Knowledge of tools != Knowledge of a programming language.
Agreed. But you seem to be saying that people who code well with an IDE, and can't code well with a more vanilla text editor, means that they don't know the language. This is a tool knowledge issue - not a language knowledge issue.
Some people are good at coding, and others are bad at coding. IDE/editor choice has little to do with it. Lines like "Most Java programmers can't write simple apps without the help of an IDE" are just false - and have nothing to do with whether the developer is any good or not.
Twenty years ago people were saying the same thing about lazy developers who use screen based editors instead of line based ones. I'm sure that twenty years before that folk were complaining about folk who use terminals instead of punched cards as god intended :-)
Would you be productive in QED http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QED_(text_editor) ? Should I doubt your coding skills because of that?
Knowledge of tools != Knowledge of a programming language.
Agreed. But you seem to be saying that people who code well with an IDE, and can't code well with a more vanilla text editor, means that they don't know the language. This is a tool knowledge issue - not a language knowledge issue.
Some people are good at coding, and others are bad at coding. IDE/editor choice has little to do with it. Lines like "Most Java programmers can't write simple apps without the help of an IDE" are just false - and have nothing to do with whether the developer is any good or not.
Twenty years ago people were saying the same thing about lazy developers who use screen based editors instead of line based ones. I'm sure that twenty years before that folk were complaining about folk who use terminals instead of punched cards as god intended :-)