Idea: Cloud Based IDE

6 points by akrai ↗ HN
If I build an IDE which allows you to program collaboratively with your team (basically Google Drive/Docs for code) would you be open to using it? Just trying to come up with project ideas people would actually use.

11 comments

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You didn't mention that there are many existing projects (google 'cloud IDE') so I will say that you would need a strategy for competing with them.
Agreed. Ease of use, a more intuitive interface, etc. would be strategies for competition. Codetasty, one of the popular cloud IDEs, has about 25k users, which is a very small percent of the total number of developers in the world. So I would think there is still a large number of potential users who aren't already using a competitor's product.
Some already exist, for example repl.it with team mode.

https://repl.it/site/blog/multi

Agreed -- I appreciate the input. However, I feel that none have been widely adapted and most leave much to be desired in terms of user experience. What are your thoughts in respect to this?
Come work with us and improve it: https://repl.it/jobs We're still small/founding stage (7 people) so you can have a lot of impact. Feel free to email me directly amjad@repl.it
Glitch does this and supports collaborative editing...
There is already Cloud 9 and some other players. Some companies also were shutting down like Nitrous.
Hi. Thanks for the input. I agree that there are some other products on the market. I feel that Cloud 9 locks you into the AWS ecosystem though, as opposed to an independent IDE which allows you to choose from several different deployment options. And I looked up Nitrous. I have a few thoughts of my own about why it shut down — namely, I think they invested substantial capital to get corporate adaptation, which didn’t really happen as they expected it to, resulting in a negative financial situation and stalled growth. What are your thoughts on this?
These were only 2 examples, there are like 10 other companies out there that do the same. Cloud 9 was/is open source as well so you can install it on your own servers.
you want ideas people will use, or ideas that people will pay for?