Comment by mje__

I generally understand the motivation of these companies, but damn I really hate that they all build IDEs. I wish they would focus on command-line tools or libraries and integration with (say) eclipse for those that really want an IDE. Having a different half-assed IDE for each hardware platform makes for a frustrating day at work

Build automation for embedded systems is such a PITA. My previous job we had a build step that used AutoHotKey to click through the manufacturers 'proprietary tools'. You can imagine how reliable that was