Introduction to the

Java developers may be familiar with JetBrains, which boasts IDEA, the world’s best Java development tool. Indeed, IDEA is so easy to use that it fulfills every Java developer’s dream.

Of course JetBrains also provides other language development artifact, PyCharm, PhpStrom, WebStorm and so on. Anything related to development work can be found in JetBrains’ family bucket.

Such a handy artifact is naturally expensive, but JetBrains specially launched a free licence version for the student Party, very humanized.

Now JetBrains is launching Fleet, a Fleet editor. What exactly does it do? What are its advantages? Take a look.

From the eclipse to the Fleet

I remember when I first encountered Java, I started from the Java command line. After writing the code, the code is first compiled into bytecode using the Javac command, and then run it using the Java command. Although Java is the second most useful language in the world, this manual compilation and execution is a pain in the neck.

Then one day, I found eclipse, a tool introduced by my classmates. It was amazing! It was so powerful that it changed my understanding of IDE.

Of course, I always thought that the best IDE was Microsoft’s Visual Studio, which was all-inclusive, but at the time it only supported Microsoft’s own C# and.net platforms, so I had to give up.

Eclipse is easy to use and free, and with a wide variety of plug-ins, it’s easy to DIY your own IDE.

So at that time in addition to the development of another hobby is to repeatedly install various plug-ins of Eclipse, experience different fun.

Later in my work, I also used Eclipse at the beginning. However, as a pure open source project, Eclipse also exposed its shortcomings, that is, third-party plug-ins were chaotic and there were bugs in the use.

Then a colleague gave IDEA to Amway. To be honest, IDEA was ugly at the beginning, and IDEA was more loosely organized for projects, which was more like the management of files rather than projects. Therefore, I still insist on using Eclipse.

So what prompted me to make the switch from Eclipse to IDEA?

Remember, it was a summer, the sky is still very blue. I clicked on the Eclipse website as usual to see if the latest version was available for an upgrade.

The release was Eclipse CHE, a web development tool billed as the next generation of Eclipse.

Will Eclipse only be available on the Web? Is the browser experience as silky as native development tools?

Although I was worried, I gave it a try and followed the official documentation and tried to install Eclipse Che.

The installation is painful, and the use is even more painful. Whether it’s a problem with my machine’s subsystem or its documentation is not clear, I simply haven’t been able to develop a project using Eclipse CHE.

Eclipse Che was meant to move the development environment to the cloud, but at the time the technology and thinking were a little too far ahead, so I was persuaded to leave.

Next came the switch from Eclipse to IDEA, which took years of development. I never paid much attention to eclipse and the development of Eclipse CHE.

When writing this article, I went to see that the original Eclipse Native IDE is still in place, its latest version is 2021 12, Eclipse CHE has also developed to 7.0, and began to support Kubernetes-native.

But there’s no going back.

Now that Eclipse has passed, let’s talk about IDEA again.

To be honest, IDEA is better than Eclipse in terms of usage as a paid software. The best Java development IDE is not for nothing.

Of course, to support such powerful features as IDEA requires a large amount of system memory. IDEA is always 1G-2G is not a problem.

Are there any lightweight development tools? B: of course.

Development tools are tools for highlighting code, compiling code, notepad and so on.

There were two tools available at the time, Atom and Microsoft’s VS Code.

Both are lightweight development tools that support extension of plug-ins. I used them all, and I ended up with Vs Code from Microsoft. Although there is no specific comparison, it feels that Microsoft’s is more stable and has better functionality.

Given that you already have a powerful, simple, lightweight development tool like Microsoft’s vscode, why would Fleet think anyone would choose it?

That’s a good question. Let’s talk about it.

The characteristics of the Fleet

Fleet’s biggest advantage is jetBrains. With IDEA and other development tools behind it, it’s hard not to believe in Fleet.

To put it another way, JetBrains has spent 20 years of knowledge and experience writing development tools, and Fleet is trusted because it uses IntelliJ’s code handling engine underneath.

Of course, that’s not enough. We need to know exactly what Fleet has.

Take a look at the Fleet home screen. It’s very simple and beautiful. Git and History come with it.

Fleet supports auto-completion, refactoring, jumping, debugging, and all the other features that an IDE should support.

The current Fleet support JAVA language, kotlin, python, go, javaScript, Rust, TypeScript and JSON. Other languages such as PHP, C++,C#, and HTML are under development.

You might wonder if these features are found in other lightweight ides, but what makes Fleet special?

Distributed! Yes, distributed!

Fleet’s architecture is distributed, and Fleet doesn’t care whether your project is local, in a container, or thousands of miles away in another country. Fleet can handle local and remote projects equally well by providing virtualized file systems.

Fleet operates in Editor mode,Smart mode, and Distributed mode.

For Editor Mode, everything is local, so it provides limited functionality and features:

In Smart Mode, advanced features such as project – and context-aware code completion, navigation of definitions and usages, dynamic code quality checks, and quick fixes are available. These features are beyond the capabilities of a lightweight Fleet and require additional Language Servers and Code engine to handle them, as shown below:

What is Distributed Mode? If you want to put the Language Servers and Code engine into the cloud or docker container, the Fleet will only connect to the remote server as a client.

Such distribution can also realize the function of multi-user cooperation.

Personally, Fleet is probably an advanced version of Eclipse CHE. Stay tuned.

JetBrains Space

JetBrains also combines Fleet and jetBrains Space.

Think of JetBrains Space as a remote workspace that eliminates the need to set up a local workspace.

conclusion

Fleet works so well, how do you download it? I’m sorry that Fleet is currently unable to download it. You must apply for it on Fleet’s official website. I heard that the number of seats is limited.