Boosting Developer Productivity with Q Developer: Hands on Insights

Exploring Q Developer: A Hands-On Experience with James Ward

In this episode of our podcast, we welcome back James Ward, who dives deeper into AWS tools. James, who is relatively new to AWS, shares his hands-on experiences with Q Developer, an AI assistant designed to integrate seamlessly with AWS services. This episode is a follow-up to our previous discussion and offers a practical look into using Q Developer to enhance coding productivity and streamline cloud management.

James Ward is a seasoned software developer with extensive experience in the tech industry. He has worked with various programming languages and frameworks, including Java, Scala, and Kotlin. James has a strong background in cloud computing and has contributed significantly to open-source projects. His expertise in the field of software development and AI makes him a trusted voice in the industry. He has held pivotal roles at companies like Salesforce and Google, where he focused on enhancing developer tools and cloud services. Currently, James is exploring the capabilities of Q Developer, an AI assistant that integrates with AWS, to help developers improve their productivity and streamline their workflows. His insights and practical experiences provide valuable knowledge for both novice and experienced developers.

Overview of Q Developer

James introduces Q Developer as an AI assistant geared towards developers using AWS. He mentions its integrations with popular IDEs like IntelliJ and VS Code, as well as its availability on the AWS console and command line. He clarifies that he is still learning the tool and offers a high-level understanding of its capabilities.

James Ward states, "Q Developer is an AI assistant. There are IDE plugins, so IntelliJ, VS Code, I don't know if there's other IDEs supported, and then there is, in the AWS console, so if you're managing your cloud infrastructure in AWS, there's also a Q console in there that you can chat with and ask questions like list my EC2 instances or something. It's integrated there, and then there's also a command line version of Q Developer."

Integrating Q Developer with IDEs

James explains how Q Developer can be used within IDEs such as IntelliJ. He discusses the functionality of explaining code blocks, generating code, and understanding error messages. He highlights how Q Developer helps him make sense of unfamiliar code, especially in languages like Rust and Python.

James illustrates, "One of the things that I've used Q Developer for that have actually helped me be more productive is that there are times that I pull up a piece of code, and maybe even I wrote the code, but I don't actually understand the code. This happens for me a lot with Rust and Python languages that I'm not as familiar with, where I can look at the code and be like, 'I might be able to understand what's going on there.' But here's what I do a lot with code that I'm not familiar with: I just highlight a block of code and then I go to explain code."

Practical Use Case: Java and Loom

James shares a real-world example where he used Q Developer to write Java code involving Loom and structured concurrency. He shows how the AI assistant helped him understand and write code for complex tasks, such as racing two HTTP requests and returning the first successful result.

He elaborates, "This is IntelliJ IDEA, and with some Java code. This has been one place where I have used Q Developer because I've been writing some code, which is going into a space of things that I do not understand, which is how do I use Java with Loom, with a structured task scope and do structured concurrency in Java? And so I was able to write this code and Q Developer did help me on some of the aspects of this."

Code Explanation and Understanding

This section delves into how Q Developer’s code explanation feature works. James explains how he uses this feature to understand unfamiliar code blocks and error messages, making it a valuable tool for both experienced and novice developers.

James notes, "The explain functionality is certainly useful. And then of course you can come in and ask follow-up questions and all that kind of stuff, so I think that helping me understand a codebase is helpful. You can also feed in error messages and be like, 'explain this error message,' and so there's just a lot of places that I'm like, 'okay, I need to increase my understanding on this,' and using then the chat console to explore that has been useful."

Generating Tests and Boilerplate Code

James talks about using Q Developer to generate tests and other boilerplate code. He demonstrates how the AI assistant can create JUnit tests for Java methods, which is particularly useful for ensuring code quality and preventing regressions.

He demonstrates, "One of the things that we can do is say, 'write a test for this,' and we can see how it does with that. I haven't actually tested this before, but, and like we talked about in the previous episode, I don't have the LLM write my tests usually, but some people may want that. And yeah, so great. We're getting a JUnit 5 Mockito test for that, and I have no idea if that code works, but we could go over, flip over to our test file and insert that test in."

Advanced Features: Slash Commands

James introduces advanced features like slash commands, which can plan and implement new functionality across multiple files or transform code for different Java versions. He also mentions the upcoming workspace feature, which will allow users to query their entire project.

James shares, "There's a couple of features in here for these slash commands. So I've not used these that much, but slash dev plan and implement new functionality across multiple files. I don't know what. I'm sure that's useful. I haven't dove into that yet. There's slash transform. If I have a project that I want to upgrade the Java version of, and I've heard people using that and that being helpful."

Conversational Use of Q Developer

James discusses how he uses Q Developer in a conversational manner to learn new concepts and solve problems. He provides an example of asking Q Developer to write a Java method for racing HTTP requests, showcasing the assistant’s ability to adapt to new APIs and technologies.

James explains, "When I'm venturing into new territory, concepts I don't understand, I just have a full-on conversation with Q now. I'm totally curious if it's going to come up with anything like what I have here. Okay. So it didn't use the, no, it hasn't used the new structured task scope, which this is like a brand new Java thing, so probably the, this is trained on, the training data set is much more heavy on completable future than on the structured task scope."

Real-time Demo and Insights

In this section, James provides a live demo of Q Developer within IntelliJ. He walks through various scenarios where the AI assistant has been particularly helpful, such as generating multi-line code completions and explaining complex code structures.

He demonstrates, "I've got all these different scenarios here, and let's say that I want to now start writing my 11th scenario. We'll see if this works, but usually, as I'm starting to write, let's see if it. And sometimes it's 'Hey, do you, Oh, there we go. Okay.' So it did. I had to start getting a little further in. But it's okay, now, I'm underneath scenario 10, and it's already guessed 'Hey, What you want next is scenario 11,' so it like figured out what's."

Getting Started with Q Developer

James outlines the steps for getting started with Q Developer, including installing the plugin in IDEs like IntelliJ and VS Code. He emphasizes the ease of use and availability of a free edition for developers, making it accessible to a wide audience.

James advises, "There is a web page on the AWS site that's like Q Developer and here's how to get started with IntelliJ or VS Code or whatever. But, or you can just like an IntelliJ, go to your plugins and go install it, and then start asking questions, there's like a slash help menu. I wonder if we can also ask it like, 'what should I use Q Developer for?' It's like conversationally learn how to use it. This is the future, right? We just like experiment with this AI assistant and see what it comes up with."

Summary

• Recap of Q Developer’s key features and integrations
• Practical use cases and real-world examples provided by James
• Insights into advanced features like slash commands and workspace queries
• Step-by-step guide to getting started with Q Developer
• Encouragement to experiment with the AI assistant to enhance coding productivity

James Ward’s insights and practical experiences with Q Developer offer a valuable resource for developers looking to enhance their productivity and streamline their workflows. Whether you're an advanced developer or just starting, Q Developer provides tools and features that can make your coding journey smoother and more efficient. So, why not give it a try and see how it can transform your development process?