I spend 5 days out of a week coding for work, so I'm definitely not motivated to code a lot on weekends. This means that I do not have any software development tools installed on my personal machine. Not even IDEs.
However, being the curious little geek that I am, I often have the little urge to hop into VSCode and start coding again, whether it's for a mini project, trying out some new tech, preparing for a new article or a talk.
Since my laptop is more used to Netflix than Python now, I don't really feel like installing any dev-tools locally. Here's when Cloud9 comes to my rescue. And here's a few reason why I LOVE IT.
Super Easy to Setup
This isn't even a debate. All it takes is a single click after you fill in a couple of boxes; and you're up and running.
Gives you complete Access
I've used online coding platforms for web-development and Jupyter environments and I've been restricted from using admin commands in the shell and install anything new.
Not with Cloud9 though. It's almost complete control of the environment where I can install whichever packages I want and make use of them.
Integrated with Code Whisperer
This is definitely a great add-on if any Gen-AI code assistant is already a part of your local IDE. I don't use it as extensively but it's a handy tool to have. The results that CodeWhisperer shares are generally very accurate and easy to work with.
Environment Sharing
Much like how LiveShare works in VSCode, you can share the entire setup with your teammates or friends just by creating an IAM User for them.
Do you folks use online code editors or IDEs? Let me know your thoughts on Cloud 9 :)