Since recent time I have been involved in the Software Developers Network in Split, so I thought I’d tell you a bit about it.

We are a group of people in Split, Croatia meeting once in a while to talk about professional and non-professional topics (we might meet for a beer in a pub, or have a monthly presentation with projector and everything in another, or like we did today meet for a whole day, have lunch together, have some presentations and just talk to each other) - much like the SQL&Developers User groups I’ve been a part of in recent years.

One important difference between SoftDevNet and the SQL&DEV Users group I’ve been a part of is that this is more based on informal gatherings and communication than on real presentations as such - note, it doesn’t mean we don’t have real presentations - just that we tend to organize our meetups in more relaxed environments (last two meetings were in a bar with a projector, laptop and speakers, today’s Eclipse day was in a separate section of a restaurant) and that we foster discussions over standards speaker-driven sessions.

Other very important aspect is that SoftDevNet is not Vendor related (this was started by my friend who works for Siemens and doesn’t use any of the MS related dev. tools, and so far in the *organizator* chart I am the one pushing and putting the focus on Microsoft technologies and on things that I think are good about them) - which gives us much freedom as well as helps us broaden our horizons on the good stuff *other* vendors have as well (ok, this was mean a bit from me :))

So far, I am very happy to be a part of this movement and to be able to help Brane with some ideas and general help on organizing the meetups. Very soon I plan to do some talks (actually should have done it already (even promised)… but simply my other obligations kept me away from some preparations I wanted to do) so I am excited even more.

One thing I will try to do from my Microsoft side is to get MS more involved with the story as well as MSCommunity which I am a part of.

What’s next?

We have a Christmas party coming up, and afterwards again our regular monthly meetings as well as maybe some weekend ones like we did today with Eclipse. First of in January is a discussion which Siniša Dolinac (my colleague) and myself are hosting on Software Estimations (more on that after the Christmas party :))

So, anyway… if you are in Split, drop us a note, join our mailing list or simply follow our work on the SoftDevNet site!

Cheers!

So, finally we were able to organize the Eclipse Day as a part of our Software Developers Networking group we are organizing in Split.

First of, all I can say is that it was great… for me personally much better then a standard user group meeting, simply because of the interactivity which we’ve all had.

There were approximately 10 people, 3 of them were presenters - but the whole idea was in interactivity. The presenters would start talking about a subject from Eclipse (Antonio talked about Eclipse in general and later on on CDT - a C++ dev. addition to Eclipse, Srečko talked about the Java integration with the tool, and finally Goran talked about the extensibility) and we would chime in with our questions and thoughts.

From my side, I was the main Visual Studio propagator - every good thing the guys mentioned from Eclipse, I’ve challenged with my opinion on how you would (or wouldn’t) do the same thing with the Studio.

Some of my conclusions were:

1. Both are great tools, with still my preference being on Visual Studio (not because I live in it, it just suits me a little bit better - at least on the first look)
2. With functionality they both follow each other - Visual Studio *took* some great things from Eclipse, in turns Eclipse did the same from Visual Studio, the same follows with Java and C#, both are good - although as you might have guessed, C# to me seems better and more forward thinking - but still they follow each other
3. Resharper + Refactor Pro still brings the experience topped over the one the presenters had with Eclipse

Some things I see VERY lacking to Visual Studio (or better said, some things Eclipse has fundamentally better):

1. MicroKernel idea + distributions - Visual Studio is overloaded with stuff I don’t need, nor use - while this is great to have generally, it would be great to be able to have a really good and stable *Kernel* or base of the IDE, and then build it up with everything I need (and only I need) - because of the MicroKernel architecture and it’s plugin architecture (OSGi), you can (or some other vendor) can make specialized distribution of Eclipse for different purposes (e.g. have a Wizard based one for some developers, and a completely wizard-less, designer-less one for me :)) - that said with only manipulating the plugins you can narrow down that implementation as well by turning off some plugins, and their initialization (by the mentioned plugin standard) is Lazy, so they are loaded once you need them - and not a minute earlier. This gives me a pretty great idea how a *hog* of a IDE can quickly become all you need, and only what you need.
2. OSGi plugin architecture - It’s great to see that the whole extensibility story of an IDE is centralized over a standard. While Visual Studio currently does have a great Plugin architecture, it would for sure be better if they would have something a little bit more as according to some standard (first to my mind pops up easier adoption, shared learning resources, etc…)

Some things I think are better with Visual Studio (or better said… I don’t know that they are better with Eclipse, by what I saw they are not):

1. Visual Studio + ReSharper + Refactor Pro - nuff said, check out the tools (the guys asked if I could do a presentation on that, maybe I could in the future?)
2. Visual Studio is going forward with giant steps - I don’t see that with Eclipse (on the other hand, probably I didn’t see enough plugins - which are everything with Eclipse)
3. Software Factories initiative - while this is platform independent idea, the ideas which are behind it in the MS world (DSL’s and GAT) are really nice

Final thought… I still wouldn’t give my Visual Studio for even 2 Eclipses, but Eclipse is really made on some GREAT foundations… and is all you want it to be, meaning - if you don’t like something or think something could be better - you just need to change it.

Final thought 2… I need to get to know a little bit more of Eclipse to be able to really judge it… all the thoughts here are just me thinking out loud (you can think of it as Brain Draft’s :))

Cheers!