Cross Platform IDEs?

Hey folks,

Looking to get back into programming after 20+ years and teach myself how to develop software with these GUI interfaces and IDEs. But there are SO MANY choices of programming languages and IDEs that I can't seem to make a decision on...

My ultimate goal is to program software for real estate appraisal (my day job!) and/or business productivity on the Linux platform, with the ability to extend to Windows platforms without re-writing the program. Like OpenOffice, GIMP, and VirtualBox have a Linux version, they also have a Windows version. That is what I want to do, although if I MUST make a choice, I'll choose the Linux platform and let one of the multitudes handle the Windows version. I also note that C/C++ seems to be the most popular language, with Python seeming to be an "up and comer", which is also attractive to me, so I can be ahead of the curve for a change.

With all that said, I have identified several IDEs and narrowed it down to 5 potential selections:
1. Anjuta
2. Eric4 (Python 3.1)
3. Gambas2
4. IDLE (Python 3.1)
5. NetBeans 6.7.1

Seems like Gambas is the most "user friendly"; while NetBeans has the largest user base, community support, and documentation; Eric4 and IDLE seem to market their Python credentials; and Anjuta seems fairly user friendly, but has limited documentation and appears specific to Linux/Gnome desktop applications. Are these accurate assessments? Can anyone with experience using any of these programs provide additional insights? What was good, what needs improvements? What is appropriate for an effective beginner who hasn't programmed anything since the mid-1980's Basic, COBOL, and ForTran languages?

More importantly, given my stated criteria above for business-oriented software on Linux platforms, with extensibility/portability to Windows platforms, which of these IDEs would be the appropriate choice? Given the anticipated learning curve, I'd really like to make the "correct" choice from the beginning, as opposed to the trial & error method that I usually employ!

Anyone caring to share the knowledge, please chime in with your thoughts, opinions, and experiences!!! Thank you in advance!

 

If your main goal is to write cross-platform applications then I would say your best bet would be to have a look at Java and Eclipse.

All open source, free and can be run on pretty much any platform. Can also use them to develop for Android as well.

 

Considering your advice, as well as input from others, I have learned that Java is indeed an excellent choice for cross-platform programming extensibility; as well as Python, C, C++, Ruby and a host of other languages I never heard of. However, I'm specifically interested in Java (due to its popularity), Python (due to its "easy syntax" and increasing popularity), and C/C++ (to look at existing code of cross-platform open source programs).

Based on all that, I've settled on Netbeans 6.8 IDE, which has modules for ALL of these languages. Now that the language & IDE decision has been made, it's time for the nitty-gritty "hard stuff"...

I'm a guy who was a pretty good programmer in the early/mid 1980's with Basic, COBOL, and ForTran. But that was half a lifetime ago, before GUIs were common, and everything was done from a command line. So basically, I'm a raw beginner with a LOT of catching up to do, and "knowledge gaps" to fill in.

I'm looking into software programming again because I'm specifically interested in developing a real estate appraisal program to run on linux machines (with future ability to port to windows machines, if it's any good!). This will basically be a "form filler" program, with a single section of spreadsheet style calculation, and some photo/map pages.

With that disclosure made, my question(s) are two-fold:
(1) which language would you select for this program, Java or Python, and WHY?
(2) can you recommend a good book for the suggested language (Java or Python) that is geared toward Beginners who want to create GUI.

While I'm interested in anyone's opinion, I'm hoping someone with practical experience in Java/Python apps for Linux platforms will share the knowledge! As always, thank you in advance for any information you share!

 

While not as popular as Java, you might take a look at REAL Studio. It's cross-platform (Windows, Mac OS X and Linux), RAD, has an object-oriented language, uses native controls, builds native applications and compiles to x86 machine code instead of byte code.