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Review: Four killer cloud IDEs

Browser-based JSFiddle, Icenium, Cloud9, and Codenvy stretch from client-side JavaScript and HTML5 to server-side Java and Web stacks

By Peter Wayner, InfoWorld, 04/17/13

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Telerik's Icenium Mist is a browser-based tool for building mobile apps around the Apache Cordova project, the latest version of a thin layer of device-specific code that was once known only as PhoneGap. Icenium Mist lets you create the apps in your browser and run them in a simulator for the different versions of the iPhone. It's a very quick way to spin up an iPhone app. Icenium Graphite, a companion tool that runs on Windows, handles the build, deployment to your device, and publishing the app to the App Store and Google Play.

The good news is that the tool has a solid code browser, a fine editor, and a sturdy connection with Git repositories for saving your revisions. Telerik has already folded in jQuery, jQuery Mobile, and Kendo for building the widgets, but you can replace them with your favorite code. Although the debugging isn't very robust -- the tool often produced inscrutable remarks like "Error: Script error. (URL: , LineNumber: 0)" -- I was able to work around it using the browsers' built-in debuggers. After all, the apps are just HTML and JavaScript, and the so-called simulator is another browser window.

Icenium is enough to build many basic apps for your mobile needs. It's not exactly native code, but that power is not necessary for most basic apps. It's a clever remix of the browser environment with the mobile.

Icenium is free through May and $19 per month afterward, with a discount for purchasing a full year in advance.

Review: 4 killer cloud IDEs

Icenium lets you build cross-platform, iPhone and Android apps in your browser, using JavaScript frameworks such as jQuery and Kendo. 

 Cloud9 IDE: Node, Ruby, Java, and PHP
The Cloud9 environment is full of features aimed at the fat part of the dynamic Web app development world: Ruby, PHP, and Node.js stacks. The Cloud9 IDE offers a classic file browser and editor for your projects that can be debugged on their server and deployed anywhere you like.

The editor is quite powerful, offering code highlighting and error detection. Syntax errors are flagged immediately in your browser before they're even saved to the server, speeding up the debugging cycle. This won't catch runtime errors, though. You'll need to insert console logging methods.

The environment comes with both a console log and a command line, so you're logged into the Unix directory where your code is running. For grins, I typed "emacs" and it worked. I'm not sure what anyone would do with the command line when a full editor is above it, but it's bound to come in useful for some odd occasions.

The company is generous with free demonstration projects, with the exception of one private workspace that requires your projects be public where others can watch them. The premium membership, which is just $12 per month, offers six private workspaces, plus better access to the shell and the VM. There's also no limit on collaborators, people who can edit your projects with you. The only other thing you might need for bigger development projects is local access to a database like MySQL.


For more enterprise computing news, visit InfoWorld. Story copyright InfoWorld Media Group, Inc.

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