IDE Scorecard

Developers’ Choice

IDE Scorecard

Definitive Rankings of the Top 11 IDEs by Over 1,200 Developers June 2006

Evans Data Corp, 740 Front St, Santa Cruz, CA 95060 www.evansdata.com (800) 831 3080

IDE Scorecard

I NSIDE T HIS R EPORT Overview 1 Overview Abstract and Methodology 3 Overall Usage In Spring 2006, Evans Data Corp conducted primary market research on IDEs, interviewing over 1200 developers worldwide and asking them to rate 4 Feature Rankings the top IDEs. Developers only rated the features of those IDEs that they had 5 Further Information used. They were asked to rank sixteen different features commonly found in IDEs. Each feature could be ranked as “excellent, “very good” “adequate”, “needs improvement” or “NA”. During processing, the first four rankings were assigned a numerical value according to their relative significance. The last value (“N/A”) was discarded. Values were then combined to produce a score for each element for every IDE and also for an overall total score.

The top 11 IDEs ranked were:

“Eclipse is well on its Adobe/Macromedia Studio 8 way to becoming one Borland Delphi of the most popular Borland JBuilder IDEs for any Eclipse language..” IBM Rational Application Developer IBM WebSphere Studio Microsoft Visual Studio .NET NetBeans Oracle JDeveloper Sun Java Studio Sybase PowerBuilder

Features and capabilities rated were:

Compiler/Interpreter Debugger Editor Make/Build Functions Documentation Application Modeling Tools Web Design Tools Sample Applications Profiler

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IDE Scorecard

Overview Cont’

Compiler Performance Performance of Resulting Applications Ease of Use Ability to Integrate 3rd Party Tools Availability of 3rd Party Tools Quality of Technical Support Options Size and Quality of Developer Community

In addition, developers were asked to rate the IDEs based on how well suited they are for creating a particular type of application (server-centric, desktop, thin-client, rich-client, and embedded systems).

The following pages describe the overall relative ranking of the IDEs by their own users, as well as the rankings for each IDE according to the category being assessed, and a profile for each IDE showing their strengths and weaknesses.

The Enterprise version of this survey also profiles each IDE by major geographic region, as well as providing a profile for each IDE’s users, share projections and growth projections. Please ask your sales rep for information on the Enterprise version of this study.

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IDE Overall Usage This study examines developers’ satisfaction with the IDEs and toolsets that they personally use. Only those developers who use a particular IDE were asked to rate it, thus the focus of this study is on the quality of the IDEs and their supporting toolsets “Studio 8 shows rather than market share. However, market share and the quantity of the IDEs being surprising strength in used is always an important factor in both the adoption and the evolution of the toolset. the APAC region” The table below shows the number of developers who said they use each of the IDEs in the list. Other IDEs were included in the list but had fewer than 35 individuals citing them. Developers could select as many IDEs as they wished, and so the percent of cases (individuals) will add up to more than 100%.

Microsoft Visual Studio continues its long-standing reign as the most used IDE anywhere. For many years Microsoft Visual Studio has dominated the development tool scene, both because of the huge installed base of Windows, but also because of the world-class quality that Microsoft devotes to its tools. Microsoft has always recognized the strategic importance of developers, and has spent significant resources on producing excellent development tools. Visual Studio.NET is no exception. Visual Studio’s dominance is clear across geographical regions, though it is stronger in North America than either APAC or EMEA.

Adobe’s acquisition of Macromedia gave it a very strong IDE with a solid base of web developers. With Dreamweaver, Flash and other tools for web development, Studio 8 has a good following and bright prospects for future market share growth. The suite wraps together an animation tool, Flash 8; a Web design application, Dreamweaver 8; and a graphics editor, Fireworks 8. Also included are the PDF maker FlashPaper 2 and the Web site manager Contribute 3. Studio 8 shows surprising strength in the APAC region

The other IDE with a major following is the Eclipse project. More of a community than a planned and deliberately architected IDE, Eclipse is the juggernaut that is taking the development world by storm. Eclipse is the most popular Java IDE right now and is well on its way to becoming one of the most popular IDEs for any language. Though there may be some lack of satisfaction with the IDE and toolset itself, this is related to the evolving nature of Eclipse and the OSS community and developers are nonetheless embracing Eclipse worldwide.

IDE Usage - Worldwide Pct of Resp Pct of Cases Microsoft Visual Studio .NET 31.7 59.8 Adobe / Macromedia Studio 8 11.8 22.2 Eclipse 11.2 21.2 Borland Delphi 7.6 14.3 Sun Java Studio 6.2 11.6 NetBeans 4.6 8.6 Borland JBuilder 4.5 8.5 Oracle JDeveloper 4.0 7.6 IBM WebSphere Studio 3.5 6.6 IBM Rational App Developer 2.5 4.8 Sybase PowerBuilder 1.9 3.6

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Overall Rankings

The chart on this page shows the combined overall ranking for the top eleven IDEs. Relative scores for each of the categories were calculated for each and then the scores were added together. This resulted in a combined overall ranking for each IDE - as shown below. Relative Combined Overall Ranking IBM’s Rational Application Developer product received the highest overall rankings IBM Rational from it users. It received the highest ratings for Modeling and Design Tools, Developer 1386.0 Documentation, the Make/Build function, and the Quality of Tech Support options. Microsoft VS.NET 1309.8 In addition it received high scores, though not the top score, in virtually every other Borland Delphi 1302.1 category. Rational was a powerhouse of development tools when IBM bought the company and IBM has handled the acquisition beautifully, not letting the quality of the Rational products slip at all.

