AppCode: Objective-C IDE from JetBrains goes public

At first I was excited that Xcode had some competition, so I downloaded this as soon as it was available.<p>Unfortunately, it has a crappy Java-generic GUI. For an IDE for a platform that makes a big deal out of user experience, it really looks awful. (And it manages to be slower than Xcode 4!)<p>I understand that tools don't have to be pretty to be functional, but I draw the line here.

I know the GUI might not look nice due to being Java, but if AppCode will get as much polish and as many features as IDEA or the smaller language specific IDEs got, then AppCode is something to really look forward to.<p>Even after a year of constantly using PhpStorm (yeah - <i>still</i> no time to rewrite that huge app I'm maintaining) I'm still finding little things that show that the IDE was really made by developers.<p>It's just like with the iPhone: It's full of little nice touches.<p>Recently, I was pissed of enough about the typo in the name of an interface:<p><pre><code> IModuleAmmendment </code></pre> and I had PhpStorm rename refactor it.<p>Of course it worked (and instantly over 800 files), but it also fixed the typo in a class implementing the interface (CatalogModuleAmmendment was for example renamed to CatalogModuleAmendment).<p>And that's just a sample: The IDEs are full of these little things. This makes me so productive that I can easily live with the less-than-perfect looking UI.<p>This sounds like a commercial, but I'm really just a (incredibly) happy customer of theirs.

What I would pay for is not another IDE but one that handles all the code signing bullshit for me. It's crazy the amount of errors a team can have regarding code signing and push notification certificates.

I'm excited to see more additional development solutions for Objective C; but why are we taking a step backward with these awful Java like GUIs that have plagued Eclipse and NetBeans?<p>Why in 2011, are people still building UI heavy applications with Java?

JetBrains does a lot of good things. The fact that they bring their ideas to a number of different languages is a great thing. Resharper, IntelliJ, RubyMine, PyCharm, Phpstorm and now AppCode - you could stick purely to Jetbrains products and have a familiar IDE layout and functionality for the various different application development tasks you undertake.

I've wished many times for ReSharper-like refactoring in Xcode. Now JetBrains (the ReSharper people) have announced CIDR, an Objective-C IDE.<p>Apparently CIDR is still at an early stage (pre-beta even) and doesn't yet support debugging on a physical device, but I still take this as great news. I think allowing developers to download and try CIDR now will give JetBrains the feedback they need to deliver a great finished product.

I don't think most Xcode users know what they're missing. And unfortunately they still won't, just by looking at screenshots and perhaps firing this up and having a quick bash around.<p>Some really good screencasts are needed to show what's possible with appCode - fortunately JetBrains does excellent screencasts for their other products and I'm sure they'll do these as it gets closer to release.<p>As for me, I'm a long-time IntelliJ user. Xcode 3 has been incredibly painful to use - even after taking a lot of time and effort to learn the keyboard shortcuts.<p>Xcode 4 is a major step in the right direction and started to actually make iOS coding reasonably fun. But it still can't hold a candle to the features available in this early release of appCode - it's awesome.

I can't imagine they can compete with XCode 4 and its excellent integration with profiling tools, LLVM, etc.

Competition is always good. Just wish that you don't have to download Xcode again with every iOS SDK update.

I am sure it will get polished before the final release. All IntelliJ IDEs can install a very functional VIM plugin - that itself is a big deal for me!

As a java developer that needs to also support native iphone and android apps, this is a huge win for me. Its very nice to jump around projects using the same familiar keystrokes and functions.

just for reference, here's what it looks like: <a href="http://cl.ly/5rbn" rel="nofollow">http://cl.ly/5rbn</a><p>doesn't look ugly to me. Looks clean actually...

The project sounds cool, but the perspective of the bottle icon is way, way off.

I am very excited to try this since XCode has really needed a suitable alternative for a while.

Ah good, something we can point to the next time someone complains about XCode.

I noticed it has the new "vanishing" scrollbars. Looks a little ugly, but it's not that bad. I expect it will get better with time. I like the color-coded tabs and easy tab switching. The editor itself lags a bit.<p>Strangely enough, it didn't recognize my .mm files as Objective-C++ files.