Oracle Wednesday will give developers their first look at a new version of its JDeveloper integrated development environment for Oracle 9i, the first full release of the toolset in almost two years. The new IDE is optimized for Oracle's 9i application server but also is compatible with other J2EE-based app servers.

Download JDeveloper BETA.

Read Oracle Gives Developers Sneak Peek At New Java IDE.

As the internet operating environment shapes up as the next generation OS, the underlying database becomes ever more critical. Larry is King of this HILL and guess what, just as Evil BILL used the last GEN OS to conquer al and sundry so will Larry....

Ladies and gents the APP SERVER is the OS ... and withot the db server its null...

Just a thought ....

133 megs for the IDE!

"Lean and mean", said Ellison at JavaOne...

At least it is leaner than WebGain Visual Cafe, which is what I use for WebLogic work.

The last time I looked at WebGain it was more like WeightGain. What OS's does WebGain run on? When can we expect a Solaris/Linux/Mac version?

I don't know what Oracle's offering is like but as soon as I get the time I will download the 100 something MB's and give it a try.

William

I liked it - WeightGain :-) VisualCafe 2.0 was good
though.

Wasn't Ellison talking about their J2EE product, OC4J at JavaOne? That is 10MB to download and wicked easy to use.
Sounds to me that you're confusing the IDE with the server.

onya boonie.

Is JDeveloper still Borland's JBuilder codebase, like the predecessors?

I would so understand the Solari/Linux compatibility...


just my 0.02


Luca Botti

9i is written in pure Java by the look of it and from what I've been told.

From what I understand they've dumped all the Borland code for their own so it no longer has that JBuilder look and feel, although it is quite similar.

It's quite a nice product to use (I've used the Beta), and it's got UML modelling built in (not as good as Rose but really good for real time code updates), as well as a memory profiling tool (very useful) and integration with source control (not sure how good this is).

I think that Oracle might be trying to build a 'killer app' IDE here - I mean it's got all the features you want and as far as I know you can download a fully featured version for free (unlike JBuilder etc.). It also has all of the BC4J framework built in, with integrated wizards in JDev to help you create n-tier apps very quickly. I wouldn't be surprised if Oracle get quite a bit of market share as a result. I guess their intention is to get everyone onto their App Server over time. It'll be interesting to see what happens...

The version of JDev 9i that you can download is free because its a beta. They might end up having a trial version once its released but you can bet they wont release this tool for free once its done. In fact I'm sure, like all of their other software, that they'll charge quite heavily.

My understanding was that it would be available for 'free' to download, but if you used it commercially then you would have to pay your licence fees as per normal. JBuilder is different in that unless you pay the money up front then you don't get a fully featured version.

I saw this as a part of Oracle's push to get you to use their product and thus gain market share. I may have misunderstood the Oracle guy who was explaining it to me though.

You can get a fully functional 30 day trial version of JBuilder Enterprise if you call the local sales rep.

Personally I've never been impressed with any of Oracle's development tools. It's not their strength. This of course may be different but it's going to take some time before Oracle makes any headway in either the App Server market or tools. Of course they need the products that can do it.

Right now it's still a battle between BEA and IBM with everyone else a distant third.

A comment on Oracle's ability to leverage their DB market with the app server is also not certain. The fact that Oracle backtracked once already (replacing the core Oracle 9i with Orion) makes for uncertainty. Also Oracle was pushing business components as opposed to EJBs for the longest time. The problem is that Oracle lacks focus in any area outside the core DB market.

My take is that BEA is still the one to beat and it's going to get more and more difficult to do so over time. They've been very aggressive in product announcements and simply do not make mistakes like the others.

Wait and see.

With all due respect, Bob, I recommend you download and try Oracle9i JDeveloper Beta before making blanket statements.
We've spent the last two years reworking the entire product and it's a completely Oracle effort, no more Borland code.

(( Frustratingly for us on the development team, a legal agreement made with Borland back several years ago includes a clause that we must keep the Borland copyright on our spash screen until the end of 2001. After that, you'll see it disappear to reflect the actual state of affairs: JDeveloper IS NOT JBuilder. It's must better!)

And despite your comments about Oracle not having a strength in tools, I'll let the tool speak for itself. It has a combination of features for J2EE developers that is unparalled by any other IDE on the market. With features from real-time UML Class and Activity Modeling (with roundtrip-code generation both so simple java classes as well as persistent business components) all the way through to debugging, J2EE deployment, profiling, code optimization, WebDAV, and SCM support. All in one killer IDE.

Right now JDeveloper 3.2.3 (our production release) comes with a free license for development use. I don't see that policy changing for JDeveloper 9i, so developers will simply be able to download it and use it.

Give it a spin, then criticise or praise it with authority! :-)

http://otn.oracle.com/product/jdev

If you don't want to download it, there are several Web-based "ScreenCam" demos (called "ViewLets") that will give you a taste for the wide spectrum of features we support.

