Java “must-have” development tools

Question

Java doesn't seem nearly as "well served" as .NET with tool lists on the Internet. There's James Selvakumar’s article entitled "Must have tools for a Java Developer" which has items I don't agree with. (Do FireFox and MySQL qualify as development tools?).

There is also the Java Power Tools book.

Assuming you already have a half-decent IDE and source safe repository, what three Java tools are on your "must-have" list?

Update (03/11) : Summary of the answers:

• IntelliJ IDEA 3
• Hudson 3
• JIRA 3
• JProfiler 2
• Cobertura 2
• Maven 2
• JUnit, preferably along with a mocking framework (e.g. Mockito, EasyMock) 2
• ANT + CI server 2
• yourkit profiler 2
• NetBeans profiler 1
• FindBugs 1
• javap 1
• wireshark/wsmonitor/SoapUI/Fiddler 1
• trac 1
• pack200 1
• Sonar 1
• gvim 1
• make 1
• Bugzilla 1
• VMware with JBOSS 1
• JAD 1
• JClasslib 1
• clover 1
• bamboo 1

Answer 1

javap. :-) Lets you figure out exactly how code gets translated, especially if you're writing code in, say, Jython or Groovy.

Answer 2

My only "must have" items are gvim and make. And Arrogant Bastard Ale.

Answer 3

1. Testing tools: JUnit, preferably along with a mocking framework (e.g. Mockito).
2. A build tool of choice.

Answer 4

I use a tool (that I developed) which tracks everything I do (and lets me quickly inject notes) to create sort of a journal that I can then use when returning to things. It helps me track all those little ideas and realizations, etc.

The same tool also "pushes" things that I tagged in my functions (assumptions, notes, "do" and "don't do" directives). When when I look at a bunch of calls, calls to targets that have that information are decorated, helping me remember that there are certain things I need to know aobut that service.

Answer 5

I don't want a half-decent IDE, I want IntelliJ IDEA.

Also a decent profiler is very useful. The NetBeans one is usable and free, but JProfiler is preferable.

EDIT: My 3 recommended free tools would be Hudson, FindBugs and Cobertura.

Answer 6

1) Xemacs + IDE(eclipse, idea or netbeans) with powerful debugger like Firebug, etc
2) yourkit profiler
3) wireshark/wsmonitor/SoapUI/Fiddler

Answer 7

JIRA. Admittedly not a a Java-specific tool (though it is written in Java).

Answer 8

Hudson, Maven, trac

Answer 9

emacs (it qualifies for at least 3 tools).

Answer 10

Eclipse with the Test & Performance Tools Platform installed.

Answer 11

pack200. Expect a dramatic size reduction of your distribution jar files. Even your 50 MB rt.jar can compress to less than 5 MB using pack200 + 7zip (or NSIS installer that also uses LZMA). Nice for distributing applications via web.

Answer 12

I agree with most of the @Dan Dyer choices. I prefer Yourkit for a profiling and I'd add JAD, JClasslib and UMLet (not really Java specific) into the mix.

Answer 13

• IntelliJ IDEA (Anything else is wasting my time)
• ANT + CI server (Hudson)
• Issues tracking system. Bugzilla works well. Jira is fine.
• Profiler, JProfiler

Answer 14

I really like to work on a project with Maven2 (for build management), Hudson (for Continuous Integration) and Sonar (for software quality control).

Answer 15

1. Intellij IDEA
2. Ant
3. JUnit and EasyMock
4. VMware with JBOSS
5. Jira.
6. Cobertura and QALab.

Answer 16

Next to the big list of tools, I'd like to add clover and bamboo which are both great products.

Answer 17

Just a thought but in the summary of answers can you link all those tools to their respective homepages ? Would be very helpful. :)

Answer 18

nowdays my java toolbox contains:

• netbeans
• maven (with plugins for cobertura, findbugs, PMD)
• ant (sometimes :))
• junit 4.5 (theories)
• mockito
• antlr
• glassfish
• hudson
• mercurial is my SCM of choice slowly migrating from subversion

Answer 19

my $0.02 worth...

• eclipse (or intellij if i'm doing my own stuff)
• maven
• hudson
• jad (and jadclipse plugin for eclipse)
• soapui (for testing web services)
• tortoise (as the svn client in windows, subclipse in eclipse)
• jira (crucible and fisheye if you have a generous manager) all from atlassian
• dbvisualizer (database client, but written in java :-)
• archiva as my choice maven repository in the enterprise
• stackoverflow bookmark :-)

Answer 20

• IntelliJ IDEA + Vi plugin (best of breed)
• yourkit profiler (best of breed)
• Hudson
• JUnit or TestNG
• Ant + CI Server

Answer 21

Jester does some "semantic" code coverage by making small changes in your source code and checks if you test still pass. Frankly, Jester tests your tests.