MPLAB® X IDE is designed to help you write, debug and release applications for embedded systems. However, your company may have requirements that make code development outside the IDE necessary. You can build your code outside MPLAB X IDE by following the instructions in this section.
If you need to debug your code outside the IDE, you can compile your code with debug information (see first link below) and use the command-line Microchip Debugger (MDB), which comes with each version of MPLAB X IDE, to debug your code. For more on MDB, see the "Microchip Debugger (MDB) User’s Guide" (DS50002102), found on the MPLAB X IDE webpage under the Documentation tab.
Alternatively, you can import the code developed outside the IDE into an MPLAB X IDE project. See "Prebuilt Projects" and “Loadable Projects, Files and Symbols” for more information.