NetBeans IDE 6.5 Release Information

The NetBeans IDE is an award-winning Integrated Development Environment available for Windows, Mac, Linux, and Solaris. The NetBeans project consists of an open-source IDE and an application platform which enable developers to rapidly create web, enterprise, desktop, and mobile applications using the Java platform, as well as PHP, JavaScript and Ajax, Ruby and Ruby on Rails, Groovy, and C/C++. It is supported by a vibrant developer community and offers a diverse selection of third-party plugins.

Release Overview

In addition to full support of all Java platforms (Java SE, Java EE, Java ME, and JavaFX), the NetBeans IDE 6.5 is the ideal tool for software development with PHP, Ajax and JavaScript, Groovy and Grails, Ruby and Ruby on Rails, and C/C++. The 6.5 release provides enhanced support for web frameworks (Hibernate, Spring, JSF, JPA), the GlassFish application server, and databases. Additionally it includes a new IDE-wide QuickSearch shortcut, a more user-friendly interface, and automatic Compile on Save.

The NetBeans IDE 6.5.1 bug fix release is a minor update to NetBeans IDE 6.5.

Get the NetBeans IDE 6.5

Documentation

Use the following documents to get started with NetBeans IDE 6.5.

Feature Highlights

PHP PHP Editor (Code completion, syntactic and semantic code highlighting)

Support for heredoc notation and PHTML

Debugging using Xdebug

Generators for MySQL database code snippets JavaScript and Ajax JavaScript Debugging on FireFox & Internet Explorer

HTTP transaction monitoring

Improved JavaScript and CSS Editor

JavaScript Library Manager incl Yahoo UI, Woodstock, jQuery, Dojo, Scriptaculous, Prototype libraries Java EE & Web Development Enhanced support for Spring, Hibernate, JSF, JSF CRUD generator, JPA (Java Persistence API)

Create RESTful web services from database tables or from JPA entities

Drag and drop SaaS services into PHP files

SQL Editor Improvements (code completion, save/recall queries, and more)

Improved Eclipse project import and synchronization for Java Web projects

Automatic Deploy on Save JavaFX Create, test, debug, profile, and deploy JavaFX projects

JavaFX editor with syntax highlighting, source navigation, code completion, code folding, javadoc pop-ups, and error detection.

Live preview of visual elements

Code snippet palette for transformations, effects and animations Groovy and Grails Develop pure Groovy apps or use Groovy in Java SE projects

Groovy editor with code completion, highlighting, and more

Grails web application framework

Open existing Grails applications without adding metadata Ruby and Rails New Test Runner interface for displaying test results

Rake improvements: Rake Runner and a pre-generated Rake file

Debugger: Conditional breakpoints and catchpoints

Ruby projects accept JVM options from command line GlassFish v3 Prelude for Web Development Modular, OSGi based architecture

Small footprint, fast startup and deployment

Support for scripting, including JRuby C/C++ Improved code completion, error highlighting, and semantic highlighting

Call graph, Memory window

Remote development

Packaging of application as tar files, zip files, or SVR4 packages



Java ME New project wizard for adding custom components to the Visual Designer Palette

New SVG UI components in the enhanced SVG Composer enable rich UI design

New Data Binding Custom Components in the Visual Designer Palette

Upgraded obfuscation tool to ProGuard 4.2 and test framework to JMUnit 1.1.0



Java Debugger New multi-threaded debugging with improved UI and work-flow

Smart Step Into with method selection right inside expression

Deadlock detection with visual indication



Java SE Automatic Compile on Save

Improved Eclipse project import and synchronization

Java Call Hierarchy

Analyze Javadoc

Swing GUI Builder can generate simple or fully qualified class names



IDE Tools and Usability CamelCase code completion

Customize formatting settings per project

One IDE-wide QuickSearch shortcut for files/symbols/types, IDE actions, options, and docs

Support for Windows UNC paths (shared network folders)

Learn more at the NetBeans IDE 6.5 New and Noteworthy page.