Best Ide for Linux

Best Ide for Linux has been one of the most challenging articles I’ve had to write. There are many excellent, yet free IDEs available today. However, most users are looking for a lightweight IDE free of ugly menus and dialogs, but with all the necessary features. That’s why I struggled getting to my final list of IDEs.

Best Linux IDEs Or Code Editors

8. Bluefish Editor

Let me start with the #10 on my list. It’s Bluefish Editor. If you are a web developer, then Bluefish editor can be a good choice. It supports many advanced features such as auto-completion of tags, auto-indentation, powerful search & replaces, and integration of external programs such as make, lint, weblint, etc.

Bluefish supports more than HTML & CSS. It has support for the following languages as well.https://238d9f0f7a01e6e91ad611d4ecd78567.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

• Ada
• ASP .NET and VBS
• C/C++
• CSS
• CFML
• Clojure
• D
• gettext PO
• Google Go
• HTML, XHTML and HTML5
• Java and JSP
• JavaScript and jQuery
• Lua

And More…

You can see the full list of features and supported languages on the official website here.

The things that I wish I had in Bluefish were the ability to edit multiple lines simultaneously. I also want to work with multiple languages within a document that the Bluefish editor does not support. So when I select Ruby, it disables the support for HTML & CSS, which are necessary to build any web application using frameworks such as Ruby on Rails.

How To Install Bluefish Editor In Linux?

Add the following PPA in Ubuntu or other Ubuntu-based distros to install Bluefish editor.

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:klaus-vormweg/bluefishsudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install bluefish

7. Geany

Geany is a lightweight IDE, and it supports all major languages. Geany aims to provide a simple and fast development environment. It has all basic features such as auto-indent, syntax highlighting, auto-complete code or snippets, etc.https://238d9f0f7a01e6e91ad611d4ecd78567.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

Geany is clean and provides a larger space to work in. So if you want a lightweight and pretty basic Linux IDE for your development, go with Geany.
Geany 0.12 has a basic plugin system. Yes, it’s basic. Unlike other IDEs that I will mention in this list, the Geany plugin is a basic system. It comes with some plugins installed that are –

• Classbuilder – Creates source files for new class types
• Export – Exports the current file into different formats
• Filebrowser – Adds a file browser tab to the sidebar
• HTML Characters – Inserts HTML character entities like ‘&’
• Save Actions – Provides different actions related to saving files (autosave, instantsave, backupcopy)
• Split Window – Splits the editor view into two windows

There is a list of plugins for Geany that you can get here. You can know there how you can get new plugins.
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You can see the complete list of features on their official page.

Geany is already available in the default repository of most Linux distributions. So you can use the package manager to install Geany. The current Geany version is v1.26, but in Ubuntu, v1.25 is available. So you can install Geany v1.25 using apt. If you want to install the latest version, download the .tar file and compile the package yourself.

sudo apt-get install geany

6. Gedit

Gedit is a Linux IDE that comes pre-installed with the most popular Linux distribution, Ubuntu. So if you’re using Ubuntu, then you would have also opened documents with Gedit.

It is a very simple and small IDE, but it can be customized to fit your working environment by installing plugins and configuring existing settings. Gedit does not provide the easiest way to install plugins (like a search engine for searching plugins), but you can download them and then install them manually. It’s not a review, so I can not mention how-tos here. You can search for Gedit plugins in Google, which will give you instructions to install them.https://238d9f0f7a01e6e91ad611d4ecd78567.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

How To Install Gedit In Linux?

Gedit is already installed in Ubuntu, and it is available in all major distributions’ default repositories. So use your distribution’s package manager to install Gedit.

5. KATE

If you use Kubuntu, then you would have used KATE. It’s the text editors that come pre-installed with Kubuntu, popular Linux distribution based on Ubuntu. KATE is a lightweight and fast text editor, and it can open multiple files simultaneously.

KATE is a simple yet powerful IDE. It supports a great number of languages and auto-detect the language sets the indentation for a document automatically. A programmer can split the window to work with multiple documents simultaneously. KATE has embedded terminal, SQL plugin, Find & replace, session support, syntax highlighting, smart comment and uncomment handling, bracket matching; KATE takes backup automatically so, in case of crash or unexpected shutdown, your work doesn’t get lost.

You can look at the complete list of features in KATE on the default page here.https://238d9f0f7a01e6e91ad611d4ecd78567.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.html

KATE is already in the default repository of most Linux distributions. So you can use your distribution package manager to install KATE. Here is how you can install KATE in Ubuntu or Ubuntu-based Linux distributions. sudo apt-get install kate

4. Eclipse

Now from here, the IDEs are even more advanced and robust. Let me start with a prevalent one, Eclipse. Eclipse is mostly written in JAVA, and it is primarily used for developing JAVA applications. But, we can extend language support by installing plugins.

