ANONYMOUS XCode (were using 2.1 currently) is a usable but flawed IDE for Mac development. Its major shortcomings are: 1. No mouse-driven context sensitivity for variable display in the debugger. The debugger cant show values of variables you pass the cursor over in your source text. This is really a must-have debugger feature that virtually every other professional debugger has had for years (Metrowerks, Visual Studio, etc.). 2. There are annoying delays when checking/clearing break points and intellisense pop-ups are slow even on dual G5 workstations. 3. Text editor is slow (slight delays when hitting enter key, typing, etc). 4. Defining configuration sets (ie release vs debug) is overly complicated in how build settings are defined and managed. Apple fiddles with this part of XCode with every release and makes it more and more convoluted. 5. You frequently lose breakpoint markers after compile & run. 6. Debugger stepping is slow. 7. IDE documentation is scant and the HTML based on-line help system just plain sucks (slow, poorly written). Weve used XCode for major commercial development and trust me it doesnt rock. It is just barely above the quality that you would expect with free software. Its less robust than Apples ancient MPW, and hardly compares to Microsofts Visual Studio especially its substandard debugger. (Version 2.2) |