How to Build, Debug, and Deploy Apps to Google App Engine in 3 Minutes

eXo Cloud IDE is an online IDE for Java, Python, PHP, Ruby or JavaScript, and for nearly two years, it has been used by developers to build applications for a number of PaaS environments — including Cloud Foundry, CloudBees, Heroku and others. eXo Cloud IDE now enables you to code, compile and debug Google App Engine applications in your browser and deploy them within seconds.  This article is authored by Mark Downey

Since eXo started the Cloud IDE project back in 2010, our objective has been to make developers more productive in building and deploying cloud-based apps.

As a start, we’ve focused on building a strong IDE that includes all the features a Java developer would expect. That includes auto-completion, code refactoring, and building and debugging code in the cloud, just as if it was done on your desktop.

More importantly, we have tried to make the development workflow as painless as possible by providing a smooth integration with popular cloud services — from source control to application hosting — and now we’re bringing that integration to the Google App Engine world

Now, developers can use eXo Cloud IDE to build, debug and deploy App Engine apps without having to install and configure the App Engine SDK — nor any of your traditional desktop IDEs. Everything happens right in the browser.

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To try it yourself, create an account on http://cloud-ide.com. Start a new project and select the Google App Engine Java app as the project type. You can choose to deploy to the App Engine PaaS, and you will then be asked to create an app with your App Engine account. After choosing an App ID, just click Deploy in Cloud IDE and the sample app will be deployed. That simple!

To run and debug your app on a development server, press Debug in the Run menu. You’ll see the Debug window appear at the bottom of the screen. You can now open your Java file and set your breakpoints in the left margin.

You can then run the app by clicking the URL in the Output tab, and execution will stop at your breakpoints.

 You can now inspect your variables, modify their value at runtime, and even add conditions to create conditional breakpoints.

Finally, to redeploy the application to App Engine, just go to the App Engine menu in Project > PaaS > Google App Engine, and click Update Application.

With eXo Cloud IDE, you can now run, debug and deploy App Engine apps without having to install and configure the App Engine SDK or the Eclipse Plugin (or, for that matter, Eclipse itself). Because everything related to your development activities is taking place on the Cloud IDE servers, your initial setup time is dramatically reduced. In just a couple minutes, you can get back to focusing on the things that matter most: coding and refining the app itself.


On Thursday June 28, eXo, the user experience platform-as-a-service (UXPaaS) company, announced that its cloud-based integrated development environment, eXo Cloud IDE, now integrates with Google App Engine. Developers building Java or Python applications for Google App Engine can now develop, debug, deploy and manage their applications through a browser -- entirely in the cloud. eXo Cloud IDE is available today and offered free of charge, and users can sign up for accounts at www.cloud-ide.com.

Mark Downey is product manager for eXo Cloud Services, where he leads the development and delivery of eXo Cloud IDE and eXo Cloud Workspaces. Send him your questions or feedback at mark (at) exoplatform.com.