Re: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
Thank you to all for the replies so far. Very helpful. Now that I've had some time to evaluate CFBuilder, I'd like to revisit this thread. I'm not bashing on CFB here - honest questions: considering that I'm not starting from scratch but already have the functionality of DreamWeaver at my disposal, I'm struggling to figure out the *incremental* value of CFB. Things I like about CFB are the code completion (member functions, etc. although it doesn't always work), the *idea* of a community of extensions, and easy refactoring. Things I wonder about: - I see RDS but I don't understand how that can compete with having SSMS in another window. - I see the TailView but I'm used to opening 'tail -f' in another shell window. - I see the plugin for Subversion integration but I have TortoiseSVN hooked into Windows Explorer. - So far the idea of extensions are great but I can run things like varscoper standalone without much effort and (correct me if I'm wrong!) but Apptacular is meant for the ORM features in CF9 and I have customers on CF8 so I'll keep using PU-36 standalone. In short, what I see from CFB is a lot of tools integrated into one window. It feels tidy but I'm not convinced there's *real* value there (beyond what I get with DW). What am I missing? Thanks, db ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339816 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
Re: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
Thank you to all for the replies so far. Very helpful. Now that I've had some time to evaluate CFBuilder, I'd like to revisit this thread. I'm not bashing on CFB here - honest questions: considering that I'm not starting from scratch but already have the functionality of DreamWeaver at my disposal, I'm struggling to figure out the *incremental* value of CFB. Things I like about CFB are the code completion (member functions, etc. although it doesn't always work), the *idea* of a community of extensions, and easy refactoring. Things I wonder about: - I see RDS but I don't understand how that can compete with having SSMS in another window. - I see the TailView but I'm used to opening 'tail -f' in another shell window. - I see the plugin for Subversion integration but I have TortoiseSVN hooked into Windows Explorer. - So far the idea of extensions are great but I can run things like varscoper standalone without much effort and (correct me if I'm wrong!) but Apptacular is meant for the ORM features in CF9 and I have customers on CF8 so I'll keep using PU-36 standalone. In short, what I see from CFB is a lot of tools integrated into one window. It feels tidy but I'm not convinced there's *real* value there (beyond what I get with DW). What am I missing? Tidiness has intrinsic value for many people. To me, the value is largely that I don't have to deal with all the extra stuff Dreamweaver brings to the table, and I get all those tools nicely integrated. Plus, because it's Eclipse, I can easily switch to other perspectives to do related non-CF work. And I'm sure more extensions will be coming. Dave Watts, CTO, Fig Leaf Software http://www.figleaf.com/ http://training.figleaf.com/ Fig Leaf Software is a Veteran-Owned Small Business (VOSB) on GSA Schedule, and provides the highest caliber vendor-authorized instruction at our training centers, online, or onsite. ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339818 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
Re: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
Variable completion for me is the huge win. This is the biggest time saver that I have ever had, and the biggest reason I use CFB. Secondly is the integrated debugger. I pull this out when I need to debug some seriously complex code, and it's a g-d send. It's one of those tools that you may not need 90% of the time, but those 10% you do need it, it's awesome. Extensions are very useful. Crazy useful in fact (especially looking at what they have demo'd in CFB2). Being able to right click on a folder/file in an IDE and make your IDE do something is very useful. I've written at least 1 extension that has saved me hours of work. That all being said - CFEclipse is free, both IntelliJ and CFB have trials. Give them all a shot for a few days of development. See which one fits you. ( Side note - you can see my review of the CFML Plugin for IntelliJ IDE here: http://www.compoundtheory.com/?action=displayPostID=498 ) Mark On Tue, Dec 7, 2010 at 2:58 AM, Dave Burns cft...@burnsorama.com wrote: - So far the idea of extensions are great but I can run things like varscoper standalone without much effort and (correct me if I'm wrong!) but Apptacular is meant for the ORM features in CF9 and I have customers on CF8 so I'll keep using PU-36 standalone. -- E: mark.man...@gmail.com T: http://www.twitter.com/neurotic W: www.compoundtheory.com cf.Objective(ANZ) - Nov 18, 19 - Melbourne Australia http://www.cfobjective.com.au Hands-on ColdFusion ORM Training www.ColdFusionOrmTraining.com ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339841 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
RE: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
Dave, Let's look at some of the things you have listed. - RDS is just not datasources, it is also file views and extensions and also about the Editor as well. Without the RDS you don't' get a lot of the intellisense help etc. - TailView is very handy because you can open up a number of views an watch the different errors, as well as color code the errors as well. - SVN Plugin does far more than what you think it does, and combined with mylyn it is an invaluable tool at your disposal. Now the one thing to note, which a lot of people seem to misunderstand is productivity. When you have everything at your finger tips witout having to switch windows and applications all the time, and you setup your Eclipse views to a way that makes sense for you then your productivity gets increased by about 500%. So the question you need to ask yourself is do you want to be productive and have it all at your finger tips, or are you happy to plot along switching windows and applications all time? Regards, Andrew Scott http://www.andyscott.id.au/ -Original Message- From: Dave Burns [mailto:cft...