Netbeans is Getting Better

I am currently writing an article about how to do formatting with Microlog. When doing this I felt that I needed some examples of how the formatting really looks like. Since there are a bunch of example MIDlets in Microlog, it should be as simple as executing them. But that is not the case! As described in an earlier article, it seems that Eclipse is not always fit for fight, it does not manage to start the wireless toolkit.

I tested NetBeans back in 2005 when learning Java ME, although I was an Eclipse fan. For some time I actually used both, I used Eclipse for the development and NetBeans when executing the MIDlets. The reason for this was that EclipseME plug-in was not as good as the NetBeans counterpart. But gradually I started to use Eclipse exclusively. One reason for this was that Eclipse ME matured. When the EclipseME was migrated into Mobile Tools for Java, I have not felt that I was missing NetBeans. But at times when Eclipse fail, I am missing NetBeans. It is a real shame that after all these years, Eclipse still have problems when it comes to Java ME development.

I could spend hours on getting Eclipse to work, while downloading and installing NetBeans should be easy. Said and done! I downloaded NetBeans. Unfortunately my Windows Vista decided to download updates as well, so it took quite some time to download it. I wish I had a faster Internet. Downloading using a 512kbit/s ADSL modem is not the best solution for downloading 211 MB of NetBeans, while at the same time downloading Windows updates.

When writing this article, NetBeans has been installed in the background and everything seems to be working as it should. My first impression is that NetBeans has matured since the last time I used it.