Geany

As an amateur programmer and web developer (I did say amateur) I’m always looking to find a good IDE that matches my workflow and that allows me to do what I want as quickly and with the least effort possible. Out of all the free IDEs I have tried in both Windows and Linux, none of them even come close to matching Geany’s pure awesomeness!

While it undoubtably has the worst looking icon ever, you can clearly see that the IDE is not overly complex or messy.

There are three main tabbed areas that you use. The big one is of course the code view, then there’s a sidebar where you can see what classes, functions, methods and objects that are available in the code, but you can also see other files in the same directory, and what documents you currently have open. At the bottom there’s an information pane, where you can see the session history, messages from the compiler, as well as a notepad, messages from Geany, and a terminal.

Among Geany’s features are:

• Code folding.
• Session saving.
• Basic IDE features such as syntax highlighting, tabs, automatic indentation and code completion.
• Simple project management (I’ve never been a big fan of IDEs that force you to structure your project in a certain way. I’m looking at you, Netbeans…)
• Build system
• Color picker (surprisingly handy during web development)
• Embedded terminal emulation
• Call tips
• Symbol lists
• Auto-completion of common constructs (such as if, else, while, etc.)

It also supports the following languages:

• ActionScript
• Ada
• ASM
• C
• C#
• C++
• CAML
• CMake
• Conf
• CSS
• D
• Diff
• Docbook
• F77
• Ferite
• Fortran
• FreeBasic
• GLSL
• Haskell
• Haxe
• HTML
• Java
• Javascript
• LaTeX
• Lua
• Make
• Markdown
• Matlab
• None
• NSIS
• Pascal
• Perl
• PHP
• Po
• Python
• R
• reStructuredText
• Ruby
• Sh
• SQL
• Tcl
• Vala
• VHDL
• XML
• YAML

The reason I love this IDE is not because it has a tonne of features, has a built-in version tracker, or automatically generates all the documentation one could ever need (in fact, it does none of that), but because it stays out of my way. It lets me write my code, read whatever messages my compiler throws at me, allows me to organize my opened files the way I want to, and allows me to compile and run my code with two clicks.

The only real downside that people like to point out is that it doesn’t allow for direct editing via SSH. The reason it doesn’t is because that would bring in more dependencies, and one of the goals of Geany is to keep it as light as possible. However, I don’t really see the problem. Whenever I’m updating files on my web hotel, I just mount the location using gvfs, and then Geany allows me to edit the files just as if they were on my local system.

If you are on the hunt for a light and blazingly fast IDE that stays out of your way, give Geany a try and let me know what you think! I’m also very interested in hearing what you think makes a good IDE, so if you have any thoughts on the matter, please leave a comment!