The diff/merge thing is definitely an issue. I can see this being solved in 3 ways: 1) People move to more text based files. Markdown could become ubiquitous

The diff/merge thing is definitely an issue. I can see this being solved in 3 ways: 1) People move to more text based files. Markdown could become ubiquitous. 2) People create more diff tools 3) Version control tools exist which aren't as focused on file merges as they are on tracking change. I work with a bunch of UI designers - if we had a way to track their additions and deletions from a repo (even if any merge simply required a "pick a file" option) that would be a huge benefit to our team. w/r/t the IDE thing just try using Xcode. Open up any project file and BOOM - merge hell. It decides to add it's own flavor to every .xcodeproj depending on which version of Xcode you open.