1. How To Install and Get Started with Java Programming (on Windows, Mac OS and Ubuntu)
NetBeans (@ http://netbeans.org) is an open-source Integrated Development Environment (IDE). NetBeans began in 1996 as a Java IDE student project at Charles University in Prague. Sun Microsystems acquired NetBeans in 1999. In 2010, Oracle acquired Sun (and thus NetBeans).
Compared with its rival Eclipse (http://www.elicpse.org) (both are open-source, so I don't know what are they competing for?), NetBeans provides seamless support for Java AWT/Swing, Java ME mobility pack, Java EE, and bundled with an excellent profiler for performance tuning.
NOTE (2018 Feb 01): NetBeans 8.2 might not work with JDK 9 at this moment. Stick to JDK 8 now, if you want to use NetBeans.
Source: Chua Hock-Chuan, https://www3.ntu.edu.sg/home/ehchua/programming/index.html This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.