I started a computer club at my son’s middle school. One of the limitations is that no software can be installed, and there are no development tools on the computers. So I set out to find web based IDE’s where we can write and run code via the web browser. This is what I found.
W3Schools.com
I started with w3schools.com, which is a favorite reference site of mine that contains tutorials on pretty much every web technology imaginable, including HTML, JavaScript, SQL, CSS, PHP, XML, SOAP, etc.
For the client side technologies they have a great “try it yourself” functionality where you can enter JavaScript, etc. and have it display the output for you.
The process is to edit in the window on the left, then click the “Edit and Click Me” button to view the output on the right. There is no debugging or error reports, you just see what comes out. Makes it really hard to track down JavaScript typos.
It would appear some of w3schools content isn’t completely accurate, so use with caution.
If you are developing with HTML/CSS & JavaScript and one of the common public frameworks then check out JSFiddle. It offers a resizable split view where you can edit your HTML, JavaScript and CSS all independently, and then see the combined result. Additionally it offers the option to save, share and reload “fiddles”.
Other nice features include:
- Syntax highlighting
- TidyUp code formatting
- JSLint validation
- Access to a wide selection of JavaScript frameworks
- Discussion and forks of public fiddles
It is currently in Alpha with a limited number of public alpha accounts available
This is an honest to goodness web based IDE and compiler. Type the code with syntax highlighting, compile it, provide input,
What is ideone?
Ideone is something more than a pastebin; it’s an online compiler and debugging tool which allows to compile and run code online in more than 40 programming languages, including Pascal.
How to use ideone?
Choose a programming language, enter your source code and input data into text boxes. Then check or uncheck run code (whether to execute your program) and private (whether not to list your code in the recent codes page) checkboxes, click the submit button and watch your snippet being executed.
JS Bin is an open source collaborative JavaScript debugging tool.
Similar it offers HTML and JavaScript editing and previewing. It has a nice and clean user interface and also includes common JavaScript frameworks.
Error checking is provided by the JSHint project. Like JSLint with the addition of an API.
JSBin is completely open source, so you can download it and implement it on your own server.
Snipt is your collection of frequently used commands or code snippets.
Because even Subversion gurus forget the ’svn merge’ syntax sometimes.
It’s good for storing small pieces of code or commands that you use rather frequently, and will probably forget.
Not really an IDE. No running or debugging. It will syntax highlight the code you upload though.
Pastie is a lot like Snipit. You can paste in bits of code and it will provide syntax highlighting and the ability to share it with others.
Pastie syntax highlights a number of different languages, but offers no execution, debugging, etc. Useful for sharing code. You can also search, but it is a plain text search and you don’t specific which language you are searching for, nor is there any useful meta information like description, title, etc.
A few others that I didn’t look to closely at include:
- csdesk.com – Similar to jsbin and jsfiddle, except focused on HTML and CSS.
- Cloud9IDE.com – JavaScript focused. Requires a sign up for a 30 day trial.
- CodeRun.com- I had high hopes, but it didn’t work in most browsers I tested it in. This one supports development in Silverlight, C#, PHP, ASP.NET and a number of other technologies, with syntax highlighting, debugging, etc. Will keep my eye on this one.
