> If the doohickeys your IDE does for you to improve code quality actually do so, I would expect to see evidence of it.
...and then you bring up examples of superstar programmers. They are outliers, they'd be productive in whatever. That's not where IDEs do anything, instead you should look at average programmers in average companies with large codebases. That's where IDEs shine, because they can analyze large amounts of other people's code and hint you and guide you in the right directions when interfacing with it, without forcing you to read all of it.
Another improvement IDEs offer, especially when doing Java in Eclipse, is that you're always in a compiled state, and any errors in your code are highlighted while you write. You don't have to "context switch" to another mode where you run a compiler to check what you just written for syntax errors and other errors, and then bring that information back with you when you switch back to editing. It's all there, all the time, which increases your productivity, because it decreases the time you spend on fixing small errors, spelling errors, syntax errors, etc.
In short, when I meet a developer that rejects IDEs, I have suspicions that he may be a grumpy old programmer that just refuses to go outside his comfort zone.
I don't see a difference between someone rejecting a newer better language to stick with one they know, and someone rejecting a newer better IDE to stick with an environment they know.
...and then you bring up examples of superstar programmers. They are outliers, they'd be productive in whatever. That's not where IDEs do anything, instead you should look at average programmers in average companies with large codebases. That's where IDEs shine, because they can analyze large amounts of other people's code and hint you and guide you in the right directions when interfacing with it, without forcing you to read all of it.
Another improvement IDEs offer, especially when doing Java in Eclipse, is that you're always in a compiled state, and any errors in your code are highlighted while you write. You don't have to "context switch" to another mode where you run a compiler to check what you just written for syntax errors and other errors, and then bring that information back with you when you switch back to editing. It's all there, all the time, which increases your productivity, because it decreases the time you spend on fixing small errors, spelling errors, syntax errors, etc.
In short, when I meet a developer that rejects IDEs, I have suspicions that he may be a grumpy old programmer that just refuses to go outside his comfort zone.
I don't see a difference between someone rejecting a newer better language to stick with one they know, and someone rejecting a newer better IDE to stick with an environment they know.