So, I have been mostly self thaught programmer (C++), as its a big part of my job (not a regular developer). But so far I have been using a simple text editor like Geany to code and I compile stuff either in terminal (linux) or produce my own make file.

I am starting to wonder if I should switch to a full IDE, as I am on linux, I was thinking of trying KDevelop. But I am simply not sure if its worth, do I even need it?

I have never used an IDE, it seems kind of complicated for the start with “projects” and I havent really found any good introductions to how this workflow is supposed to work.

Do you think using and IDE is something everyone should use? Or do you think a text editor with producing your own make files should be enough?

  • GuzziEnglish
    3•1 year ago

    I started as a sysadmin in 1995 and started programming not long after that. I spent most my time in a shell and vim, started writing python all in vim. Then I took on a project that was a graphical application for windows and OS X. It was a rewrite of a windows visual basic app that we did not have the source for, so now good opportunity to write a multi platform application.

    I wrote that program in python/pyQt3. Started on linux (which it also ran on) decided to look at IDE’s to help with pyQt I found Eric3. It made writing the first app and many after a lot easier.

    So moved on from there a few years later and I use Jetbrains Pycharm commercial if I am writing anything bigger then a quick script I will do it in Pycharm.

    Some of the things I like in Pycharm.

    • really good vim emulation
    • the linter finds code problems very well
    • completion is great
    • debugger is fantastic I rarely use a print to debug but it still happens
    • Increase’s productivity, hard to see at first.

    I strongly recommend looking at IDE’s start with Kdev and see where it goes also try the trial version of Jetbrains Clion. https://www.jetbrains.com/clion/