So with plugin support, Eclipse becomes one of the best IDEs to develop programs in C, C++, COBOL, Fortran, Haskell, JavaScript, PHP, Perl, Python, R, Ruby, and Ruby on Rails, Scheme, and many more.

Eclipse SDK(Software Development Kit) is free and open-source, and it includes Java Development tools for Java developers.

How To Install Eclipse In Linux?

https://238d9f0f7a01e6e91ad611d4ecd78567.safeframe.googlesyndication.com/safeframe/1-0-38/html/container.htmlDownload Eclipse for your Linux distribution from their official website. It’s a compressed file, uncompress it and run ‘eclipse-inst’ to run the installer.Download

3. Brackets

Brackets is the IDE developed by Adobe developers. It is the IDE for you if you’re a web designer. There are several awesome features in Brackets that make it stand out. Brackets support plugins to extend functionalities, and installing plugins is really easy. Just click the third ICON from the top right sidebar, and it will pop up a window showing you popular plugins. You can click install to install any plugin, and you can also search for any specific plugin.

Inline Editing

Besides all the basic features such as auto-indentation, auto-completion, and code highlighting, Brackets has advanced features that help you while editing web pages and working with CSS. Some of these features are Inline editing, Editor splitting, plugins, and many more.

The inline editing allows you to edit CSS without moving to a CSS file. To edit CSS of any id or class, select that line and press CTRL + E. It opens up the window with the CSS associated with that ID.

Live Preview

If you’re using Brackets, you will no longer require your browser to inspect tools to inspect the code. Instead, you can use the Brackets Live Preview feature to show your changes live in the window. To use this feature, go to the menu >> File and click Live Preview.

Add Plugins

Brackets has tons of plugins available that provide additional functionalities to Brackets. If you’re working with JS, for example, then you can install a plugin that helps you with JS code. Sometimes you also require creating a PDF of the code then installing a plugin that does so. You can add hundreds of other features by adding plugins. Brackets is always adding new plugins to their database. Here are some of the popular Brackets Plugins –Emmet  High-speed HTML and CSS workflow.

There are several text editors out there that programmers can use to write C/C++ code, but IDE has come up to offer comprehensive facilities and components for easy and ideal programming.

[ You might also like: 23 Best Open Source Text Editors (GUI + CLI) for Linux ]

In this article, we shall look at some of the best IDE’s you can find on the Linux platform for C++ or any other programming language.

1. Netbeans for C/C++ Development

Netbeans is a free, open-source, and popular cross-platform IDE for C/C++ and many other programming languages. Its fully extensible using community-developed plugins.

Netbeans includes project types and templates for C/C++ and you can build applications using static and dynamic libraries. Additionally, you can reuse existing code to create your projects, and also use the drag and drop feature to import binary files into it to build applications from the ground.

Let us look at some of its features:

• The C/C++ editor is well integrated with the multi-session GNU GDB debugger tool.
• Support for code assistance
• C++11 support
• Create and run C/C++ tests from within
• Qt toolkit support
• Support for automatic packaging of compiled application into .tar, .zip, and many more archive files
• Support for multiple compilers such as GNU, Clang/LLVM, Cygwin, Oracle Solaris Studio, and MinGW
• Support for remote development
• File navigation
• Source inspection

2. Code::Blocks

Code::Blocks is a free, highly extensible, and configurable, cross-platform C++ IDE built to offer users the most demanded and ideal features. It delivers a consistent user interface and feels.

And most importantly, you can extend its functionality by using plugins developed by users, some of the plugins are part of the Code::Blocks release, and many are not, written by individual users not part of the Code::Block development team.

Its features are categorized into a compiler, debugger, and interface features and these include:

• Multiple compiler support including GCC, clang, Borland C++ 5.5, digital mars plus many more
• Very fast, no need for makefiles
• Multi-target projects
• A workspace that supports the combining of projects
• Interfaces GNU GDB
• Support for full breakpoints including code breakpoints, data breakpoints, breakpoint conditions plus many more
  display local functions symbols and arguments
• custom memory dump and syntax highlighting
• Customizable and extensible interface plus many more other features including those added through user-built plugins

3. Eclipse CDT(C/C++ Development Tooling)

Eclipse is a well-known open-source, cross-platform IDE in the programming arena. It offers users a great GUI with support for drag and drops functionality for easy arrangement of interface elements.

