Microsoft's approach
MS Visual Studio (MS VC) is a fully flavoured IDE (Integrated
Development Environment), with all the features, one
could expect from it.
Benefits of using MS VC
- MS VC organises source code fully automated
- Intellisense functionality makes it easy to use
frameworks.
- Man users all over the world. Man discussion group, forums, etc
Disadvantages
- MS VC is not free software.
- There are some compatibility issues.
- It is obviously only available on Windows. I am not going
to suggest it to Mr. Gates, that they should port it to
Linux and license it under the GPL .-)
After having used both of them, I must say both MS VC and
Eclipse are almost equivalent from the
comfort perspective. The reasons, why I use Eclipse are:
- Eclipse is free software
- Exclipse runs on Linux AND Windows
- Eclipse is not bound to C/C++. It has an excellent Java mode
as well.