It was better when it was worse (and the RAM...)

I usually deride this kind of arguments. I believe that although specific issue can worsen with time (a part from the obvious ones, such as oil shortage), most things somewhat improve. This is especially true in the computer science/math/science fields. We have better algorithms and better hardware.

My (not so) cheap netbook (which I am using to write this post) would have been a super-computer for the standards of when I started using a computer. I am not only talking about the 14h of autonomy (back then I
don't think the concept of laptop was widespread)... even my crappy Atom CPU would have been a wonder.

I'm usually not very sympathetic with the ones who actually complain about the resources needed to run modern applications (Mind child, when I was your age I had only 640 KB of RAM and I did this and that! -- which in turn must have been generated by some condescending unix hacker or some punched card freak comparing populous with pong when they were young).

In fact their argument is flawed in the sense that modern programs tend to do lots of stuff that their ancestors did not (which can be useless stuff, compare Word 2007 with Word 5.1 for Mac...). Moreover, modern computers have to do lots of stuff older computer did not have to do, operating systems are more complex, we expect stuff like plug and pray to work etc etc etc. It is like complaining why stuff cost less money many years ago: e.g., in "How Blue Can You Get" B.B. King sung about buying his woman a 10 dollar dinner, meant to be a very expensive one (while she thought it was just a snack). By today standards its the price of a fast food meal.

However, there are some constants. Vim is a fast editor. It does not matter: 10 year ago it was a fast editor. Today it is a fast editor (and improved as well the functionality). On the other hand, while Java as a platform improved a lot in the last fifteen years, Java IDEs are always heavyweight. I was there when Eclipse was just a beta, just something more than a proof of concept. And it was slow. And huge. And now... well, it improved, of course... but I have a quad-core MacPro and its barely passable. I let you wonder how it is on the EEE.

By the way, I don't want to criticize too much Eclipse (Idea is much in the same condition....). Yes, I hate the fact that you have to put everything in a workspace. I hate that it is so much project based that you basically have to create projects for everything. But I have to admit that those tools are necessary to make developing in Java bearable (and productive). Moreover, I quite like the idea... small core, everything is a plugin. Reminds me of Emacs; just with less configuration hassle (which is good). Perhaps in another 15 year it will run smoothly on the machines they will have; Emacs took a lot of time to run fluidly on home-computers afterall.

O yeah, and I have to absolutely buy some RAM because otherwise those IDEs are going to make me die of old age while I try to finish my tasks.