TextMate vs AptanaStudio(integratechange.com)
integratechange.com
TextMate vs AptanaStudio
http://www.integratechange.com/2009/03/18/textmate-vs-aptanastudio/
7 comments
TextMate has a steep learning curve? I can't wait till the author reviews Emacs and vi, the other two big(ger) boys in the eternal editor holy war.
I know it's a joke, but those graphs are wrong, as is the way we talk about learning curves.
If something has a steep learning curve, it's easy to learn to use. Look at the vi graph: Assuming the x axis is time and the y axis is knowledge, according to its chart you know how to use virtually all of vi as soon as you start using it.
Things that are hard to learn have shallow learning curves: it takes a long time to become proficient.
If something has a steep learning curve, it's easy to learn to use. Look at the vi graph: Assuming the x axis is time and the y axis is knowledge, according to its chart you know how to use virtually all of vi as soon as you start using it.
Things that are hard to learn have shallow learning curves: it takes a long time to become proficient.
I think the x axis should be rather interpreted as "learning progress" instead of absolute time - then it makes more sense.
But ofcourse when read like that it lacks the absolute time reference (notepad can be learned in a day whereas vi takes months) and generally yes, this is just a tongue-in-cheek sketch. - Still, not too far from reality, imo.
But ofcourse when read like that it lacks the absolute time reference (notepad can be learned in a day whereas vi takes months) and generally yes, this is just a tongue-in-cheek sketch. - Still, not too far from reality, imo.
Thank you for saying this. I correct folks all the time on this and while they agree steep == easy && shallow == hard is correct, it's 'counter-intuitive' (their words, not mine).
vi is easy, you only need to know ~5 commands to be useful in it.
vi is easy, you only need to know ~5 commands to be useful in it.
No, a learning curve has incremental knowledge on the X-axis and effort on the Y-axis. The more effort you have to put in to learn that next important feature makes the curve steeper. This is also why learning curves typically level off at some point.
I won't disagree with you on that.
I'd recommend trying Netbeans with the Ruby Plugin or Ruby Mine.
I've been using Ruby Mine some lately and am pretty impressed. Has a debugger that works well, auto-completion, rake integration, click thru to declaration, etc.
It's not going to be free ($79), but given JetBrains track record with IDEs I think it's a good investment.
I tried NetBeans last year and it seems promising, but haven't used it in 6 months.
I've been using Ruby Mine some lately and am pretty impressed. Has a debugger that works well, auto-completion, rake integration, click thru to declaration, etc.
It's not going to be free ($79), but given JetBrains track record with IDEs I think it's a good investment.
I tried NetBeans last year and it seems promising, but haven't used it in 6 months.
It's interesting to see a comparison of apples to oranges (IDE to text editor) when you can very easily compare apples to apples - E text editor very closely resembles TextMate, works on Windows, and supports all (or almost all) of the bundles available for TextMate. It's even cheaper than TextMate.
But did you want him to compare E with Textmate? His point was that he switched to a Mac and wanted to compare what's out there for RoR on Mac: in his case, Aptana, which he was already using on Windows, and Textmate.
Two different things, true, but the former is what he was used to on Windows, and the latter a very common tool for RoR dev on Mac.
As he says in the post, that kind of decision ends up being very personal anyway. I settled on Textmate recently but I'm not sure that will be the case forever. (personally, I'd go for something in between: the speed and simplicity of Textmate with functions like the navigation between classes, auto-completion but without the slowness shown by Eclipse et al)
As he says in the post, that kind of decision ends up being very personal anyway. I settled on Textmate recently but I'm not sure that will be the case forever. (personally, I'd go for something in between: the speed and simplicity of Textmate with functions like the navigation between classes, auto-completion but without the slowness shown by Eclipse et al)
E is compatible with Textmate bundles, but it is not the same editor. For one thing, it's got serious stability problems. TextMate doesn't handle big files well, but it very rarely crashes.
For anyone willing to experience, I would like to suggest Komodo edit, it’s the free version of Komodo IDE. There is great autocomplete for ruby, php and html/css. There is also a thing that does textmate bundle that Komodo calls it Abbreviatons but I never could get it working right with ruby/rails.
But Vim already has those features via omnifunc.
I'm still trying to get used to TextMate (Started using it 2 weeks ago).
It's a good enough editor, but I wish it'd just stop trying to do things for me (Inserting closing brackets/quotes, auto-indenting, etc etc). It's taken a long time to disable all these irritations and I'm not sure I have them all yet.
