Back in 2004 when I was creating the ClientAPI I spent some time trying to find the best way to edit javascript, with hopes that I would find a solution that offered IntelliSense™ and an easy means to document it. Having found neither I decided to create my own console app to transform an XML file into documentation. While this is a starting point, it sure is a far-cry from the in-line IntelliSense™ documentation we as developers have become accustomed to.
A couple days ago I was reading one of the blogs I subscribe to that discussed javascript editors. The first response to that blog was for an open-source project called Aptana. I decided to download it, in hopes that it would provide me a much better javascript editing experience than what is currently offered by Visual Studio.
I must admit that my first impression was one of confusion, for the product uses different terminology than I am accustomed to (namely perspectives). However, seeing that my main goal was to get IntelliSense™ (they call it Code Assist) to work, I decided to simply focus on what was necessary to accomplish this. It proved to be quite easy. Simply drag the js files you wish to take part in Code Assist to the Code Assist Profiles window and your editor now offers fairly accurate IntelliSense™ for the entire ClientAPI.
This editor seems to offer other features I am quite interested in, namely the ability to document the api, have it show up in Code Assist and provide some sort of HTML documentation. I assume there is a way to strip out the documentation comments as well, along with being able to reliably compress the javascript. I wish I had more time to tinker with this, but there is way too many other things I need to get done first. If anyone has some free cycles to play with these features, don’t hesitate to send me an email with some of your findings.