The Eclipse CDT is a project based on the primary Eclipse platform and it provides a fully functional C/C++ IDE with the following features:

• Supports project creation.
• Managed build for various toolchains.
• Standard make build.
• Source navigation.
• Several knowledge tools such as call graph, type hierarchy, in-built browser, macro definition browser.
• Code editor with support for syntax highlighting.
• Support for folding and hyperlink navigation.
• Source code refactoring plus code generation.
• Tools for visual debugging such as memory, registers.
• Disassembly viewers and many more.

4. CodeLite IDE

CodeLite is also a free, open-source, cross-platform IDE designed and built specifically for C/C++, JavaScript (Node.js), and PHP programming.

Some of its main features include:

• Code completion and offers two code completion engines.
• Supports several compilers including GCC, clang/VC++.
• Displays errors as code glossary.
• Clickable errors via the build tab.
• Support for LLDB next-generation debugger.
• GDB support.
• Support for refactoring.
• Code navigation.
• Remote development using built-in SFTP.
• Source control plugins.
• RAD (Rapid Application Development) tool for developing wxWidgets-based apps plus many more features.

5. Bluefish Editor

Bluefish is more than just a normal editor, it is a lightweight, fast editor that offers programmers IDE-like features for developing websites, writing scripts, and software code. It is multi-platform, runs on Linux, Mac OSX, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, and Windows, and also supports many programming languages including C/C++.

[ You might also like: Best Notepad++ Alternatives For Linux ]

It is feature-rich including the ones listed below:

• Multiple document interface.
• Supports the recursive opening of files based on filename patterns or content patterns.
• Offers a very powerful search and replace functionality.
• Snippet sidebar.
• Support for integrating external filters of your own, pipe documents using commands such as awk, sed, sort plus custom-built scripts.
• Supports full-screen editing.
• Site uploader and downloader.
• Multiple encoding support and many more other features.

6. Brackets Code Editor

Brackets is a modern and open-source text editor designed specifically for web designing and development. It is highly extensible through plugins, therefore C/C++ programmers can use it by installing the C/C++/Objective-C pack extension, this pack is designed to enhance C/C++ code writing and to offer IDE-like features.

7. Atom Code Editor

Atom is also a modern, open-source, multi-platform text editor that can run on Linux, Windows, or Mac OS X. It is also hackable down to its base, therefore users can customize it to meet their code writing demands.

It is fully featured and some of its main features include:

• Built-in package manager.
• Smart auto-completion.
• In-built file browser.
• Find and replace functionality and many more.

[ You might also like: Atom – A Hackable Text and Source Code Editor for Linux ]

8. Sublime Text Editor

Sublime Text is a well-defined, multi-platform text editor designed and developed for code, markup, and prose. You can use it for writing C/C++ code and offers a great user interface.

Its features list comprises of:

• Multiple selections
• Command palette
• Goto anything functionality
• Distraction-free mode
• Split editing
• Instant project switching support
• Highly customizable
• Plugin API support based on Python plus other small features

[ You might also like: How to Install and Use Sublime Text Editor in Linux ]

9. JetBrains CLion

CLion is a non-free, powerful, and cross-platform IDE for C/C++ programming. It is a fully integrated C/C++ development environment for programmers, providing Cmake as a project model, an embedded terminal window, and a keyboard-oriented approach to code writing.

It also offers a smart and modern code editor plus many more exciting features to enable an ideal code writing environment and these features include:

• Supports several languages other than C/C++
• Easy navigation to symbol declarations or context usage
• Code generation and refactoring
• Editor customization
• On-the-fly code analysis
• An integrated code debugger
• Supports Git, Subversion, Mercurial, CVS, Perforce(via plugin), and TFS
• Seamlessly integrates with Google test frameworks
• Support for Vim text editor via Vim-emulation plugin

10. Microsoft’s Visual Studio Code Editor

Visual Studio is a rich, fully integrated, cross-platform development environment that runs on Linux, Windows, and Mac OS X. It was recently made open-source to Linux users and it has redefined code editing, offering users every tool needed for building every app for multiple platforms including Windows, Android, iOS and the web.

It is feature-full, with features categorized under application development, application lifecycle management, and extend and integrate features. You can read a comprehensive features list from the Visual Studio website.