Microsoft’s Visual Studio.Net got very close to the same rankings as IBM’s product and had consistently good marks from developers in virtually all of the categories. Microsoft has the largest installed base, and largest and best established Developer Relations program, as well as a true dedication to the production of great development tools.

When Borland introduced Delphi in 1995, the Pascal-based IDE and tools was touted as the first RAD (Rapid Application Development) environment, and developers flocked to it. In the ten years since, Delphi has accumulated a large community of very loyal and dedicated developers. There are literally hundreds of newsgroups and forums devoted to Delphi, and a Google search will turn up 9.89 million hits. Delphi developers still love their IDE, as is clear from the excellent ratings developers gave in this study.

The two open source IDEs, NetBeans and Eclipse, received the lowest scores, but this is due to their open and evolving nature. Open source applications are by nature dynamic and evolutionary. While they initially have a disadvantage to applications that are carefully researched, designed, architected, and produced by vendors that stand behind their products with support and service, the force of the community behind them will look at weaknesses as opportunities and they will be addressed in innovative and most likely powerful, ways. We expect to see both NetBeans and Eclipse improve their rankings in the next version of this survey.

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0 r i r r o 8 r e T h io e e i s e p E lp d p d d io e n s lo N e u o il tu d ld a ip e . t l u u i e l v o D S e B S t u B c e i d a v J e S rB t E d n v e r e e D tu a a D d e ia N p S rl J J n h d w p l la p e o A a o n le r S P l u B u c o b m a s S a B e ro e n i r c s o V O W a a ti ft b a o M /M y s B e S R o I b M r o ic d IB A M 4 IDE Scorecard

Professional Version Profiles This study is available in a professional version which lists the full In addition the Professional version rankings for each of the IDEs and each of the features and includes a cross-sectional look at each capabilities. The professional version is available from Evans IDE so you can see how all the features Data’s e-store online. Retail price is $199, but scorecard holders of a particular IDE stack up and thus can order the Professional version for just $149. Use the promo find out the strengths and weaknesses code SC606 on the online form. of each one. For example, look at how Oracle’s IDE faired below. Feature/Capabilities Rankings Each of the following are rated for each IDE so you can see with a glance which IDE has the fastest compiler, the best Oracle JDeveloper 200 web tools, editor or other tools. 180 160 Compiler/Interpreter 140 Debugger 120 Editor 100 Make/Build Functions 80 Documentation 60 Application Modeling Tools 40 Web Design Tools 20 Sample Applications 0 ls r s r r s s e s s n r ty s o te n o e p ol c ls n ol s e o e i n Profiler o e io it g p o n o o o ti fil un io T pr c t d g A T a o ti T f U ta o t g r n E u m T p o n r m c a n te u b g gn r ty O rty e P m li li n F e tin i rfo r t a s e m o p Compiler Performance e /I D l s a or P a u C p d r ild s u e Pe P p E c v A o ile u e D r d p rd o e e M p B R b e r u 3 D D l n m e/ f e il f 3 S e f p io o k o W p o h t o m Performance of Resulting Applications t C a e m c ra y a a M c o ity e g lit S lic n C il T te a p a b f n u p m ila o I Q A r a ty o Ease of Use fo v li t d r A a ty n e u ili a P Q b e A iz Ability to Integrate 3rd Party Tools S Availability of 3rd Party Tools Quality of Technical Support Options Size and Quality of Developer Community (shown here) Quality and Size of Developer Community Would you have guessed that Eclipse’s Community is 200 180 second to that of Microsoft Visual Studio .NET? 160 140 Learn more with the Professional Version of this study! 120 100 ORDER ONLINE TODAY & SAVE $50! 80 60 www.evansdata.com 40 Promo Code SC606 20 0 i r T e 8 h io e io s r r r E s o p d p d n e e e ip i l u o u a ild p ld .N l d e t l t e u lo i o c tu D S ve S B B e u i E S d a e e t J v B d n v r e e r tu ia a a D e N d D e S d rl J p h n J w l e o p p la o a n A S r le P u m B u l b o c e Evans Data Corp s ro S a e B ra s i c n a V a o W O b ft ti y o /M a M S s e R IB 740 Front St. o b cr o M i d B Santa Cruz, CA 95060 M A I Phone: 800-831-3080 Evans Data Corp. (EDC) has made every effort to produce the highest quality research product in this series. The customer understands that EDC uses those statistical and data-gathering techniques which, in its Fax: opinion, are the most accurate possible. However, inherent in any statistical inquiry is a possibility of error, 831-425-7913 which must be taken into account in evaluating the results. Evaluations and interpretations of statistical research findings and decisions based on them are solely the responsibility of the customer, not EDC. The website: conclusions, summaries and interpretations provided by EDC are based strictly on the analysis of the data www.evansdata.com gathered and are not to be construed as recommendations; therefore, EDC neither warrants their viability or accuracy nor assumes responsibility for the success or failure of any customer actions subsequently taken.

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