Re: IDE/Rational Apex

[David Wood <dpw@sd.aonix.com>]

Damian O'Neill wrote:
> 
> Hi,
> 
> A couple of days ago I requested opinions on IDE's in general and Rational Apex in particular (thanks again to all responants). I was completely underwhelmed by positive responses. So if anyone has anything good to say about Apex or IDE's in general, I'd love to hear it.

I can't speak about Apex in particular (or, more
accurately, I won't do so...), but as you are
asking about IDE's in general, I would say it is
very much dependent both on the preferences of the
user and also the qualities of the IDE itself.

Today on the Tri-Ada floor I was speaking with 
an individual who formerly used ActivAda and now
uses ObjectAda.  He told me that with ActivAda he
would never use the IDE and did all of his work at
the command line.  With ObjectAda, he prefers to 
always use the IDE, which is modeled after MSVC++,
and he never feels the need to resort to the command 
line.  His application is over 400,000 lines of 
very complex code, and he finds the features of 
the Project Manager and Builder perfectly suitable 
to what he is doing.

There are others who will refuse to use an IDE
on general principles, and for those users it
is very much dependent on personal preferences.

There are other cases, to be sure, where a 
product's IDE just isn't up to the task.  This
has to be evaluated by the user.

-- Dave Wood
-- Product Manager, ObjectAda for Windows
-- (formerly Product Manager for ActivAda...)
-- Aonix - "Ada 95, free for the downloading."
-- http://www.aonix.com