Random Java Bits

IDE

The best IDE is of course IntelliJ IDEA. The Community Edition is actually just fine.

Regarding using my favorite editor, VS code, it’s actually (for once) recommended to use IntelliJ over VS code. The intellisense is just superior. Not many Java devs use VS code, but this might be because I can’t configure it properly.

Build Tools

Maven and Gradle are the two main build tools. Gradle seems a bit easier to use in my experience.

Managing Versions

jenv is a tool for switching versions. It’s more similar to Rbenv for ruby, rather than NVM for node. You still need to download different versions manually and tell jenv where to find them. You can use sdkman to install the different versions. You can also install with brew and just point jenv to the different installations.

Versions prior to Java 11 are versioned strangely starting with 1, so, for example, Java 8 is version 1.8.

Resources

• Quarkus, good modern framework -> quarkus