Altova XMLSpy vs. Microsoft Visual Studio Code

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Altova XMLSpy
Score 9.9 out of 10
N/A
The XMLSpy JSON and XML Editor from Altova is designed to give developers the tools they need to build the most sophisticated applications with its graphical schema designer, code generation, file converters, debuggers, and profilers for working with XSD, XSLT, XQuery, XBRL, and SOAP.N/A
Microsoft Visual Studio Code
Score 9.1 out of 10
N/A
Microsoft offers Visual Studio Code, a text editor that supports code editing, debugging, IntelliSense syntax highlighting, and other features.
$0
Pricing
Altova XMLSpyMicrosoft Visual Studio Code
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Altova XMLSpyMicrosoft Visual Studio Code
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Altova XMLSpyMicrosoft Visual Studio Code
Top Pros

No answers on this topic

Top Cons
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Altova XMLSpyMicrosoft Visual Studio Code
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User Ratings
Altova XMLSpyMicrosoft Visual Studio Code
Likelihood to Recommend
8.0
(1 ratings)
8.7
(88 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
9.4
(2 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(5 ratings)
Support Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.7
(23 ratings)
User Testimonials
Altova XMLSpyMicrosoft Visual Studio Code
Likelihood to Recommend
Altova
Altova XMLSpy is an excellent tool for creating/designing new XML schemas (XSDs) using a visual layout tool and helps developers and architects work with XML and JSON documents, understand and validate and diagnose issues with XML and JSON documents. It is not well suited for working with other data formats, such as YAML or CSV.
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Microsoft
Microsoft Visual Studio Code is highly recommended for the development of systems and / or complex applications entrusted to work teams under a specific methodology, and its use is also recommended for the maintenance of previously developed applications.
It is not recommended as a learning environment for developers with little experience as the learning curve would be too high
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Pros
Altova
  • XML schema (XSD) design and maintenance
  • XML document validation
  • XML and JSON document reformatting and pretty-printing
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Microsoft
  • Very accessible -- it's compatible with all platforms and environments, free to install, and fast to open
  • Strong native support for many languages, and very strong extensibility to provide advanced language features
  • Git integration is top-notch, often displaying a better history, diff, and merge interface that is otherwise available in version control systems
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Cons
Altova
  • Application performance could be improved, especially initial load speed
  • Better support for large document handling (documents hundreds or thousands of megabytes in size)
  • Remove all nagging popups to upgrade
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Microsoft
  • Lack of button bar like ones found in Visual Studio.
  • Lack of integrated help that could link to YouTube, Channel 9, or other Microsoft videos on how to learn about features.
  • Integration with Team Foundation Server.
  • Would like to see it having some sort of integration into a Web API testing harness.
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Likelihood to Renew
Altova
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
Solid tool that provides everything you need to develop most types of applications. The only reason not a 10 is that if you are doing large distributed teams on Enterprise level, Professional does provide more tools to support that and would be worth the cost.
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Usability
Altova
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
This is a tool for programmers and it works like many others. If you are in the development world already then you will be sailing in no time with Microsoft Visual Studio Code. It is also great for new developers and it is very easy to use and you can get all the tools you need in one place as you begin to learn.
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Support Rating
Altova
No answers on this topic
Microsoft
Active development means filing a bug on the GitHub repo typically gets you a response within 4 days. There are plugins for almost everything you need, whether it be linting, Vim emulation, even language servers (which I use to code in Scala). There is well-maintained official documentation. The only thing missing is forums. The closest thing is GitHub issues, which typically has the answers but is hard to sift through -- there are currently 78k issues.
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Alternatives Considered
Altova
XMLSpy does not have many capable competitors, it is the market leader and other alternatives do not provide the tools we rely on.
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Microsoft
[Microsoft] Visual Studio Code beats the competition due to its extensibility. Their robust extensions architecture combined with the plethora of mostly free extensions written by the community can't be beaten. The fact that this tool itself is provided by a world-recognized company, Microsoft, free of charge is phenomenal. The goodwill garnered by them is immeasurable. Other tools I've used were missing features or were just too rigid, too complicated, or too unsophisticated for my liking. The fact that VS Code is easy to mold to my will with the right extensions seals the deal.
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Return on Investment
Altova
  • XMLSpy has made us much more efficient when designing new integrations
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Microsoft
  • Positive impact on minimizing time wasted by employees with software installation and setup
  • Positive impact on reducing spend on software licensing
  • Positive impact on minimizing time used to manage different applications for different purposes - this performs all of the functions we need in basic coding
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ScreenShots