Best Java Program Editor?

Well an editor is a very personal choice. Its just my opinion. I have been programming fo around 8 years now. Worked on couple of languages and usually had to toggle between C, C++, Java and Unix / Windows.
When I started Java I used notepad. Soon I started using Kawa editor. Then came Bluette, then Visual Cafe and finaly JBuilder.
But with all that toggling to cope I have been consistently using GVIM as my single and all purpose editor be it office or home , whether Java or C or even a letter.
In my opinion for programmer its the best editor unless you need to write GUI.
Normall I would develop my front end and back end separately.
So GVIM is my choice --- no license, simple and universal access , close to vi and max flexibility.

I started with BlueJ in school, and still use BlueJ because I'm used to it and it only does the very basics of an editor, which is all I want. Syntax highlighting in a notepad like environment and simple 1 click compile. Also has a debugger and some other little features if you need them. Though, it's a little buggy sometimes.

BlueJ is extremely limited for realworld use. VI is nice for sometime use, but again too limited to be really productive in a realworld environment (yes I use it too, and I like it, that's a professional opinion as a fulltime professional Java programmer).

I prefer JBuilder, though Eclipse is a decent alternative.

For LEARNING a language though (rather than using it professionally) no IDE should be used at all (not even a limited one like BlueJ) but rather a simple text editor with maybe syntax highlighting.
VI is excellent for this, as if Jedit.

JEdit is my all time favorite..I would prefer it over any IDE, and day. I personally like using the command line to compile and run my junk, but that's just my personal preference.

Go JBuilder!! The one bad thing about JBuilder - you get way too lazy.

I fully agree that JBuilder is the best you can get, I'm a longtime user myself (since 1999 in fact with a 2 year stint into Eclipse).
But to really get that functionality you need the Developer (previously Professional) or Enterprise edition which isn't free (though IMO reasonably priced, especially the Developer edition).

Strangely many people don't seem to want to spend a cent on a piece of software they're going to be using for 5+ hours a day on average.
And that includes corporations which would earn back the investment in that software in hours from increased productivity while spending thousands upon thousands on new equipment for people that don't need it (don't get me started about marketing people getting brand new computers and screens while developers have to make do with 10 year old castoffs. I've been waiting to get a new stick of RAM for a year now while the CTO just got a 17" TFT to replace his 6 month old 15" one which still works perfectly well...).

I would like to know if there is an IDE like Visual Studio.NET, where it would allow drag and drop components instead of doing it programatically.

Doesn't Eclipse allow you to do that?

JBuilder allows it, Netbeans allows it, Eclipse has plugins for it, and so do many others.

Of course this is mainly limited to GUI components for most of them, though JBuilder also allows it for some other things like database connections and things like that.

Personally I consider most such options to be pretty useless except for prototyping. The generated source is usually not very pretty, hard to maintain, and far from optimal.

Hi everyone,

I use an extremely old ide called Java Ide Version 1.7 for Windows
The ide is a no frills ide thus something like borland's turbo C. A sad thing is the ide is an abandonware but its free.

Richard West