Item: NetBeans
Rating: 8
Author: dinesh audichya

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

It saves a lot of time in development. First thing I like syntax checking which saves a lot of time of code inspection for finding errors. Also, it provides a lot of shortcuts to jump which we usually do while coding and most interesting thing is its auto detection of references in the code, it makes our understanding to code very fast and efficient. Few more things, you cannot ignore are

Difference checker - very very accurate. It address our problems of code merging very efficiently

Sub version support - it changes color of files in files menu or tab, that is useful in getting information of updated files visually.

Plugins support for various frameworks.

Searching in folders etc

Pros and Cons

Provide a way to go to definition of object or methods called in derived class or anywhere. It makes our understanding of code very easy.
Difference checker - extremely well and better than meld.
Auto Syntax checking

Searching should be fast.
Launch (boot) time of netbeans is slow.
Should inherit some features of sublime, like auto code completion and selection of text in column style.
It is larger in size with respect to other editors.

Return on Investment

Increase productivity by auto suggest
Decrease debugging time with its features like syntax checking
Code merging is very useful while comparing branches

Alternatives Considered

sublime and notepad plus plus

It provides way to go to object or method declaration from its instance or next occurrence of object anywhere in the code. Also, it bundles difference checking and code version repos like svn, git and mercury. It almost have everything you need in development of your software.

Other Software Used

Microsoft Visual Studio Team System, Adobe Photoshop, C2 ATOM

Likelihood to Recommend

For Java, NetBeans best provides syntax checking, execution and difference checking, complete list of methods or functions etc. But it lacks in quick access to documentation to explore its features. Also, for HTML it is not well suited as doesn't provide preview. Also, you cannot use it for any language like we see in notepad plus plus. So, for python i will need to use different editor even I just want to see python code in proper coloring.

Why Use NetBeans for PHP?

Overall Satisfaction with NetBeans