your head against something recently.

He asked for recommendations. He got recommendations. No one
is forcing him to follow those recommendations.

Arne