It's a good enough editor, but I wish it'd just stop trying to do things for me (Inserting closing brackets/quotes, auto-indenting, etc etc). It's taken a long time to disable all these irritations and I'm not sure I have them all yet.
> It's taken a long time to disable all these irritations and I'm not sure I have them all yet.
I feel like you're missing the point of TextMate. These things might seem like annoyances now, but they're there for a reason. Once you get the muscle memory for TextMate it'll become an extension of your body, like a prefix-keyless emacs or vi.
Your profile says you're not new here, so I have to assume you know what you're talking about -- I don't want to get the viemacstextmate holy war started, but if you're from one of the other editors, give TextMate a chance in terms of adapting to it, and I think you'll be surprised. Don't try and force it into the emacs mold; it's not emacs, it's TextMate, and it's loved widely for a reason.
I feel like you're missing the point of TextMate. These things might seem like annoyances now, but they're there for a reason. Once you get the muscle memory for TextMate it'll become an extension of your body, like a prefix-keyless emacs or vi.
Your profile says you're not new here, so I have to assume you know what you're talking about -- I don't want to get the viemacstextmate holy war started, but if you're from one of the other editors, give TextMate a chance in terms of adapting to it, and I think you'll be surprised. Don't try and force it into the emacs mold; it's not emacs, it's TextMate, and it's loved widely for a reason.
I'm coming from jedit, and before that any other basic terminal text editor. I've never been one for help/bundles/snippets/macros/etc
My gripes come for instance when I go back to do something, and TextMate adds in extra idiocy eg
My gripes come for instance when I go back to do something, and TextMate adds in extra idiocy eg
a = 9+6
// Oops, need to double all that - (9+6)*2, lets bracket it up...
a = ()9+6
// WTF TextMate added a close bracket that is clearly useless
The way to do it is to select the text you want surrounded (SHIFT + LEFT/RIGHT etc) and then press the opening bracket key. There are other tricks to this as well. If I press " it automatically gives me "" and places the cursor inside. I can then either press CMD+Return to drop me straight to the next line or CMD+left (CTRL-e) to jump to the end.
As for moving around, I just use shortcuts such as ALT+left/right or CMD+left/right (CTRL+a/e).
As for moving around, I just use shortcuts such as ALT+left/right or CMD+left/right (CTRL+a/e).
> I've never been one for help/bundles/snippets/macros/etc
And you bought TextMate because... it's cool? I seriously don't understand, why you would buy TextMate, if you don't like using the very things that make it great.
And you bought TextMate because... it's cool? I seriously don't understand, why you would buy TextMate, if you don't like using the very things that make it great.
I'm evaluating it atm. If you know of something exactly like TextMate that is just a text editor (syntax highlighting), and not an "interfering code suggestion tool", I'd be interested.
If you select the 9+6 and then insert the opening parenthesis it will wrap everything automatically. This is not really intuitive, but the extra idiocy is there for a reason.
That bugs me too. I wonder if I could hack the bundle to fix it...
i wish someone would make a really nice cocoa IDE for ruby (or make xcode work with rails) make it work nicely with Git, Rails, Terminal and auto complete: Sold.
Auto-complete is a lovely way to learn a new language.
Auto-complete is a lovely way to learn a new language.
I'm totally of the opposite mindset. I think auto-complete is a terrible way to introduce someone to a new language.
Yes, you may see results quicker, but I've found all that happens is you become reliant upon auto-complete to do the thinking for you. All too often I have seen people use auto-complete as a tool to help them just mindlessly code away rather then taking the time to actually figure out what it is they are trying to achieve. Forcing yourself to actually look at the API and type out a function name cements a concept so much more then autocomplete.
Yes, you may see results quicker, but I've found all that happens is you become reliant upon auto-complete to do the thinking for you. All too often I have seen people use auto-complete as a tool to help them just mindlessly code away rather then taking the time to actually figure out what it is they are trying to achieve. Forcing yourself to actually look at the API and type out a function name cements a concept so much more then autocomplete.
I'm totally of the opposite mindset. I think auto-complete is a terrible way to introduce someone to a new language.
