What is IDE?

Integrated Development Environment (IDE) are software applications that help developers to develop software more easily and efficiently and detect coding errors. Although they are often confused with code writing editors, IDEs have a different structure than code writing editors.

It can work with many programming languages such as HTML, CSS, Python, Swift, C, C++, C#, R, Ruby, JavaScript and Java. IDEs are extremely suitable for complex programming. Depending on the language, IDEs may include templates, syntax highlighting, and code folding.

These programs help develop web applications, games and plugins. Features such as auto-completion, debugging and version control  increase the productivity of developers.

Developers use tools such as text editors, libraries, error tracking, compilers and testing platforms when they are developing. A developer who does not use an IDE needs to use these tools separately. At this point, the question of why IDE is important comes to mind. IDEs combine all these tools/technologies. Developers do not spend time using them, they can finish their work quickly.

What are the Features of IDEs?

IDEs make coding easier with their features. So, What are these features of IDEs? Why should an IDE be used?

Text Editing: IDEs contain a text editor that helps to write and process the source code. Also, since IDEs know the rules of programming languages, they can automatically write and edit codes.

Refactoring: IDEs allow for the code to be refactored and modified. This allows the job to be completed quickly instead of manually changing the code individually, enhancing efficient use of time. Developers quickly modify the codes as they wish.

Debugging: One of the biggest factors in the popularity of IDEs is its "Debugging" feature. This feature helps developers identify and correct errors in the source code. They also perform line-by-line tests to assess the performance of the code. Developers use this feature to identify errors before publishing applications, simulating them. 

Code Completion: The code completion feature offers suggestions to complete the code expression as developers write code. This feature helps developers write code quickly and without errors. 
 

What are the Best IDEs?

There are IDEs that support many languages such as C, C++, PHP, Java, JavaScript and Python. IDE editors have different features. They also vary in terms of interface and the features they contain.

Developers prefer the most suitable IDEs for them based on the language they support, ease of use, and cost. So, what are the most commonly used IDEs?

• WebStorm
• Syncfusion
• NetBeans
• AWS Cloud 9
• Visual Studio
• IntelliJ IDEA
• Eclipse
• PhpStore
• Xcode

Top 5 IDE Editors

Microsoft Visual Studio

Visual Studio IDE, one of the most popular web development tools, is an IDE designed to facilitate software development for Windows platforms. 

Developed by Windows, it offers users both paid (Visual Studio Enterprise) and free (Visual Studio Community) usage options. With Microsoft Visual Studio, it is possible to see how applications work on different devices and browsers.

Supported Languages: ASP.NET, DHTML, Javascript, JScript, Visual Basic, Visual C#, Visual C++, Visual F#, XAML

Android Studio

Provided by Google, Android Studio is an IDE created to develop applications that will work on Android operating systems. 

It can work with the Google cloud platform on all Android devices. It is also used to get ".apk" extension output. Being completely free has made it this popular.

Supported Languages: C++, Java, Kotlin, XML

Xcode

Xcode, which can be used for free and is open source, is an IDE editor that allows for creating applications for Apple devices such as iPad, iPhone, and Mac. 

It offers the opportunity to compile iOS applications and troubleshoot errors, and the Apple LLVM compiler offers suggestions to fix code performance problems. The disadvantage is being limited, as it only runs on MacOS operating systems.

Supported Languages: AppleScript, C, C ++, Java, Objective-C, Swift

Eclipse

Eclipse is a free, open source IDE editor that both beginners and advanced developers can use. This IDE, which has a simple interface, supports many plugins and offers automatic error reporting feature.

Supported Languages: C, C++, Java, Perl, PHP, Python, Ruby

InteliJ IDEA

Developed by Jet Brains, IntelliJ IDEA is an open-source IDE that offers deployment and debugging features for application servers. 

It has both paid and free versions. Companies like NASA, Google, Samsung, and Twitter benefit from IntelliJ IDEA's professional solutions.

Supported Languages: CoffeeScript, HTML, CSS, JavaScript, LESS, PHP, Python, Java, Ruby, TypeScript, Kotlin