Want a minimalist IDE for C#?
July 12, 2006Who wants a minimalist IDE for C#?
Surely not one would agree with what I have in mind. I mean, Visual Studio 2005 has got everything in store for us programmers, from a very good Intellisense to a very wide range of feature that would redefine the meaning of programming forever. Basically the IDE itself teaches everything about the language and the IDE itself, a very different approach from the previous ways of learning other programming languages using a number of IDEs which may have different features. That has changed the way programmers deal with the programming language(in this case, the C# language). The IDE itself has become a valuable partner in programming.
Of course nothing compares to the Visual Studio. I just had some “issues” with regards to VS2005, even with the Express Editions. The Express editions cannot create Release files when building projects and solutions(well, this part can be understood). Sometimes it would take up a lot of time loading some projects, especially if you are working on a lot of projects in a single solution. The one thing that would annoy me is that it wouldn’t run on Windows XP SP1.
If you’re asking why I dont want to use Windows XP SP2, its because I could notice a little bit of difference in the performance and speed, things that I need when developing .NET applications.
Surely there is SharpDevelop (I had been using this since the time of the VS.NET 2003, because VS.NET at that time wasn’t free). #D (as what it is fondly called) had proved to be one of the most innovative of all .NET IDEs present, if not the most innovative. I mean, it has given programmers a glimpse of what C# and the .NET framework can do, without having to go thru the burden of giving up your savings with buying the VS.NET 2003 package. What I love about it is that #D 2.0 could support .NET Framework 1.1. One thing with #D is that it is still on release candidate, more of a beta version of the actual software.
Right now I have the very minimalist IDE in hand - SciTE, an open source text editor. Thanks to our project’s team leader (he once created the File Explorer Add-in for SciTe), I was introduced to the idea of SciTE’s lexers, which allows me to create, test, and debug .NET applications and programs. But I was hoping for something better than that, but doesn’t have to be as powerful as VS2005 or #D. And I have some few ideas in mind. I just want to keep things as minimalist as possible, so that I will still be able to create .NET applications without forcing myself to upgrade, and without sacrificing the performance and speed of my PC.
After a few weeks I may be posting some developments on this minimalist IDE, of course on my free spare time. I don’t expect everyone to be there and help, any way I am doing this for my own pleasure. 
