In August 2023, a small group of Google development and UX leads expressed their frustration with the challenges of setting up a development environment for multiplatform and full-stack apps. They presented an experimental prototype called Project IDX as a potential solution to these issues. The difficulty of setting up technology stacks for development has been a longstanding problem, dating back to the early 1980s when personal computers became available.
Project IDX is a browser-based development environment built on Code OSS, which is the open-source version of Microsoft’s Visual Studio Code. It is powered by Codey, a generative AI foundation model trained on code and built on PaLM 2. The aim of Project IDX is to simplify the process of building, managing, and deploying full-stack web and multiplatform applications using popular frameworks and languages.
At the time of its announcement in August, Project IDX was only accessible through a waitlist sign-up process. It was not until December that my application was approved. Although Project IDX is still in the preview stage and has some rough edges, it has an interesting design and provides some utility, even though it is not yet intended for use in a production environment.
There are several competing products in the market, including AWS Cloud9, Gitpod, Online IDE, Replit, StackBlitz, Eclipse Che, Codeanywhere, and GitHub Codespaces.
One of the notable features of Project IDX is its similarity to Visual Studio Code, which makes it familiar to users of that platform. The IDX AI, powered by Codey, provides code suggestions and offers an AI-powered code chat for assistance with code-related tasks. Project IDX also integrates well with Git and GitHub.
Project IDX runs on a Google Cloud VM called a Cloud Workstation. While Cloud Workstation time is typically billed per hour, Project IDX is currently free to use. It supports a variety of languages and frameworks, with built-in templates and GitHub imports available. Users can customize their workspaces using Nix.
Project IDX allows for previews of applications in web, Android emulators, and iOS simulators. It also supports direct deployment to Firebase hosting and offers the option to share workspaces with shared access.
One limitation of Project IDX is that it only allows for two projects at a time. However, this can be overcome by saving projects to GitHub and managing them from there.
Overall, Project IDX shows promise with its visual similarity to Visual Studio Code and its functional similarities to other development environments like GitHub Codespaces and Gitpod. Its integration with Google Cloud Workspace is an advantage for those using Google Cloud services. However, there may be concerns about Google’s track record of discontinuing projects and services.
Despite these concerns, Project IDX is worth a try, especially if you maintain a GitHub repository for your projects. It is currently available as a free preview and accessible via a web browser.
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