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Comment by fro | Hacker News Reader

Seems like overkill. Part of why Node is great and so easy to get started with is that all you need is a browser, a text editor, and the terminal. I suppose for people that already use VS this is good, but maybe we should encourage them to write Node apps outside of that environment instead of shoving Node into a giant IDE.

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There's more to development than a text editor, though. Sometimes you do want debugging. And maybe you want syntax highlighting in your REPL. And, perhaps, you'd like some profiling to figure out how to make your Node app run faster.

Yes, and most of those things are already available as modular open source tools that fit well in the Node ecosystem. Encouraging people to use one giant, closed, monolithic program for all of those purposes is not a good step forward for Node.

I think you are failing to make the distinction that the Node community isn't encouraging devs to use Visual Studio; Visual Studio is helping its community to use Node.

I'd disagree. It allows people to use the tools they're most comfortable with, instead of imposing a singular idea as far as what the blessed environment is. Obviously, some people don't like the string of tools together approach, or else this wouldn't have been developed.

Well, they're not taking that away from you. You can still get started with the basics. But even node apps can get big.

It's the debugging story I'm really digging here. Being able to just set a breakpoint and hit f5 is real exciting as opposed to having to type "debugger" in your code and then sit around for ages. It's a shame I do all my node work on a Mac.

I'm guessing this won't be available for VS express?

Just like Python tools for VS it probably won't work with VS express, but it probably will work with the freely available VS shell (that is just the bare Visual Studio IDE without any existing language support in it). So you can get the whole package for free, but obviously only this node.js plugin will be open source.

Unfortunately, it won't work with Visual Studio Shell. The problem is that NTVS relies on the JavaScript language service that comes in the box in VS (for web projects and Win8 Store apps) for syntax highlighting and code completion, and that support is not present in Shell. That said, we're trying to come up with something here similar to the free PTVS package, so stay tuned!

Here's the work item that tracks this: https://nodejstools.codeplex.com/workitem/520

jules, PTVS is actually available as a standalone PTVS+VS package. That's basically "Python Express" built using the VS Shells.

NTVS Express is a great idea, and I've opened a ticket for it already in case anyone wants to upvote: https://nodejstools.codeplex.com/workitem/520

thx

WebMatrix 3 makes a decent free Node/PHP IDE. It isn't as polished as this looks to be and nothing really beats VS proper as it were but it makes a pretty convincing run at being second place behind VS Express and at least supports a basic idea of plugins/extensions.

you have a point. i dont think node in a fat IDE is for everyone / every scenario. i look at it as just another tool in the dev's toolbox. ideal (imho) is a decent web-based tool or light-weight editor plus a capable IDE for larger scale apps that need complex debugging, profiling, mutli-lingual project, etc. support.

for a lighter weight solution, check out: http://channel9.msdn.com/Series/Visual-Studio-Online-Monaco/...

> I suppose for people that already use VS this is good

Yeah, instead of introduction Node this way, they should have specified this was an introducing to node.js Tools for Visual Studio.

Ahhh... a browser, a text editor (emacs for me) and a terminal. That's my ideal dev environment. I've never been able to figure out IDEs.

You are free to keep on doing UNIX System V style of work.

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