Hi,
I am not a "geek" of Nios II but I have experienced during 4 years.
Since 7.1, Nios II was in a "transistional" state : Nios II IDE, Eclipse, system library (system.h), different routines, scripts....
Until 9.1, NIOS II IDE was the "official" Developpement Tool.
In parallel, there was Nios II EDS which is abandoned.
I found traces of NIOS II SBT (Software Build Tools (something like this)).
Since 9.1 (and bugs from Quartus),
nios ii sbt has become the official build tool. It offers more scripting power, no need to recompile the "system library", etc.
Nios II IDE will be discontinued (to verify please).
On
www.altera.com, in literature sections, you can found pdf that explain better than me.
I Think I'm right. Anybody else could confirm ?
Because of QUartus 9.1 bugs, I stick on 9.0sp2 (with Nios II IDE)