Yeah, eclipse starts doing all that stuff without asking you, but if you want to change how it works it is still as much work as anything else, you either live with the fact that eclipse doesn't quite do what you'd like or you write your own plugin. I will admit I don't do hot code changes while the debugger is still running, but I have never really felt the urge to either (though I suppose it would be possible to add on if sufficient need was there). I mange all my vim configuration and modules/scripts with git, each time I add something for a new task I needed to do, I dont' need to do it again the next time... after 15 years, I'm pretty much to the point where I don't need to change it much unless I start using a new language but even then most of the stuff is pretty generic. I've worked on large teams, and indeed most people choose to "jump right in" with eclipse, and most have never met anyone like me who doesn't do that... but that doesn't mean it doesn't work, I can still work with those people and they would have no idea that I wasn't using eclipse if they didn't know it. The bottom line is that there is no one true editor... if you like using an IDE, use it. I'm just saying, that stories like this one where people assert that eclipse is some how "required" for productive java programming (or any other language for that matter) are absolutely wrong. There are alternatives which do not require quad core laptop with 16GB of RAM (though the actual product you are working on may use that much or perhaps far more depending on the scale, but I digress).

So you think you can't do all those things in vim or emacs? Interesting....

Out of the box? Not sure what you mean... But yeah with emacs and vi and basic command line tools/scripts you can do all that stuff... and you can customize it to work *better* than the way eclipse does it.

Me? I've used pretty much nothing else other than VIM and command line tools for the last 15 years to edit code for various programming languages, including very large projects in commercial environments. Works fine in windows too, although I rarely use it there. I am generally one of the few on the project who does this, but as long as the results adhere to all the same coding "standards" nobody cares.

Clearly, you have no idea what you are talking about. If you ever actually used vi or emacs for anything meaningful you would know they are just as powerful as any "IDE" you could point to. You don't need a big bloated "IDE" to write code, not even Java.

You mean kind of like getting eclipse to do what you want when you want? Not exactly a walk in the park either... all depends on which tool you have experience with. Eclipse is probably the worst of the widely used IDEs out there IMO. Not intuitive, buried/redundant configurations, buggy, unstable, ugly as hell... but I hate xcode and VS.NET too... I haven't met an "IDE" that I like yet. Once you know vi or emacs really well, nothing else seems to do what you want anymore.

Why do people always lump notepad/vi/emacs together? Notepad.exe is one of the more basic text editors you'll find with almost no functionality. vim/emacs on the other hand are enormously powerful text editors which are on par with any "IDE" you can come up with. highlighting? yup. braces? yup. automatic formatting/indentation, etc, etc.? yup. code generation/completion? yup. easily find your files in large complicated projects? yup. open/edit multiple files at once and jump around between them? yup. jump to class/method/variable definitions? yup. integrated help/documentation? yup. integrated source control for svn/git/whatever you use? yup. code folding? yup. scriptable? yup. error/warning highlighting? yup. integrated debugging? yup. I could continue for a while... but all that stuff which people tend to say you "need" an "IDE" like eclipse for... yeah you can do all that stuff without eclipse.

The idea that Eclipse is needed for Java development is ridiculous. I have been using Java for 15 years on projects big and small... vim and tmux are all I need.

All cars can be stolen in a matter of seconds. The key programming things are just a way for the dealers to rip people off charging $500+ for a new key which actually costs only a few dollars. There are reverse engineered or sometimes even authentic programming devices available for pretty much all but the newest cars (just wait a year or two and those will be available too).

And I might add, that Gentoo should work just as well on Itanium, and there are lots of them dirt cheap on ebay, I've been tempted to pick some up to replace some of my older alpha machines... I can't bear to turn them off though, so maybe just add them to my collection. They seriously use a lot of electricity though. My electric bill is probably at least double what it would be without them running all the time, but I rationalize it by saving gas on my heating bill in the winter :)

Personally, I would go with linux on Alpha, then you can use all the same modern versions of everything that you are used to. I've been running Gentoo on my Alpha boxes for the better part of a decade (2003). These days, I can even run Java if I want to, although compiling icedtea from scratch takes a long time. It does work though.

Looking around while driving and trying to read road signs seems much worse to me, especially here in MA where we have such crappy signs, you never know where the street signs will be because they are never in predictable places, you can never see signs for what street you are actually on, and they are all different sizes and colors. Not to mention you can't just glance at signs, you have to spend some time reading and comprehending them. GPS is way more intuitive and should result in much less distraction. Also can be very frustrating to see signs at night because depending on placement they may not be illuminated by your headlights.

If you are shooting from great distances wouldn't you still need to actually keep the laser on the target if the target moves?

A deer is not an immovable object, they only weigh something like 100 or 200 pounds depending on age/size. Some of the biggest ones may be a little over 300 pounds. That is not enough to instantly stop a vehicle which was traveling at highway speeds.

Seriously, everyone keeps shouting and yelling about all these "free" online services tracking their users but nobody ever mentions the ISP. Your ISP really does track your every move, they can see every site you visit, etc, etc... much worse that google, or anyone else. All that data is available for sale, they won't admit it if you ask them... because it is "collected anonymously" but really, it boggles my mind that they get a free pass in all of this mess.

Begun, the clone war has.