@burnsorama.com] Sent: Tuesday, 7 December 2010 2:58 AM To: cf-talk Subject: Re: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ Thank you to all for the replies so far. Very helpful. Now that I've had some time to evaluate CFBuilder, I'd like to revisit this thread. I'm not bashing on CFB here - honest questions: considering that I'm not starting from scratch but already have the functionality of DreamWeaver at my disposal, I'm struggling to figure out the *incremental* value of CFB. Things I like about CFB are the code completion (member functions, etc. although it doesn't always work), the *idea* of a community of extensions, and easy refactoring. Things I wonder about: - I see RDS but I don't understand how that can compete with having SSMS in another window. - I see the TailView but I'm used to opening 'tail -f' in another shell window. - I see the plugin for Subversion integration but I have TortoiseSVN hooked into Windows Explorer. - So far the idea of extensions are great but I can run things like varscoper standalone without much effort and (correct me if I'm wrong!) but Apptacular is meant for the ORM features in CF9 and I have customers on CF8 so I'll keep using PU-36 standalone. In short, what I see from CFB is a lot of tools integrated into one window. It feels tidy but I'm not convinced there's *real* value there (beyond what I get with DW). What am I missing? Thanks, db ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339855 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
I'm considering moving on from Dreamweaver and finally using a better IDE for CF work. I know of CFBuilder and have downloaded the trial to eval. I used IntelliJ for some Java projects 2 years ago and it was outstanding. My current take is that price is equal and functionality is *roughly* equal with each having its own strengths. The one big issue for me is that CFBuilder already has a (small but growing) community of extensions. I like the idea of Apptacular, varscoper, etc. all built-in. My concern over IntelliJ (or more accurately, the CFML plug-in for it) is the lack of a large enough user base to support the demand for these CF-specific extensions. I'm curious to hear thoughts and get feedback re the choice. ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339366 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
RE: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
There is also CFEclipse... -Original Message- From: Dave Burns [mailto:cft...@burnsorama.com] Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2010 1:20 PM To: cf-talk Subject: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ I'm considering moving on from Dreamweaver and finally using a better IDE for CF work. I know of CFBuilder and have downloaded the trial to eval. I used IntelliJ for some Java projects 2 years ago and it was outstanding. My current take is that price is equal and functionality is *roughly* equal with each having its own strengths. The one big issue for me is that CFBuilder already has a (small but growing) community of extensions. I like the idea of Apptacular, varscoper, etc. all built-in. My concern over IntelliJ (or more accurately, the CFML plug-in for it) is the lack of a large enough user base to support the demand for these CF-specific extensions. I'm curious to hear thoughts and get feedback re the choice. ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339367 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
RE: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
Cfbuilder is built on eclipse, so you can also use most eclipse plugins as well. I do still like Dreamweaver though, it has its good points. -Original Message- From: Dave Burns [mailto:cft...@burnsorama.com] Sent: 18 November 2010 19:20 To: cf-talk Subject: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ I'm considering moving on from Dreamweaver and finally using a better IDE for CF work. I know of CFBuilder and have downloaded the trial to eval. I used IntelliJ for some Java projects 2 years ago and it was outstanding. My current take is that price is equal and functionality is *roughly* equal with each having its own strengths. The one big issue for me is that CFBuilder already has a (small but growing) community of extensions. I like the idea of Apptacular, varscoper, etc. all built-in. My concern over IntelliJ (or more accurately, the CFML plug-in for it) is the lack of a large enough user base to support the demand for these CF-specific extensions. I'm curious to hear thoughts and get feedback re the choice. ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339368 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
Re: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
I'm considering moving on from Dreamweaver and finally using a better IDE for CF work. I know of CFBuilder and have downloaded the trial to eval. I used IntelliJ for some Java projects 2 years ago and it was outstanding. My current take is that price is equal and functionality is *roughly* equal with each having its own strengths. The one big issue for me is that CFBuilder already has a (small but growing) community of extensions. I like the idea of Apptacular, varscoper, etc. all built-in. My concern over IntelliJ (or more accurately, the CFML plug-in for it) is the lack of a large enough user base to support the demand for these CF-specific extensions. I'm curious to hear thoughts and get feedback re the choice. I think IntelliJ is probably a better choice for pure Java development, although I still use Eclipse for that. Otherwise, though, I think Eclipse/CFBuilder is a much better fit for CF development, if only because of Aptana. Dave Watts, CTO, Fig Leaf Software http://www.figleaf.com/ http://training.figleaf.com/ Fig Leaf Software is a Veteran-Owned Small Business (VOSB) on GSA Schedule, and provides the highest caliber vendor-authorized instruction at our training centers, online, or onsite. ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339369 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
