JetBrains IntelliJ IDEA Blog

Did you know what in IntelliJ IDEA 10.5 you can mark a directory as a Source Root or a Test Source Root right from the Project View?

In IntelliJ IDEA 11 you also can create a library without opening the Project Structure dialog: just select jar files in the Project Structure and choose ‘Add as Library…‘ in the context menu:

The IDE will create a new library and will add it to the dependencies list of the selected module:

Grab the new build here and start playing with the Play! framework. Here you’ll find a few related screencasts. The new build also has significant changes in PostgreSQL syntax support.

The new build also includes the first step of a visual redesign of the UI (starting from the navigation bar).

Please download the new build, check out the complete release notes and send us feedback through the issue tracker.

Recently I realized that javadoc editing may be easily improved by introducing some handy little features. After using them for a couple of days, I can say they are cool, so, it’s time to share them with you. And you can try them all in the latest IntelliJ IDEA 11 EAP.

The main idea is to ease fulfilling method javadoc stubs that IntelliJ IDEA generates for you:

• Smart “End”
  Pressing End when the caret is located after javadoc parameter name relocates it to the position where description should start. It respects ‘Align parameters description’ code style setting as well (‘Code Style | Javadoc | Alignment’).
  Before:
  After:
• Smart “Enter”
  We rather often need to write a multi-line javadoc parameter description. Now pressing Enter preserves previous line indent if a corresponding option is enabled (‘Editor | Smart Keys | Enter | Smart indent’).
  Before:
  
  After:
  
• Smart complete statement
  Corresponding support is added for smart complete statement (Ctrl+Shift+Enter by default).
  Before:
  
  After:
  

We made available next build of Early Access Preview of IntelliJ IDEA 11. You can download the EAP build and check the complete release notes.
As usual, your feedback is welcome in the issue tracker.

IntelliJ IDEA 11 introduces a new feature that makes it much easier to design UI layouts for Android applications — UI layouts preview. Just open some layout xml file from your Android project and you’ll see a new Preview tool window. 

Preview is updated as you edit the file, so you can see the changes immediately. Many different options such as screen size, target platform version, theme, etc. are available for tuning what you see.

Custom view components are also supported and shown correctly. But since IntelliJ IDEA uses class files from your output directory to render such components, you have to build your project first.

Please note, that layout preview feature is under development, so we really need to know your opinions. You’re welcome to try it in the latest Nika EAP and let us know what you think. If the IDE doesn’t preview some of your layout xml files, please submit bugreports with these files attached.

When exploring a code, sometimes you end up in a decompiled code from a JAR for which there’s no source code attached. Previously you had to:

1. go find the source JAR on the Web
2. download it to your disk
3. go to your project structure settings
4. attach the JAR to the library of interest

A bit too much, isn’t it? Now (in the next EAP) IntelliJ IDEA 11 does it all for you:

When you debug JavaScript code in IntelliJ IDEA 11 you can see the most important properties of an object without expanding its node:

By default the ‘id’ and ‘name’ properties are shown for each object but you can add your own properties in Settings | Debugger | JavaScript:

This feature works for both Firefox and Chrome JS debuggers.

Let us know what you think!

We’ve recently been gathering assorted open-source projects that exist in our company under a single roof — the JetBrains organization on GitHub. One of the latest additions to the organization is an official mirror of the IntelliJ IDEA Community Edition codebase.

You’re welcome to fork the codebase and send us pull requests with your contributions. We’ll review them and merge them if they’re accepted. Please don’t forget to follow our code conventions and sign the contributor agreement if your contributions are non-trivial.

As you may know, IntelliJ IDEA has high-class support for creating Flash, Flex and AIR applications as well as HTML5 interactive content. As more and more IntelliJ IDEA users adopted these languages, we realized that they deserved a dedicated product that would meet their specific needs and make them even more productive. So today we’re very excited to introduce Astella — our brand new IDE for Sprite masters, frameRate hunters and Canvas gurus. And if you’re just learning the language and the platform, remember: a great tool is half the battle : )
Astella has an outstanding level of ActionScript, MXML, JavaScript, HTML5 and CSS coding support, a Flex (and JavaScript?) debugger and FlexUnit test runner. It bundles an ActionScript profiler and a MXML Designer. And there’s more: Astella has a customized Flash/Flex project configuration interface that allows you to easily configure your project, no matter its size or complexity! At the same time, it’s lightweight and speedy and will never interfere with what you’re doing.

Astella Early Access Program is now open! Please download these builds at http://confluence.jetbrains.net/display/AS/Astella+EAP.
We’re looking forward to your feedback at Astella forums and issue tracker.

Check for updates at the Astella blog: http://blog.jetbrains.com/astella, follow @AstellaIDE on twitter and Facebook!

Develop with pleasure!
JetBrains Astella Team