CoolBeans Philosophy

15 January 2019

You will not find the CoolBeans source code anywhere because it's not public. CoolBeans is not Open-Source.

What?, I hear you say. But you are contributing to Apache NetBeans, how could you do this to CoolBeans?

Well, Apache NetBeans is one reason. I don't want with CoolBeans to create another community, I don't want to fork NetBeans, I don't want to break the community, I don't want contributors to have to think were to go. If you want to improve the IDE, join me on Apache NetBeans!

CoolBeans is just my attempt at covering a void left for users after NetBeans 8.2. Users need an installer, a bundled Java runtime, they need the JavaEE and C/C++ and other plugins, and they needed them last year!

CoolBeans will also be the place where I could add some features I deem essential, like native OS notifications. I tried doing many such features as Open-Source plugins or tangential projects (Retina icons), but I think what I had in mind was a vision for the whole IDE. Having actual results to show would allow me to push these features even faster into Apache NetBeans.

CoolBeans is also not Open-Source because an ugly shell script will do wonders for end-users but will be judged to no end if other folks look at it. The sausage does not get made in a laboratory.

That being said, I would love to hear from people that do want to improve CoolBeans too! Don't imagine a discussion has to start with a PR, write an email instead.

Still, will CoolBeans be Open-Source some day? Of course.

--emi