IDE Bake Off IntelliJ IDEA 3'0

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IDE Bake OffIntelliJ IDEA 3.0

• Austin Java Users Group
• Razvan Surdulescu
• March 25, 2003

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IDEA Overview

• IDEA is 1.5 years old. Current version is 3.x.
• IDEAs primary strength is refactoring
• Rename/move/copy classes/methods/packages
• Extract field/method
• Many others
• Excellent (and unobtrusive) assistance
• parses the current source file
• provides hints, underlines errors, etc.

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IDEA Overview contd

• Many useful plug-ins written by the developer
  community
• Not free 499 (.com), 99 (.edu)
• Swing application
• Startup time TogetherJ lt IDEA lt Eclipse
• Memory footprint 100MB when warm
• Processor PIII equivalent or better

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Bake Off Environment

• Windows 2000 SP3
• Sun J2SE 1.3.1_06
• IntelliJ IDEA 3.0.2
• ANT 1.5.1 (built-in to IDEA)
• JUnit 3.8.1 (built-in to IDEA)
• CVS 1.11.2
• Tomcat 4.0.6
• Electric XML 6.0.3

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1a. Projects

• Setup new project
• You can change the default project properties
• You can use an existing source tree or create a
  new one.
• IDEA stores all project settings in a.IPR and
  .IWS file very clean and unobtrusive.

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1b. Projects

• Changing the default editor
• Not possible, although you can obviously edit the
  source files outside IDEA
• The editor is very powerful and configurable
• Auto-complete, auto-indent, auto-import
• Class templates, code templates
• Many others

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1c. Projects

• Configuring the class path
• Add/remove JAR/ZIP/directories to the class path.
• All class path elements become candidates for
  auto-complete, code navigation, etc.
• You can setup libraries
• Define associated classpath, JavaDoc, and source
  directory
• Use the library for compilation, documentation or
  source code navigation
• Share libraries across projects

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2a. Integration

• ANT 1.5.1 comes packaged with IDEA
• You can add an existing build.xml to your project
• IDEA will allow you to execute, filter and log
  ANT targets through the GUI
• In case of error, you can double click on the
  error line and go to the code that caused it
• IDEA can validate the ANT build file (find
  mistakes, unreferenced variables, etc.)

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2b. Integration

• JUnit 3.8.1 comes packaged with IDEA
• You can setup JUnit test targets and execute them
• In case of failure, you can double-click on the
  error line and go to the assertion that failed

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2c. Integration

• CVS
• IDEA comes with support for CVS and Star Team
• If your sources are imported into CVS, you can do
  all CVS operations directly from the GUI
• If you rename or delete a source file, IDEA will
  prompt you to keep the CVS repository in sync
• IDEA comes with a nice visual diff tool, but you
  can use an external diff tool as well

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3. Refactoring

• IDEAs refactoring is exceptional
• Rename/move package
• Rename/move/copy/delete class
• Rename/move/copy/delete method
• Rename/move/copy/delete field
• Extract method
• Change method signature
• Many others

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3. Refactoring contd

• Once I started refactoring in IDEA, I could never
  go back to another IDE!

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4. Debugging

• Local
• Full-featured debugger
• Code breakpoints (normal, conditional, counted)
• Exception breakpoints
• Thread, field inspector, watches
• Remote
• Connect to a remote JVM via JPDA
• Source path permits source breakpoints and
  navigation while debugging

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5. Time Savers

• Code navigation
• Go to class/file (ctrl(shift)N)
• Go to type/variable declaration (ctrl(shift)B)
• Go to override
• Go to JavaDoc (ctrlQ)
• Class structure (ctrlH, ctrlF12)
• Code format, layout (optimize imports)
• Standardized formatting gt easy diffs
• Refactoring (rename, move, delete, etc.)

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5. Time Savers contd

• Search (usages, text in file, text in path)
• Code generation
• Live templates (psf-TAB, soutv-TAB)
• Implement methods (interface)
• Generate getX()/setX() accessors
• Generate equals()/hashCode()
• Surround with
• Smart complete

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5. Time Savers contd

• Logical layout
• Almost everything can be done without the mouse
• Key combinations and menus are very logical
• Configurable key bindings (e.g. Emacs, Visual
  J, )
• Able to save multiple code styles, and use them
  per-project.
• Really useful if you have multiple teams with
  different coding standards.

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5. Time Savers contd

• XML support
• Text format
• Auto-complete
• DTD, XML Schema validation
• Validation of XML references/external resources

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5. Time Savers contd

• CVS Integration (operations, parse output)
• JUnit, ANT integration (parse output)
• Easy debugging (break points, source path)
• JAVAC launched in process (fast)
• Inspect code (critique)
• Many useful plug-ins written by the community
  (Plug-in Manager)

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6. Visual Modeling

• No built-in features
• SimpleUML plug-in covers the basics

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7. Build a GUI

• No built-in features

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8. Build/deploy a JSP

• Strong JSP and Tomcat 4.x support
• Java syntax checking, code completion, and
  refactoring in scriptlets
• Integrated JSP and Servlet debugging
• Web application file management
• Pre-deployment JSP compilation checks
• JSP tag completion and syntax checking, including
  custom tag libraries

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8. Build/deploy a JSP contd

• No support for packaging WAR
• IDEA expects un-expanded WAR-like directory
  structure
• Easy to package this directory structure from ANT
  (using the ltwar gt task)

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9. Deploy an EJB

• Nominal support for creating new EJBs
• Automatic management of deployment descriptor
• Easy to add/delete EJBs
• Easy to setup Entity CMP relationships
• Functionality is still somewhat buggy/hokey
• No support for packaging/deploying EJBs
• This is always container specific anyway

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10a. Customization/Extension

• Installing/using plug-ins
• Copy the .JAR file to /idea_home/plugins
• Start IDEA
• The plug-in Plug-In Manager allows you to see
  what plug-ins exist, download and install them
  directly from the GUI

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10b. Customization/Extension

• Writing a plug-in
• IntelliJ Plug-in Documentation
• Plug-in FAQ
• Two kinds of plug-ins application-level (created
  and initialized at start-up) and project-level
  (created for every project)
• The plug-in configuration is provided in plug-in
  JAR/META-INF/plugin.xml

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10b. Customization/Extension contd
ltidea-plugingt    ltnamegtVssIntegrationlt/namegt    
ltdescriptiongtVss integration plug-Inlt/descriptiongt
    ltversiongt1.0lt/versiongt    ltvendorgtFoo
Inc.lt/vendorgt    ltidea-version min3.0
max3.1/gt    ltapplication-componentsgt        
ltcomponentgt            ltinterface-classgtcom.foo.C
omponent1Interfacelt/interface-classgt            lt
implementation-classgtcom.foo.Component1Impllt/imple
mentation-classgt        lt/componentgt    lt/applic
ation-componentsgt    ltproject-componentsgt      
  ltcomponentgt            ltinterface-classgtcom.foo
.Component2lt/interface-classgt        lt/componentgt
    lt/project-componentsgt lt/idea-plugingt