Tools

Development Environments
Tool Used Comfort Notes
Eclipse 2001-present Five stars Eclipse has been the IDE of choice at my last two jobs. While my initial impression was not so positive, there have been substantial improvements to the product (as well as to Java itself) such that I now enjoy using it. I routinely use Eclipse to do both Java and PHP web applications.
Visual Studio/C++ 1995-2001 Three stars This is the de facto standard for creating Windows applications, but I stopped using it as my focus shifted away from desktop and mobile device development and toward web development. The mobile device development was for creating synchronization programs (conduits) for the Palm PDA. I have not used any of the .NET technologies.
Metrowerks CodeWarrior 1993-1997 Three stars CodeWarrior was the last IDE I used for Macintosh development. Unlike MPW (see below) it was a truly integrated environment, and was incredibly fast. I started using it while still at Apple, during the time that the CPU switch was made from 68k to PowerPC.
MPW (Macintosh Programmer’s Workshop) 1988-1995 Three stars MPW was almost a mini-OS, not so much an IDE. It provided tools that would run within the MPW environment much like a UNIX console (in fact, some of the tools were ported UNIX tools). I stopped using this after leaving Apple and focusing on CodeWarrior (see above).
Command line tools
Tool Used Comfort Notes
Maven 2009-now Five stars Since starting a new position in early 2009, I started using Maven instead of Ant. While I’ve got the basics down, there is a lot more to this tool than I’ve been using.
Ant 2001-2009 Five stars While I’m warming to Eclipse, there was quite a while where all I needed for Java development was a text editor and Ant. Since I’ve started using Eclipse more, and have been transitioning to Maven, I use Ant less, but I still depend upon it for automated, server-based builds. I’ve used it to create the ‘continuous integration’ environment for my current employer.
Web Development Tools
Tool Used Comfort Notes
Firebug 2007-present Five stars Firebug is a Firefox browser extension that allows live inspection and modification of any page’s HTML and CSS. I use this tool to fine tune style settings, such as colors, font styles and sizes, and page positioning. Changes made to either the HTML or CSS code take effect immediately, creating quite a time savings over changing the source and reloading the page.
Total Validator 2007-present Five stars I am very picky about the compliance of the HTML produced by the code I write, regardless if the source language is PHP, JSP, Perl, or what-have-you. Total Validator is a Firefox extension that will inspect a page in-place, then open a new browser screeen containing any errors that exist in the rendered page. All hand-made pages on this site (which does not include the blog pages powered by Movable Type) have been run through this tool, and are 100% W3C compliant.
Source Control
Tool Used Comfort Notes
Subversion 2006-present Five stars Subversion is my current (free) source code control system of choice (my not-free choice is still Perforce, see below). I have used Subversion in development, and also maintained Subversion servers, both for professional and personal projects.
CVS 2004-2006 Five stars Moving from Perforce to CVS was a bit of a drag. But it met two important requirements at the time: it was free, and it worked. The thing I didn’t like the most was how each file was committed separately and marked with its own revision number. If you needed to associate a set of files, it had to be tagged. Perforce did it, and when Subversion became available, I left CVS for SVN.
Perforce 2000-2003 Five stars Perforce, based upon its feature set, is my favorite source code control system. The only drawback to it is that it’s not free, and the companies I’ve worked for after the dot-bomb are hesitant to spend the $600/seat licensing. It is a very stable tool, easily scriptable via command line, making it easy to use in automated build environments.
Issue Tracking
Tool Used Comfort Notes
Bugzilla 2004-2009 Five stars I’m a user, administrator and developer of Bugzilla at my current job. I find the use of Perl and the Template Toolkit to be a bit of a hinderance, but the system does work, and needs very little attention. I’ve extended a stock version of Bugzilla to include billing information for enhancement work performed for our clients.
Remedy 2000-2003 Three stars I was never a big fan of Remedy; I found the software to be clunky and otherwise difficult to use. The installation I used at a former employer was used to track defects and was extended to do a small amount of CRM functionality.
Other
Tool Used Comfort Notes
Business Objects (reporting tool) 2007-2008 Four stars One of only two software products I’ve used in the last decade that made me say ‘Wow!’, Business Objects is a business intelligence reporting tool used to create ad-hoc reports. I built a ‘Universe’ (essentially a view into the database), with the Business Objects Designer, then created several sample reports using InfoView, a fully web-based report builder. Unfortunately, I (and my employers) have found BO to be too expensive to continue using.
InstallShield 1995-2000 Three stars Back in the days when you needed to install applications on your desktop, I used this tool to package the executable and all necessary supporting libraries and applications. In the web world, there’s not much of a use for this now.

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