But, as WTP1.0 release nears, its JSP editor will likely have more fixes/enhancements than the one MyEclipse is currently using. This question was recently asked in their forums and they said that MyEclipse 5.0 is going to based on WTP1.0/1.5.

Thats another reason that I use MyEclipse is they will always stay on top of whatever good opensource that comes out of WTP, DTP, BIRT and extend/enhance it(read: bugfix). Oh yeah, and their next version 4.1 is going to have AJAX support with Javascript debugging!

Re 1: I understand how that can happen. Sometimes things just have to get done, and right now. However, I’ll point out that unlike any other product I’ve used the MyEclipse support guys are really responsive. Just post to their forums and they’ll answer whatever you want.

Re 2: Yeah, it really does speed up for subsequent opens. It’s still slower than the “source only” mode, but not a ton.

Re 3: Well, that’s really a judgement call as to which should be the default. Personally, I like the full designer as I will sometimes use just source and sometimes use the splitscreen view to see how what I’m doing will really look. Still, the default has to be something so I don’t fault MyEclipse for making that something their most full-featured editor. At least they left the old editor in so you can pick though.

>I’m about to wrap a project and will
>have time to give MyEclipse a fair shot
>and will do so.
That’s cool. Just use their support for any questions to get you over the learning curve and I think you’ll like it pretty well. There’s just a *lot* there to learn. Personally, my dev team (about 20) has been really pleased with it over the last year, but it took a little time to get up to speed.

You win on both points, but let me add. A few points.

1. As I stated in my post, I didn’t have time to evaluate other options. I also didn’t have time to learn what the option I *did* choose had to offer. I needed a JSP editor and I needed one ASAP.

2. I saw the “wasted time” each time I opened a JSP. I’m guessing the time improvement is on the subsequent openings of the *same* JSP file. I’ll look into this further.

3. My opinion is that the default action would be to use the “classic” JSP editor. It’s faster.

I’m about to wrap a project and will have time to give MyEclipse a fair shot and will do so.

Erik

Thanks for the tip. I’ll take a look at Amateras next Monday as soon as I get back from my vaction I’m going on tomorrow.
Erik

Re: Rant 1 - the program group

The installer has a configuration page where *you* get to decide if any shortcuts or program groups are installed, just like all the other platform installers out there. The default is to install an alias in a program group, bug *you* could’ve easily selected “None”. You simply didn’t. And yes, the shortcut it installes *is* different since it configures Eclipse to run properly with large workspaces. If you notice the shortcut arguments it sets up Eclipse to run with:

eclipse.exe -vmargs -Duser.language=en -Xms128M -Xmx512M -XX:PermSize=64M -XX:MaxPermSize=128M

So in my opinion this adds a lot of value since I didn’t have to figure out how to launch Eclipse so it worked with a large workspace, which I have.

Re Rant 2: OK so you don’t like visual design tools. I do and use them all the time, but to each his own. As others have pointed out: the load time of the editor on first usage is longer than on subsequent ones because Eclipse lazily loads plugins as requested. If you don’t use the design tools, use the ‘Classic JSP’ editor as your default. MyEclipse supports either model; you get to pick. Problem solved.

This is really one of those classic blog posts where the blogger only proves that they can type faster than they can think. Advice: Ask questions first and know of what you speak before ranting IN public.

No disrespect, but NetBeans isn’t an option. Right now I don’t have time to learn a new IDE. It’s a lame excuse, but I’ve got some deadlines I’m working with.

I’ll make a point to check it out later this year.

Erik