[ahachete]

> The things I mentioned (local symbol auto-complete, reference-chasing, global go-to-symbol) are things that modern code editors do by default for any programming language

Sure, they can. But as said, they are still quite basic stuff compared to what IDEs do. It's better than nothing, but they don't contribute to productivity as IDEs do.

> Honestly, I think I just... haven't ever felt the need to do these things in Java?

This is surprising for me, but hey, each of us are a different use case.

My recommendation is to try an IDE extensively, and then you decide what suits you better. I did this, and never looked back (for Java programming; I'm still using Vim extensively for general text edition, for example).

[softsound]

As someone who really likes IDE's especially since Java has such good free ones like intejilli I think they are awesome but for changing one line of code it's overkill. I often just use online editors for quick stuff if I can.

[saywhanow]

online editors???

[camkego]

There are quite a few different environments for online IDEs and code editors, these days. Try googling some of these: “aws cloud9” “vscode web” “GitHub codespaces”

That’s really just a small sample of some of the online editing/coding solutions. I personally run vscode locally, but maybe we’re moving towards a day where running local editors and IDEs is the exception.