[news.eclipse.technology] Re: Eclipse just seems wrong

["Gregg Wonderly" <gergg@xxxxxxx>]

"Brian Matzon" <brian@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:bjmh5k$qfr$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Problem is, that what you need of eclipse, is much less than it
> provides. Eclipse is a full (well, almost) featured Integrated
> Development Environment.

So why can't it just compile my files correctly?  It seems like getting that
part right would be easy for the developers.  But, I fear that the eclipse
developers just don't understand how fundamental staying out of the way of
simple operations is to good GUI design.

> It's not just like a fancy editor, which we're
> many that think KAWA is. I like eclipse, I have no problems with its
> structure - nor do my coworkers. However that doesn't mean that eclipse
> fits everybody! If you don't like the "features" of eclipse, and want
> something simpler, then you obviously have to use a "simpler" product,
> instead of stripping it, or adding "weird" options that < 5% of the
> users need.

The primary issue is that it won't compile my source files.  This is
fundamental to me understanding whether I can get any benefits out of the
other features.  KAWA has a vary simple extensibility mechanism using simple
command lines.  One of the primary simplifications is that if a file is
readonly and I have defined a command called 'checkout', then when I attempt
to make edits to such a readonly file, kawa asks me if I want to check the
file out.  If I have no check out command, KAWA asks me if I want to remove
the readonly status.  Thus, when I am working offline without network
connectivity to my Perforce server, I can rename 'checkout' to 'p4checkout',
and KAWA asks me if I want to remove the readonly status.  That's a simple
way to handle that issue.  I can put these commands into the context menu
for files, or the project tree.  Thus, I can checkout, submit, addsource etc
quite easily without crafting 20lines of XML.

> FWIW, 95% (yes, guessing) of all java developers have their source files
> in a package hierarchy! Those that don't have some technical, often
> preprocessing, reason for not having it in a package hierarchy.

Apparently there are a lot of people who have been listening to those that
think this is some kind of requirement.  If the package structure is so
friendly and necessary, then why does the default javadoc output include a
list of classes by name so that you don't have to remember the package too?

Surely we're not all a bunch of lemmings following each other toward the
cliff?