Just a general comment: if your development process is dependent on what
IDE you're using, you're in trouble.
Regardless of what IDE you are using, however, you can run into this problem in at least 2 ways I can think of:
1. The bean has a long-term scope and you had erased the selectItem list at some point.
2. You didn't actually define the bean as a Managed bean and therefore there's not really a bean to get the options from.
You don't need a "setOptions" method, by the way. The SelectItem list is a read-only property.
The secret of how to be miserable is to constantly expect things are going to happen the way that they are "supposed" to happen.
You can have faith, which carries the understanding that you may be disappointed. Then there's being a willfully-blind idiot, which virtually guarantees it.