Ruby on Rails use an IDE or stick with a good text editor

Question

I am an experienced programmer and an enthusiastic new adopter of Ruby on Rails. I'm mostly using a mac, unix, and textMate, to get the job done. I've written some small apps on my own and am excited by the potential to write something more complex.

Should I commit time and resources to using (learning) an IDE for RoR? Please respond if you are someone who has used a configuration similar to mine and an IDE for RoR.

This is not a question about which IDE is the best, or which platform is preferred for RoR.

I'm more concerned with the cost/benefit of committing to any IDE that is built over a broad set of changing and evolving tools.

In addition, the detailed understanding of file structure and directory layout that just using a text editor fosters seems like a good skill to continue to grow as I broaden my use of the features in rails.

And... HTML, CSS, and ruby, are all well assessed with text editors that have the most basic formatting features.

On the plus side, I find IDEs that offer hand holding (templates, autocomplete text, etc.) for generating unit testing (TDD) with RSpec are appealing as this is an area in which I have limited experience.

My big worry is that I'll commit to an IDE, write an application, and then get stuck when ruby, rails, or some other key component I am using updates in a way that the IDE folks never anticipated. Using an IDE and periodically editing files or resources outside the particular IDE paradigm has burned me in the past. Previous gotchas have also included language features that an IDE did not account for well, thereby limiting development flexibility.

I'm also not sure if "local development"<->"remote server" integration/mirroring and version control are best handled through an IDE interface. git has impressed me as efficient and easy to use.

Is there a best approach here for undertaking a larger project, or are both methods O.K. with their associated caveats? Are my concerns about using an IDE outdated or warranted?

Thanks in advance for your comments -

Perry

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Addendum: Seems there is some overlap here: Will using an IDE with Rails hinder me?

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Conclusion: Lots of good food for thought. Thanks all. I am glad I began my Ruby and RoR learning with unix and a text editor. It's a great combo for the text laden environment that RoR lives in. rvm, git, rspec, gem management, and code generation are all well done from a command line. They made working through Hartl's Rails Tutorial, and playing with examples from "The Well Grounded Rubyist," easy. I am going to check out Rubymine's 30-day free trial. I expect the IDE will add to my initial understanding in (+) ways. Integrated unit testing was a big factor in my decision to try the IDE as I have stumbled with Rspec. I don't think my time (or money) have been wasted with textMate. Both were well spent.

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ADDENDUM 2
I used Ruby Mine for 30 days. It was O.K. I did decide to stick with:

• MacBook Pro
• TextMate
• git

... and they are all very good. I can switch very quickly between testing, coding, browsing, and version control. TextMate's 'Bundles' occasionally help as a CSS, Ruby, and Rails code reference.

I might also add that most of my 'troubles' stemmed from thinking I could just pick-up Ruby along the way. Nope. I had to read and experiment and read some more. "Getting" Ruby has really opened up Rails for me. If you too want to improve your Ruby, these helped me:

• The Well Grounded Rubyist
• Meta Programming Ruby

Answer 1

Most rubyists use a plain editor. What you need is the ability to jump to specific files easily, syntax highlighting, and really thats about it. Ruby is fairly succinct, and our class hierarchies are fairly flat, so you dont usually end up needing a lot of what an IDE offers.

Personally, I use vim with a bunch of plugins, and find myself more productive then I ever was in my Visual Studio years. I picked up a license for RubyMine awhile back during a sale, it is a fantastic IDE, and would probably use it if I couldnt use an editor for some reason.

If you want a recommendation, I would say vim with three plugins - Rails.vim (make vim more aware of rails and its structure), Command-T (great for jumping around between files quickly), and NERDTree - a graphical tree based file browser.

Like I said early, those capabilities are the most important thing for whatever you choose, so even if you dont go vim, make sure the editor you choose can do those things. CommandT especially, being able to fuzzy-find files at a keystroke will save you endless hours of clicking through gui file browsers over the course of your career.