RE: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
Aptana? Really? I tried adding the Aptana plugin with cfeclipse once. It slowed Eclipse down massively and in general just got in my way. Maybe I'm using it wrong though. Anyone have quick tips for using Aptana for CF development? I may try it again if I can get some value out of it. Steve -Original Message- From: Dave Watts [mailto:dwa...@figleaf.com] Sent: Thursday, November 18, 2010 2:49 PM To: cf-talk Subject: Re: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ I think IntelliJ is probably a better choice for pure Java development, although I still use Eclipse for that. Otherwise, though, I think Eclipse/CFBuilder is a much better fit for CF development, if only because of Aptana. Dave Watts, CTO, Fig Leaf Software http://www.figleaf.com/ http://training.figleaf.com/ Fig Leaf Software is a Veteran-Owned Small Business (VOSB) on GSA Schedule, and provides the highest caliber vendor-authorized instruction at our training centers, online, or onsite. ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339370 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
Re: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
On Thu, Nov 18, 2010 at 11:19 AM, Dave Burns cft...@burnsorama.com wrote: I'm considering moving on from Dreamweaver and finally using a better IDE for CF work. I know of CFBuilder and have downloaded the trial to eval. I used IntelliJ for some Java projects 2 years ago and it was outstanding. For Java (and other J-languages) work, IntelliJ is hard to beat but I don't think the CFML plugin gets much love. Eclipse is solid for Java / J-language work and CFBuilder as a plugin to Eclipse is unbeatable for CFML development. I have CFBuilder (standalone) open pretty much 24x7x365 for CFML work and I fire up a separate instance of Eclipse (with all my J-language stuff) when I'm working on a J-language project. I like to keep the two environments separate right now (to keep my main IDE - CFB - lean and clean). Whilst IntelliJ is really impressive for Java work, I can't get used to the 'feel' of it so I keep trying it but I keep coming back to Eclipse. -- Sean A Corfield -- (904) 302-SEAN Railo Technologies, Inc. -- http://getrailo.com/ An Architect's View -- http://corfield.org/ If you're not annoying somebody, you're not really alive. -- Margaret Atwood ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339371 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
Re: Choosing between ColdFusion Builder and IntelliJ
On Thu, Nov 18, 2010 at 2:19 PM, Dave Burns cft...@burnsorama.com wrote: I'm considering moving on from Dreamweaver and finally using a better IDE for CF work. I know of CFBuilder and have downloaded the trial to eval. I used IntelliJ for some Java projects 2 years ago and it was outstanding. FWIW, I'm a relatively recent IDEA (IntelliJ) convert, and I love it. They have a 30 day trial too; you might as well give it a shot. It's just really smart, in a million productivity enhancing and code quality inducing ways. Really extensive customizable keyboard shortcuts, variable and function completion, tons of languages, great snippet support, works with projects and also freeform File Open or dbl-click in explorer, file structure view that bogs down quite a bit less than CFB (at least the version I tried when it was released), shortcut to go to the definition of the function under the cursor, even in an unrelated file up the dir tree over and down, indexes everything for fast searching, nice favorites functionality, syntax error highlighting, camelcase-aware spellchecker (a bit buggy but great anyway), just a lot of things that make using it a pleasure. It's not all lollipops and rainbows though. While the program itself is really outstanding, the CFML plugin is somewhat immature. To begin with, you may find it a bit awkward starting your first project, because it doesn't make it clear how you do that for CFML, or have CFML-oriented tools for it (just choose java for now). It also doesn't fully understand CFML variable and function visibility, so for instance things declared in a cfinclude are flagged as unresolved references and completion doesn't work on them. During my 30 day trial, they fixed 15 bugs I reported (!!!), plus others, but the pace of development seems uneven, and slow these days. A number of pretty obvious flaws and enhancements have been filed by various folks, with not a lot of movement on them lately. Also, I'm on windows, but I've heard several times that on a mac, out of the box it's u-g-l-y; if that's you, go for the GTK+ theme immediately, before you hate it. The really big downside is no debugger. Both the FusionDebug and FusionReactor teams have said their products were designed for multiple host environments, and expressed eagerness to collaborate with IntelliJ, but so far nothing's come of that, beyond a statement that it's under discussion. I personally think that the investment required to make that happen would make IDEA so much more visible and attractive in the marketplace that it would pay for itself many times over, and have said so, but so far all I can say is I hope it happens, but we'll see. I think to some extent Sean is right that the plugin doesn't get the resources it could use, and their reluctance to pony up for a debugger is a symptom. Far as I know, there's one dev working on it, and she's great, but also have other commitments. So it appears that I wrote more about downsides than its awesomeness, but that's totally not how I actually feel. I'm happier with IDEA than I've ever been with a development environment. If it never got any better than it is now, I'd still be using it. Try it, I think you'll like it. You probably know this, but the CFML plugin works only with the paid version not the free Community edition. There's a google group here if you have questions: http://groups.google.com/group/cfml-plugin-for-intellij-idea Dave ~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/message.cfm/messageid:339392 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-talk/unsubscribe.cfm
