Decent JavaScript IDE [closed]

Question

What is a decent IDE for developing JavaScript, I'll be writing both client side stuff and writing for Rhino. Ideally It needs to run on Mac OSX, although something that runs on Windows too would be nice.

ADDITIONAL:

Having had a play with both js2 and Aptana, I think I'll be continuing to use Aptana. Mainly because I find emacs a bit hard to get my head round, although I did think that the error hi-lighting in js2 was better than that in Aptana.

I'm still looking for a way to visually debug my js code that is running atop Rhino...

Shipowner

I'll look into the emacs solution and Aptana over the weekend... – Shipowner

Related question: #369011 – Crepitate

WebStorm from www.jetbrains.com is excellent for JavaScript, because it supports ECMAScript 5, understands JsDoc perfectly (inheritance and all). It's the only IDE that actually does that. – Dillie

Answer 1

Aptana IDE, absolutely. Stable, great syntax support for all the major javascript libraries, very good css and html editors. Also good support for php, air, ruby on rails and iPhone app development (I never tested this one). Aptana can also connect to remote site via ftp (sftp in the pro edition) and to svn and cvs repositories. It's based on Eclipse, so it's not exactly a lightweight application. But it's really, really good. You can also use it as an Eclipse plugin if you develop java wab app, but when I tested it in this version, about 1 year ago, it was not stable. Much better to use the standalone version.

Gyasi

Does Aptana have code completion similar to Microsoft's IntelliSense? – Lepanto

I never used Microsoft IntelliSense, so I don't know. I can say that Aptana has code completion similar to Eclipse, that's very good for me. – Gyasi

Ah, that's basically all it is. I was curious since I'm still not familiar with a lot of Javascript functions and language constructs. Thanks. – Lepanto

it does not look very great. I expexted maybe too much, but Aptana seems a big software that does not do much (it probably does autocomplete and it does color syntaxing but I expected to browse methods by clicking on the call or such things) – Catatonia

Answer 2

If you're familiar with Emacs Steve Yegge's js2-mode could be worth a look.

Anagnorisis

I second that... js2-mode is amazing. – Enfleurage

Answer 3

Aptana Studio, both standalone and Eclipse plugin versions were quite ok last time I used them.

Descry

Even i have used this IDE and I have found ti extremely useful. – Davenport

Answer 4

I have found the Spket Eclipse plugin very useful.

Catastrophism

Answer 5

Take a look at WebStorm HTML/JavaScript Editor. It's lightweight and runs on MacOS. It supports debugging and running your code right from IDE and has very smart autocompletion capabilities for JavaScript both DOM-based and browser-based.

Hopscotch

Answer 6

Komodo Edit/IDE is definitely the best IDE/editor (that I have used) for developing JavaScript.

Notable features include live error reporting, JavaScript macros and syntax auto-complete for ALL major frameworks!

Hulk

Answer 7

If you have a very big application written in Javascript, there's only IntelliJ Idea. It parses multiple Javascript files and highlights not only syntax errors but undeclared variables and functions, allows to jump from function call to function definition, and more.

I've tried Emacs (because that's my favorite editor) and Komodo, and they don't come close. I guess it's the same for Eclipse.

Personally, I think that superior parsing and navigation abilties of Idea are only required when you're working with crappy undocumented code, otherwise I'd happily write the code in Emacs using js2-mode, but I'm working with huge poorly documented and buggy framework and it really helps to be able to jump to the source of the function or superclass to check how they work.

Selfexistent