Re: [ide-dev] VS Code

[Mickael Istria <mistria@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On 09/13/2016 10:06 PM, Doug Schaefer wrote:

Are there things that it does that are better than what we have in the Eclipse IDE?

The main point is that HTML, CSS, _javascript_ and Web (and C#) editors are better.
And it's the same for most tools that currently take market share to Eclipse IDE.

It is technically feasible to go in that same direction? Do we even want to?

Yes, it's technically feasible to have good editors in Eclipse IDE, and we want to. But it require more people contributing.

As the Java language server grows and serves VS Code, I wonder how good of a Java IDE it could become.

The language server protocol (and VSCode) are missing very important features of JDT or standard Eclipse IDE tools: outline (https://github.com/Microsoft/vscode/issues/5605#issuecomment-241707033 ) , show type hierarchy, refactorings, Test execution and reporting...
In the current state, VSCode is too limited and simply very far from being a good Java IDE as we're used to. With a Java Language Server, it's going to be a decent Java editor with good content assist and error reporting; but it's going to miss important features for an effective Java developer workflow IMO.
The cost of becoming as powerful as an IDE is that it usually creates complexity in UX, and AFAIK, VSCode developers focus on keeping a simple and consistent UX more than in accepting whatever feature.

I am also starting to wonder that about C++ with either a CDT based language server or something built on Clang (which I believe they have already).

If the completion proposals (or whatever LSP feature) from a language server or Clang are better than the ones from CDT, then you should definitely consider that. If you go for a language server supporting LSP, I'd be glad is assisting you using the Language Server Protocol client for Eclipse IDE I've worked on so you could give it a try.

It seems though that VS Code is very reluctant to introduce anything resembling forms, or even widgets. Everything seems to be text based, even their Preferences settings brings you to a JSON editor. I think it’s kind of ridiculous, especially for new users.

It’ll be interesting to hear Erich Gamma’s keynote at ECE. If they stay with their current approach, I think Eclipse will keep miles ahead. At the same time I fear if they try to be more like Eclipse, they’ll fall into the same traps we’ve fallen into. Erich’s a driving force behind both, be interesting to see where it goes.

What I was told is that they just don't want the UI/UX to be bloated and feel complex like in Eclipse IDE, so they're avoiding too many menus, too many views, too many dialogs... There are simply features that may never come into VSCode because they don't feel worth the UX cost for their value. On the other end, VSCode crew also investigate new UX for features that are usually accessible and usable with complex workflows.
A simple UX from day 0 to the end is a very strong constraint on the development of such development tool. At the moment, I have the impression that VSCode will always appear simpler, but less feature rich than Eclipse IDE; that VSCode will always remain a very rich text editor missing some critical features and Eclipse a bloated but complete IDE.

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Mickael Istria
Eclipse developer at JBoss, by Red Hat
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