So I’m giving TextWrangler a spin this morning while working on EWE.
I had been using jEdit for the last year or so — and was happy with it — jEdit is pretty fast for a java application, but a native app is still usually just “snappier” — and textwrangler is. I think I’m on the path to switching
I usually stay with editor defaults — largely because I change enough that I never really become profficient with them — but certain things had to change from the very beginning:
- Default font for editing changed from Monaco,10pt to BitStream Vera Mono, 12pt (12pt. == I must be getting old)
- Set the “save backup files” setting (I wish it had an autosave, I haven’t really found one yet — but I haven’t looked closely either)
- TextWrangler can save an file’s “state” (window positions, font settings, etc.) — I turned off the “honor font settings” part — because it was driving me nuts that the Monaco font setting was sticking for certain files (there really should be a “strip the current state” option, I couldn’t find one)
- I checked the “Balance while Typing” option — because I’m always leaving off a ‘)’ or a ‘}’ while coding in PHP and Perl. Interestingly, the “unmatched }’ notifications from textwrangler seem to be shipped off to QuickSilver
- I checked the “Show Line numbers” option (a must), and the show cursor position, and show current function options
Right now, I only wish it would remember that I did a multi-file search last, and would automatically enter the highlighted term in the serach field. I also want to dock the search windows. I’ll get used to that though.
Kudos to BareBones. (now watch TextWrangler become a pay-for application again two years from now).