[ You might also like: How to Install Visual Studio Code on Linux ]

11. KDevelop

KDevelop is just another free, open-source, and cross-platform IDE that works on Linux, Solaris, FreeBSD, Windows, Mac OSX, and other Unix-like operating systems. It is based on the KDevPlatform, KDE, and Qt libraries. KDevelop is highly extensible through plugins and feature-rich with the following notable features:

• Support for Clang-based C/C++ plugin
• KDE 4 config migration support
• A revival of Oketa plugin support
• Support for different line editings in various views and plugins
• Support for Grep view and Uses widget to save vertical space plus many more

12. Geany IDE

Geany is a free, fast, lightweight, and cross-platform IDE developed to work with few dependencies and also operate independently from popular Linux desktops such as GNOME and KDE. It requires GTK2 libraries for functionality.

Its features list consists of the following:

• Support for syntax highlighting
• Code folding
• Call tips
• Symbol name auto-completion
• Symbol lists
• Code navigation
• A simple project management tool
• In-built system to compile and run a users code
• Extensible through plugins

13. Anjuta DevStudio

Anjuta DevStudio is a simple GNOME yet powerful software development studio that supports several programming languages including C/C++.

It offers advanced programming tools such as project management, GUI designer, interactive debugger, application wizard, source editor, version control plus so many other facilities. Additionally, to the above features, Anjuta DevStudio also has some other great IDE features and these include:

• Simple user interface
• Extensible with plugins
• Integrated Glade for WYSIWYG UI development
• Project wizards and templates
• Integrated GDB debugger
• In-built file manager
• Integrated DevHelp for context-sensitive programming help
• Source code editor with features such as syntax highlighting, smart indentation, auto-indentation, code folding/hiding, text zooming plus many more

14. The GNAT Programming Studio

The GNAT Programming Studio is a free easy to use IDE designed and developed to unify the interaction between a developer and his/her code and software.

Built for ideal programming by facilitating source navigation while highlighting important sections and ideas of a program. It is also designed to offer a high level of programming comfortability, enabling users to developed comprehensive systems from the ground.

It is feature-rich with the following features:

• Intuitive user interface
• Developer friendly
• Multi-lingual and multi-platform
• Flexible MDI(multiple document interface)
• Highly customizable
• Fully extensible with preferred tools

15. Qt Creator

Qt Creator is a free, cross-platform IDE designed for the creation of connected devices, UIs, and applications. Qt creator enables users to do more of creation than actual coding of applications.

It can be used to create mobile and desktop applications, and also connected embedded devices.

Some of its features include:

• Sophisticated code editor
• Support for version control
• Project and build management tools
• Multi-screen and multi-platform support for easy switching between build targets plus many more

16. Emacs Editor

Emacs is a free, powerful, highly extensible, and customizable, cross-platform text editor you can use on Linux, Solaris, FreeBSD, NetBSD, OpenBSD, Windows, and Mac OS X.

The core of Emacs is also an interpreter for Emacs Lisp which is a language under the Lisp programming language. As of this writing, the latest release of GNU Emacs is version 27.2 and the fundamental and notable features of Emacs include:

• Content-aware editing modes
• Full Unicode support
• Highly customizable using GUI or Emacs Lisp code
• A packaging system for downloading and installing extensions
• An ecosystem of functionalities beyond normal text editing including a project planner, mail, calendar, and newsreader plus many more
• A complete built-in documentation plus user tutorials and many more

17. SlickEdit

SlickEdit (previously Visual SlickEdit) is an award-winning commercial cross-platform IDE created to enable programmers the ability to code on 7 platforms in 40+ languages. Respected for its feature-rich set of programming tools, SlickEdit allows users to code faster with complete control over their environment.

Its features include:

• Dynamic differencing using DIFFzilla
• Syntax expansion
• Code templates
• Autocomplete
• Custom typing shortcuts with aliases
• Functionality extensions using Slick-C macro language
• Customizable toolbars, mouse operations, menus, and key bindings
• Support for Perl, Python, XML, Ruby, COBOL, Groovy, etc.

18. Lazarus IDE

Lazarus IDE is a free and open-source Pascal-based cross-platform visual Integrated Development Environment created to provide programmers with a Free Pascal Compiler for rapid application development. It is free for building anything including e.g. software, games, file browsers, graphics editing software, etc. irrespective of whether they will be free or commercial.

Feature highlights include:

• A graphical form designer
• 100% freedom because it is open source
• Drag & Drop support
• Contains 200+ components
• Support for several frameworks
• A built-in Delphi code converter
• A huge welcoming community of professionals, hobbyists, scientists, students, etc.

19. MonoDevelop

MonoDevelop is a cross-platform and open-source IDE developed by Xamarin for building web and cross-platform desktop applications with a primary focus on projects that use Mono and .Net frameworks. It has a clean, modern UI with support for extensions and several languages right out of the box.

