[Mono-osx] Re: Use of Eclipse as a .NET IDE

[Edward J. Sabol]

> I know the hardcore out there will do their Mono work in vi or
> somesuch, but I find working in a full-on IDE like VS.NET that has
> code completion hints, formatting, integrated visual debugger, etc to
> be *MUCH* faster.
>
> I have avoided doing anything with Mono on my Mac because of the lack
> of a good IDE.

FWIW, I use Emacs on my Mac, which I installed very easily using Darwinports.
(You can also install it using fink, I'm sure.) There's still no debugger, of
course (too bad there's no way to use gdb to debug Mono/CIL, which I believe
is theoretically possible if someone would put in the effort), but all the
rest of the IDE trappings that you mentioned (code completion, formatting,
syntax colorization) can all be done in Emacs. The only problem is that Emacs
isn't configured to do a lot of the fancy IDE stuff "out of the box" per se,
but it *can* do all that stuff if you just take some time to learn how to
configure it. (I can give a few pointers on how to do that, if anyone is
interested.) Emacs is like the original IDE from before they called them
IDEs, and it's still the best, IMHO, in that it's completely customizable and
extensible.