Is Sublime Text Really an IDE?

In recent debates, the question of whether a particular text editor qualifies as an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) has been brought up time and again. For instance, just a couple of days ago, I found myself in an argument about whether VS Code should be classified as an IDE. This sparked a broader discussion about what makes a text editor an IDE, and the boundaries between the two.

The crux of the matter lies in the distinction between a text editor and an IDE. If an editor can compile, link, and run your program through its user interface, does that make it an IDE?

According to this logic, text editors like Textpad, UltraEdit, and Notepad could also classify as IDEs. However, most people would disagree. This leads to the question: what else does an IDE offer that those programs can't?

A key feature of an IDE is the interactive debugger, which supports conditional breakpoints, variable inspection, and value editing. While web browsers can perform these tasks, they lack the ability to save the updated file back to the file system through the web server.

Sublime Text and VS Code, both standalone application tools, indeed offer:

Fancy multi-file editing with syntax coloring An interactive debugger with features like conditional breakpoints, step-through debugging, variable inspection, and value editing Extensive plugin ecosystems for extending their functionality in highly sophisticated ways

To me, Sublime Text and VS Code are IDEs, albeit with only a few functionalities moved into plugins compared to more traditional IDEs like Visual Studio or JetBrains. One significant drawback that some users might point out is the lack of support for line-numbered, syntax-colored printing, which can be extended by plugins in VS Code.

Substantially, a tool like Sublime Text is indeed an IDE when it comes to web development. Users can download packages to support syntaxes of various languages and obtain auto-complete features. Packages are available for almost every programming language.

Nonetheless, many would argue that Sublime Text is primarily a text editor. To a large extent, it is a very sophisticated and powerful text editor, incomparable to others. For those who are more comfortable in a full IDE environment, VS Code stands as a closer option, offering IDE-style features like an integrated terminal, Git, excellent diff comparisons, and Intellisense.

While I used Sublime Text for years and developed significant muscle memory, I found VS Code to be nearly immediately approachable and ultimately a better editor than Sublime Text. It strikes the perfect balance between being a speedy, uncomplicated text editor and a full-blown IDE, proving that the line between text editor and IDE can be blurry depending on how you configure and use the tool.