What are the most commonly used IDEs for mobile development?

Integrated Development Environments (IDE) are software that helps developers to build applications efficiently and increase their productivity. Tools needed by developers to develop their projects are organized in a single graphical user interface that is easy to understand and use.

Below are some standard vital features of all available IDEs:

• Debugger: We use this feature to test code for bugs or errors.

• Editor: We use it to edit source code, highlight syntax errors, and color tones for variables/functions.

• Compiler: We use it to convert the code written by developers into an executable file.

• Automate code: We use it to auto-complete and auto-suggest code snippets.

Advantages

There are numerous benefits that developers can gain from using an IDE for application development. Some of them include:

• Easy installation: It is relatively easy to set up an IDE in a system.

• Less manual configuration: An IDE comes with a vast collection of pre-installed settings that lets users save time configuring the development environment.

• Standardization across tools: It offers centralized work tools for developers to use and work together coherently.

IDEs for mobile development

There are multiple kinds of IDEs for different development domains. Although all IDEs share some common characteristics, we use some of them for a specific development domain.

Let's take some examples for mobile development:

Android Studio

Google introduced this IDE for the sole purpose of Android development.

Based on JetBrain's IntelliJ Idea, Android Studio supports multiple languages, including:

• Kotlin

• C++

• Java

Android Studio has below advantages:

• It is fast with several feature packs.

• It has pre-built templates.

• It offers robust testing mechanisms.

Xcode

It's for Apple's integrated environment for iOS development. We use Xcode to help developers in building applications on macOS.

This IDE also supports multiple languages:

• C/C++/Objective-C

• Swift

• Java

• AppleScript

• Python

• Ruby

• ResEdit(Rez)

Xcode has below advantages:

• It's user-friendly.

• It offers effortless navigation.

• It serves as a good editor.

800Eclipse

Developed by International Business Machines Corporation(IBM), Eclipse offers developers a workspace to create applications that can later install plug-ins to customize the development environment.

Eclipse supports the following languages:

• Java

• C

Its plug-in system can also support other languages like Python, C++, and others.

800 Eclipse has below advantages:

• It offers a sizeable plug-in library.

• It offers modeling support.

• It's recommended for large projects.

Visual Studio Code

Microsoft's Visual Studio Code is one of the most popular IDEs for development. It offers a wide range of language support and extensions to boost developers' productivity.

Following are some of the types of projects that visual studio code supports using its built-in language support and extensions:

• Python

• C/C++/C#/Objective-C

• Swift

• React/React-Native

• Java, etc

Visual Studio has below advantages:

• It offers auto-indentation.

• It has several extensions for support.

• It's highly customizable.

Qt Creator

It is a cross-platform IDE for developing desktop, web, and mobile applications.

Developed by an organization called Qt Project, coders use this IDE to write projects in:

• Qt QML

• C++

• Python

Qt Creator has below advantages:

• It offers multi-platform support.

• It reduces costs due to simplicity.

• There is no need for a virtual machine.