With “IDEA 4.5”:http://www.jetbrains.com/idea/index.html due out any day now (no doubt Javablogs will be bombarded with product announcements when it happens) I had a look at the forthcoming changes. Whilst a couple of things looked quite handy (such as structural search and replace or improved code duplication checks) there are a few things I’d like to see added:
* If I create a new class prefixed with @Abstract@, I’d like the class created abstract too – this could of course be tailored to individual coding guidelines, so all those Visual Basic refuges prefixing abstract classes with @A@ will be catered for
* If I create a class with an @Impl@ suffix, like @BobImpl@, and IDEA knows of an Interface called @Bob@, it will automatically create the class as a @Bob@ implementation.
* If a class has a test, e.g. @BobImpl@ has @BobImplTest@, then IDEA will provide a link from @BobImpl@ to @BobImplTest@ and vice-versa. A link similar to those provided to show implemented in/implementing method links would be great.
* Given that IDEA understands more links between classes/interfaces, e.g. @Bob@, @AbstractBob@, @BobImpl@, @BobImplTest@, that the refactor->rename would more consistently renamed ‘linked’ classes
* It would be fantastic if IDEA picks up normal code edits as being refactor operations – for example if I change the name of a class by editing, IDEA pops up a dialog asking if I want to perform a refactor->rename.
* A spell checker!
* A Thesaurus to help me with naming…
magpiebrain 
2 Responses to “IntelliJ IDEA wish list”
For me, each one of those features would annoy me more than its usefulness warrants, except the thesaurus, which wouldn’t annoy me because it probably wouldn’t get in my way.
Also, pressing Shift F6 to rename isn’t very hard, and most of the time when I change the name of a method without using Shift F6, it’s because I specifically don’t want to refactor (like when I rename someMethod to oldSomeMethod and then write a new version of someMethod).
OK, we’ll comprimise and make them all optional – personally I’d use all of them. I certainly need a spell checker 🙂