Ask HN: Anybody use an online IDE? Why? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Anybody use an online IDE? Why?

6 pointspedalpete12 comments

I've used the Nitrous.io editor before. They provide an online development environment for Node.js, Rails, and a few other things. Their editor is great for quick edits, but I think the lack of extensibility in all the online editors/IDEs I've tried means they're basically a no go.

I'm also spoiled by Sublime Text.

Try https://www.neutrondrive.com/, since you can connect it to any Virtual Machine in the cloud you have, it is infinitely flexible.

I tried using online IDEs and came across two big pain points:

- required connectivity is a pain that manifests itself in lots of different ways from being useless when disconnected if you need to compile etc to just being plain slow when you expand folders and it has to fetch that data

- resource restrictions limit you to pretty small projects or ones with light or no compilation

Plusses are:

- not having to install mountains of shit and keep track of versions and accumulate all that junk on our computers

- browser tab feels quite natural alongside documentation and stuff

- isolating one project's requirements from others including freezing dependencies

- easily turning off a project and all its dependencies

For now I'm using headless virtual machines in VirtualBox running the Cloud9 IDE : https://c9.io/. I'm doing this for Haxe/OpenFL mobile development and NodeJS projects.

I just use an external virtual machine hosted by http://digitalocean.com/. Then you can get as beefy as a box as you want. However, I usually keep it small because I deploy to small virtual machines on heroku or EC2. Plus it gets expensive, but $5/month for a small VM is nothing.

I thought about that but my local resources are significantly better than any cheap VM, plus it doesn't solve the connectivity stuff.

Ideally a dropbox-esque solution will emerge that lets me use a project vm locally with a web (or other) IDE, through a hosted web IDE service, or with the option to deploy projects + etc to whatever server you want.

I use https://www.neutrondrive.com/ everyday to code. Mainly I started using online IDE's because I wanted to code on a Chromebook but after about 2 years of doing this there are a lot of advantages.

1. I always have my development environment. I can switch computers and be right back where I left off. Now instead of always carrying a laptop I just use whatever computer is at work or home. And I still use a laptop/chromebook for travelling.

2. Forced me to start using virtualized environments. I can setup and switch dev environments more easily. What takes hours of compiling open source programs on the Mac takes me a few minutes to setup. I can clone environments or setup environments more closely to what runs in production.

3. I can collaborate on code in real time very easily since I can share it just like a google doc.

4. I can setup dev environments for non-coders very easily. I needed my designer to do some HTML coding but running the full stack on her Mac would have taken hours to setup. Now she can help and not have to do as much setup she doesn't understand. Plus since everything is out in the cloud I can check up on her without needing access to her laptop.

With all that said I'm a web developer and the online IDE route works well for me. Other developers might not have the same experience. For example, a mobile developer will have a harder time getting everything working online for them.

Wow! Great review. Sadly, you loose points on ethics because you failed to mention that you are the developer of neutrondrive. Or is it just a coincidence that all your submissions are related to Neutrondrive?

I likely would have been supportive if you had just come out and said it. Why beat around the bush?

Not trying to hide anything. Yes I may be biased towards my product but I really like online IDEs and I started using online IDEs because I wanted to code on a Chromebook. However, most didn't meet my needs because they are very inflexible. So I started Neutron Drive for myself mainly.

There are a lot of different options out there. Try them out. I think other IDEs have become more flexible now so they will provide similar advantages.

Other options to try: https://c9.io/ https://codenvy.com/ https://www.nitrous.io/

Those are the best I can think of besides Neutron that is :-)

I use Neutron Drive for some simple web sites that I have hosted in Google Drive. It gives me the ability to edit HTML, CSS, & JavaScript directly in the browser.

Previously I would have to download a copy of the file from Google Drive, edit it locally, and then upload the new version since Google Drive doesn't support editing these file types.

I use https://c9.io/ Why? give it a try.

i tried a few, mostly to code easy features while sitting in the couch with a tablet... didn't like any of them. exchanged some messages with the founders and never felt like coming back. i think we are a long way still

Hi,

No: it's not Emacs :-)

I think it's an interesting idea, though.

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