We're getting great feedback on the new Beta in our JDev 9i Beta support Forum, too, if you want online tech support for the tool.

http://technet.oracle.com:89/cgi-bin/forumdisplay.cgi?action=topics&number=104

_____________________________________________________________________
Steve Muench - Developer, Product Manager, XML Evangelist, Author
JDeveloper Team -- BC4J, XSQL, Web Services -- Oracle Corporation
"Building Oracle XML Applications" - www.oreilly.com/catalog/orxmlapp

Steve-

Jdeveloper 9i or not Oracle's track record with anything other than the database (in this case meaning dev tools and app server) speaks for itself in my mind: the stuff is garbage. Designer is a horribly buggy application. Developer isnt anything to write home about either. JDeveloper (pre 9i...btw...love the jump from 3.x to 9.x) hasnt been bad but then again its still based on JBuilder (which until v3.5 wasnt much to write home about either). Look at the app server: Oracle went on and on about the Java features and now they license Orion because the Java stuff isnt any good (and they recommend in the docs not to use it but Orion). Aside from the database it seems that the only time Oracle does anything decent is when they license someone elses code or use open source software. I downloaded JDev 9i beta to give it a shot. Maybe it will change my mind but I'm not holding my breath. Oracle's desire to include everything 'in the box' so far hasnt given them a best-of-breed solution. Does the UML generator work (via any mechanism) with other modelling tools? If so what good is it?

I've used jBuilder Enterprise in the past and – like others - I have been skeptical of Oracle’s development tools. So I have to say that I was pleasantly surprised by this jDeveloper 9i beta IDE ... there is a lot of stuff here (everything but the kitchen sink?).

As mentioned above, it has support for UML classes and activity diagrams (with the ability to integrate with Oracle' workflow engine as a probable future), Java development tools (editor, compiler, and debugger), database development tools (going to get more TOAD-like functionality over time?). There is so much stuff in here it is hard to describe - let alone understand how it all fits together. It will definitely take some time to learn how some of the more sophisticated functionality is supposed to work (e.g., workflow based application development with activity diagrams, etc.).

This is a beta release and there are still plenty of rough edges. For example, the integrated configuration management / version control functionality is currently based on Oracle's repository. The ability to extend the IDE (like jBuilder) is apparently disabled at this point in time, so we can’t use other configuration management tools (e.g., CVS, PVCS). Hopefully this will change in the final release.

The ideas behind the jDeveloper 9i integration are really intriguing – the tight integration of the key functionality provided by best-of-breed development tools (Rose, jBuilder Enterprise, TOAD, jProbe, CVS, … take your pick) could make the case for jDeveloper 9i quite compelling. I believe that specialized tools (e.g., Rose, TOAD, etc.) will probably continue to offer their advantages, but jDeveloper 9i may offer significant advantages through tight integration of this key functionality – especially compared to other “enterprise class” IDEs (jBuilder, Visual Café, Visual Age, etc.).

Definitely check it out … what you see may change they way you think about Java IDEs.

I have downloaded the tool and played with it for some time, it looks nice and everything, but… what if I want to develop for BEA Weblogic, I‘m not even mentioning IBM? I know it is not the major purpose of this IDE, but it would nice if I can create and manage the weblogic-ejb-jar.xml deployment descriptor at least, and the rest can be done by ANT build tool. If this is a real IDE then it shouldn't be 100% tighten to the Oracle APP Server, it should be open or other wise we are coming back to MS problem, which is - we have the best tools but only if you stay with us.

Vladimir,

Good point. It is certainly part of our strategy to be able to develop, deploy and debug on any standard J2EE Server.

In the 9i beta we have focussed on features for Oracle9iAS first. With some manual steps, you can deploy to other J2EE servers as well. In future releases we will increase our support for the most popular J2EE app servers.

As an example of our commitment in this area, we have support in JDeveloper 3.2 for deploying on WebLogic (Some of our customers have deployed production applications this way).

Thanks,

Roel Stalman
JDeveloper Product Management

Hye,
I have a question about JDeveloper license. I've already tried to contact Oracle, but I didn't got much luck.
I would like to know if small enterprises have to buy any kind of license, since I've read somewhere that Oracle JDeveloper is free for development.


P.S: Sorry my bad english

Thanks in advance

Hello


I read that isn't based on jBuilder, and I think that the wrote the all thing from 0.

Did Oracle use an opensource IDE like NetBeans as their base?

I think that would have been very good for Oracle and everybody.

I can't down load the JDeveloper Beta. It always returns a 0 byte jdev9ibeta.zip.

What's wrong with it? Do they really want people to try it?

Greetings,

It looks like nothing avialable from the Oracle right now to download. I tried different things and all of them returned nothing.

Regards,

Taras