MonoDevelop’s feature highlights include:

• 100% free and open-source
• A Gtk GUI designer
• Advanced text editing
• A configurable workbench
• Multi-language support e.g. C#, F#, Vala, Visual Basic .NET, etc.
• ASP.NET
• Unit testing, localization, packaging, and deployment, etc.
• An integrated debugger

20. Gambas

Gambas is a powerful free and open source development environment platform based on a Basic interpreter with object extensions similar to those in Visual Basic. To greatly improve its usability and feature set its developers to have several additions in the pipeline such as an enhanced web component, a graph component, an object persistence system, and upgrades to its database component.

Among its several current feature highlights are:

• A Just-in-Time compiler
• Declarable local variables from anywhere in a function’s body
• Smooth scrolling animation
• Gambas playground
• JIT compilation in the background
• Support for PowerPC64 and ARM64 architectures
• Built-in Git support
• Auto-closing of braces, markups, strings, and brackets
• A dialog for inserting special characters

21. The Eric Python IDE

The Eric Python IDE is a full-featured Python IDE written in Python based on the Qt UI toolkit to integrate with Scintilla editor control. It is designed for use by both beginner programmers and professional developers and it contains a plugin system that enables users to easily extend its functionality.

Its feature highlights include:

• 100% free and open-source
• 2 tutorials for beginners – a Log Parser and Mini Browser application
• An integrated web browser
• A source documentation interface
• A wizard for Python regular expressions
• Graphic module diagram import
• A built-in icon editor, screenshot tool, difference checker
• A plugin repository
• Code autocomplete, folding
• Configurable syntax highlighting and window layout
• Brace matching

22. Stani’s Python Editor

Stani’s Python Editor is a cross-platform IDE for Python programming. It was developed by Stani Michiels to offer Python developers a free IDE capable of call tips, auto-indentation, PyCrust shell, source index, blender support, etc. It uses a simple UI with tabbed layouts and integration support for several tools.

Stani’s Python Editor’s features include:

• Syntax colouring & highlighting
• A UML viewer
• A PyCrust shell
• File browsers
• Drag and drop support
• Blender support
• PyChecker and Kiki
• wxGlade right out of the box
• Auto indentation & completion

23. Boa Constructor

Boa Constructor is a simple free Python IDE and wxPython GUI builder for Linux, Windows, and Mac Operating Systems. It offers users with Zope support for object creation and editing, visual frame creation and manipulation, property creation and editing from the inspector, etc.

Feature highlights include:

• An object inspector
• A tabbed layout
• A wxPython GUI builder
• Zope support
• An advanced debugger and integrated help
• Inheritance hierarchies
• Code folding
• Python script debugging

24. Graviton

Graviton is a free and open-source minimalist source code editor built with a focus on speed, customizability, and tools that boost productivity for Windows, Linux, and macOS. It features a customizable UI with colorful icons, syntax highlighting, auto-indentation, etc.

Graviton’s features include:

• 100% free and open-source
• A minimalist, clutter-free User Interface
• Customizability using themes
• Plugins
• Autocomplete
• Zen mode
• Full compatibility with CodeMirror themes

25. MindForger

MindForger is a robust free and open-source performance-driven Markdown IDE developed as a smart note-taker, editor, and organizer with respect for the security and privacy of users. It offers tons of features for advanced note-taking, management, and sharing such as tag support, data backup, metadata editing, Git and SSH support, etc.

Its features include:

• Free and open source
• Privacy-focused
• Supports several encryption tools e.g. ecryptfs
• Sample mapper
• Automatic linking
• HTML preview and zooming
• Import/export
• Support for tags, metadata editing, and sorting

26. Komodo IDE

Komodo IDE is the most popular and powerful multi-language integrated development environment (IDE) for Perl, Python, PHP, Go, Ruby, web development (HTML, CSS, JavaScript), and more.

Check out some of the following key features of Komodo IDE.

• A powerful editor with syntax highlighting, autocomplete, and more.
• A visual debugger to debug, inspect, and test your code.
• Support for Git, Subversion, Mercurial, and more.
• Useful add-ons for customizing and extending features.
• Supports Python, PHP, Perl, Go, Ruby, Node.js, JavaScript, and more.
• Set your own workflow using easy file and project navigation.

27. VI/VIM Editor

Vim an improved version of VI editor, is a free, powerful, popular, and highly configurable text editor. It is built to enable efficient text editing and offers exciting editor features for Unix/Linux users, therefore, it is also a good option for writing and editing C/C++ code.

Conclusion

Linux is one of the most powerful and fastest operating system in the world. It offers a wide range of features not found in other Operating Systems. Linux Ide provide a complete set of tools for developers while helping to develop programs.