Agreed. Back in college I remember reading a book about effects of various computer aids on our cognitive development [the users in question were mostly teenagers/students]. Programmers were mentioned too. Relying on compilers to catch syntax errors or auto-completing IDEs to suggest method names we're basically refusing to pay attention/memorize things, which ultimately leads to a much poorer skill quality. Ever since then I've been training myself to expect my code to compile at 1st try, i.e. I would do a quick reviews before hitting the "build" hotkey.
From my experience: I think most Microsoft developers will feel completely lost if left with a command line compiler and notepad.exe Even if you take coding out of the equation, many don't have a good understanding of what makes an executable, i.e. they wont' be able to build a project without an IDE.
Agreed. Back in college I remember reading a book about effects of various computer aids on our cognitive development [the users in question were mostly teenagers/students]. Programmers were mentioned too. Relying on compilers to catch syntax errors or auto-completing IDEs to suggest method names we're basically refusing to pay attention/memorize things, which ultimately leads to a much poorer skill quality. Ever since then I've been training myself to expect my code to compile at 1st try, i.e. I would do a quick reviews before hitting the "build" hotkey.
From my experience: I think most Microsoft developers will feel completely lost if left with a command line compiler and notepad.exe Even if you take coding out of the equation, many don't have a good understanding of what makes an executable, i.e. they wont' be able to build a project without an IDE.
I couldn't disagree more. Obviously a bad developer is a bad developer with or without auto complete.
Where auto complete comes in is when one wants to port knowledge from one programming language to another. For example while I'm a computer science student I moonlight as a PHP developer and I don't really care to memorize PHP's perverse (idiosyncratic if you prefer) functions. But I know that array_ CTRL-Space in eclipse will tell me that array_filter takes the list as it's first while array_map takes it as it's second argument. One can blame that on PHP's designer but at the end of the day auto complete saves me from memorizing something I really don't need to know. (Ok now that I've looked it up and written it down that bit of knowledge will probably stay with me forever)
Haskell is way more consistent in that regard, but I still couldn't survive without Hoogle.
And Java without auto complete takes not only twice the time to write but would also force me to remember that Collection is in java.util while Iterable is in java.lang. I think anyone would be hard pressed to explain to me why I need to know that.
So I think I made my case that skills are not dependent on rote learning of a function's argument order or a class's namespace.
Furthermore it seems to me that auto completing IDEs actually help with remembering often used "phrases".
Where auto complete comes in is when one wants to port knowledge from one programming language to another. For example while I'm a computer science student I moonlight as a PHP developer and I don't really care to memorize PHP's perverse (idiosyncratic if you prefer) functions. But I know that array_ CTRL-Space in eclipse will tell me that array_filter takes the list as it's first while array_map takes it as it's second argument. One can blame that on PHP's designer but at the end of the day auto complete saves me from memorizing something I really don't need to know. (Ok now that I've looked it up and written it down that bit of knowledge will probably stay with me forever)
Haskell is way more consistent in that regard, but I still couldn't survive without Hoogle.
And Java without auto complete takes not only twice the time to write but would also force me to remember that Collection is in java.util while Iterable is in java.lang. I think anyone would be hard pressed to explain to me why I need to know that.
So I think I made my case that skills are not dependent on rote learning of a function's argument order or a class's namespace.
Furthermore it seems to me that auto completing IDEs actually help with remembering often used "phrases".
Well, notepad.exe is not even close to being a decent text editor so that would be a horrible thing to do. (remember that you can't have line numbers for example)
But I agree with your point about learning. The trade-off is always that it takes more time to learn without help than with but later, one tend to rely too much on the help. The difficult thing is to know how to go back to basics at some point.
But I agree with your point about learning. The trade-off is always that it takes more time to learn without help than with but later, one tend to rely too much on the help. The difficult thing is to know how to go back to basics at some point.
The one feature that would be painful to lose is syntax highlighting. I just cannot parse the text effectively without it.
This is silly. Auto-complete doesn't do any thinking, it's just presenting you options of what to do. You make the decision. You do the thinking.
I agree, seeing all of the documentation on the same page helps you learn other functions that you might otherwise not look at. Also, the higher level the language the less the programmer has to rely on autocompletion.
I agree that it's a terrible way to introduce someone to a new language, but I have to admit, when I have to help out on some Win32 C++ project, it sure is handy for helping to shake the rust off and save time. For me, it's not the language syntax as much as the Win32/MFC/ATL apis, and while I'm now a vim guy, Visual Studio is the one exception for me.
I would honest-to-god rather be using Notepad then Aptana. Being slow loading text files is just unacceptable.