Is Eclipse 3.3.1.1 Better and Jdeveloper 10g

In my work environment there has always been a debate of whether we should be using Eclipse or Jdeveloper. I have always been a believer that JDeveloper is the best solution for our organization since we are a Oracle shop, so we should use the tools that Oracle has provided for us. This argument is always agreed with by developers using Eclipse, but argue that Eclipse is still much better. Some advantages I have always seen, as related to using the IDE in our organization are:


It is easy for Developer to setup and start working with
Works nicely with the other Oracle products (Well most of the time)
It is what I am familiar with

JDeveloper has been a great too for me, but when you start developing projects using different Application Servers like Tomcat, Jboss, ect. JDeveloper becomes very limited. JDeveloper’s main disadvantages are:


Very resource intensive.
Runs slow on most machines.
Can only run apps, through the ide, on OC4J.
EJB tools seem to only work well to run on Oracle App Servers.
Does not lend itself well when importing projects created outside of JDeveloper

I have recently been working on some new projects, where Eclipse is suggested for setting up the development environment. I figured that this would be a great time to install and start using Eclipse 3.3.1.1. I will say that this new version of Eclipse and plugins provided are very impressive.

The disadvantages, of JDeveloper, become very apparent when you start using Eclipse. Eclipse is a great development IDE. Not only is it well written, the IDE allows for developers to generate custom plugins to support many different development environments. Some of Eclipses advantages are:


Runs very fast
Is developed using the SWT toolkit.
Is designed to be easily expandable with plugins.
Had a verity of tools availiable.
Ability to handle many different application servers internally.
Provides everything JDeveloper does and address all of its limitations.

The disadvantages are:


Eclipse can be difficult for some developers to start using.
Setup can be frustrating sometimes for plugins
You have to install a lot of additions/plugins to get started working efficiently.

There seems to be more disadvantages to using JDeveloper than Eclipse for a variety of development projects. Eclipse also has some great plugins like the JBoss Tools which provide you with a some great visual tools and awsome management of the JBoss app server thorough the IDE.

I now feel that JDeveloper is only good when you are working with all Oracle products, but Eclipse is definately the better IDE of the two. Oracle should take a note from JBoss and get rid of there IDE and start developing nice plugins for the Eclipse IDE. I think that this would benefit the community in a much better way. I can’t believe what I am saying, but I think I have changed sides now, and I am a Eclipse fan. I can’t wait to migrate some of my projects into the IDE and start working inside of it.

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