Text editor for Linux (except Vi)?

Question

Let me preface this question by saying that I am using TextMate for Mac OSX for my texting needs and I am in love with it. Anything comparable on the Linux platform? I will use it to encode python / ruby.

Performing a search on Google gave outdated answers.

Edit: since there was some concern about the “merit” of this issue. I am about to start a new Ruby programming project on Linux, and before I started, I wanted to make sure that I had the right tools to complete this task.

Edit # 2: I use VIM on a daily basis - all .. time. I like to use it. I was just looking for alternatives.

Answer 1

Emacs is a great text editor. It has tremendous power when you become a strong user. You can access the shell, open as many files as you want, in many sub-windows and extremely powerful script support that will allow you to add all kinds of neat features.

I use ruby ​​mode, which adds syntax highlighting and something else like ruby, and the same thing exists for every main language.

If you continue to use it, you can only use the keyboard and never touch the mouse, which greatly increases the speed of editing.

If you want to start with something much simpler, gedit is good ... it has also built in syntax highlighting for most languages ​​based on the file name extension. It comes with the OS (although you can easily install emacs using apt-get or some similar package search utility).

UPDATE: I think gedit is based solely on the graphical interface, so it would be useful to study emacs if you are stuck with the shell only (it is fully functional both in shell and in graphical mode).

FURTHER UPDATE: Just FYI, I'm not trying to push Emacs to Vim, this is what I use, and it's a great editor (I'm sure Vim too). This is difficult at first (since I'm sure Vim is also), but the question was about Linux text editors besides vi ... Emacs seems like a logical choice for me, but gedit is a great simple text editor with some nice features if that's all you are looking for .

Answer 2

http://xkcd.com/378/

Answer 3

Kate, KDE's advanced text editor is pretty good. It has syntax highlighting, block selection mode, terminal / console, sessions, window splitting both horizontally and vertically, etc.

Answer 4

I use sublime text in linux.

Answer 5

Try Scribes . He is trying to replace TextMate for Linux

Answer 6

I use SciTE a very small and simple text editor.

Answer 7

I like the versatility of jEdit ( http://www.jedit.org ), it has a lot of plugins, cross-platform and also stuff like choosing the block that I use all the time.

The disadvantage is that it is written in java, but not the fastest.

Answer 8

I find Geany ( http://geany.uvena.de/ ) not bad.

Answer 9

I use pico or nano as my "random" text editor on Linux / Solaris / etc. This is easy to handle, and while you are losing a couple of lines of text in a menu, it is at least easy to see how to exit, etc.

You can even extend nano, I think, and add syntax highlighting.

Answer 10

Alternative text editors? Try Diakonos , the "mass editor for Linux." The default keyboard display, as expected, is for cutting, copying, pasting, undoing, opening, saving, etc.

Answer 11

When I was looking for an alternative to TextMate for Linux, I ended up using Geany . It is not so powerful, but still nice to work with. Great replacement for Kate.

Answer 12

On Mac OS X, I have been using BBEdit since the early 1990s, so I use this as my link for all other editors. I sometimes use BBEdit to edit files in a Linux box using ftp mode, and this works very well if you have a fast network connection to a Linux box.

I learned emacs two years ago because the rest of the programming team that I joined uses it. I find emacs powerful but annoyingly old-fashioned in many ways, but once you have learned emacs, you can use it on any platform (Linux, OS X, Windows). This is an editor that I use almost exclusively at work. However, I need years to master all its functions.

I also used gedit for Linux and found it very convenient, but I did not try to use it as the main editor for any project.

I have a colleague at work who uses Komodo Edit 4.4 (free from activestate.com), running it on a Windows computer, but using it in ftp mode so that it can edit files on our Linux server. Komodo Edit has many nice features, but it takes looonnnggg time to run for the first time.

Answer 13

Do not forget NEdit ! Small and lightweight, but with syntax highlighting and macro recording / playback.

Answer 14

Best besides Vi? Vim.

Answer 15

SciTE http://www.scintilla.org/SciTE.html

Answer 16

The best I have found is gedit, unfortunately. Spend a few hours with it and you will find that it is not so bad with plugins and themes. You can use the command line to open documents in it.

Answer 17

My friend is swearing, jed, http://www.jedsoft.org/jed/

Answer 18

At first I do not want to start a war.

I did not use TextMate, but I used its Windows equivalent, e-TextEditor, and I could understand why people love it.

I also tried many text editors and IDEs in my search for the perfect text editor on Linux. I tried jEdit, vim, emacs (although I loved when I was on uni) and others.

On Linux, I decided to use gEdit. Although from time to time I use Komodo Edit. When I'm in a hurry, I use gEdit solely because it is faster than Komodo Edit. gEdit has many plugins and comes with beautiful color schemes. I believe that when gEdit has the right means to enter code, it will be cool. I think the only reason I use Komodo Edit is the project file.

I have a friend who donated his book "Vi Improved" in the hope that he will be able to turn me into Wim. The book is an inch thick and completely sets aside time for learning Vim ..

Every time I find an editor, I always return to gEdit. This is the crop editor in the right place. Give gEdit a go, this is the default text editor in Ubuntu and Linux Mint.

Here is a link to a great guide on how to make gEdit look and behave (somewhat) like TextMate: http://grigio.org/pimp_my_gedit_was_textmate_linux

Hope this helps.

Answer 19

+1 for pico / nano - easy, get the job, good help

Answer 20

I agree with Mike, although I'm vim dying. I've been using GEdit a lot lately when doing a light ruby ​​script. The standard editor (plus Ruby code snippets) is extremely useful and polished and can provide a good respite from full-featured, constantly working editors.

Answer 21

I just started using OSX. Free note editors that I discovered:

• Komodo by ActiveState. There is no debugger or regular expression editor (although one of them comes with Python, i.e. redemo.py) in the free version, but is great for use.
• ERIC written in PyQT.
• Eclipse with PyDev is my preferred option for editing Python on all platforms. Nice clean GUI, decent debugger. Good parsing, etc.

Answer 22

I have been using Emacs for 20 years. It is great and works everywhere. I also have TextMate which I use for some things on Mac (HTML mode is great). If you want to do Ruby development, Netbeans supports Ruby and also works on all platforms.

http://www.netbeans.org/features/ruby/index.html

I have seen several blogs, etc., claiming to be the best Ruby environment.

Answer 23

I use joe for simple (and not so simple) editing when I am away from Eclipse.

It uses the classic Wordstar keywords - although I have never used Wordstar, it is a point of sale for many people.

It is lightweight, well maintained, lightweight, and has files available to everyone.

Answer 24

I love Kate because he has some interesting features (already quoted) that are commonly found in (heavier) IDEs. My favorite feature, however, is the terminal window, which is very practical for quickly compiling save-compile-execute.

Nedit is another valid option, in which there are many functions (and it does not have a lot of dependencies: this is a huge plus IMHO).

For shell editing, when I cannot use VIM, I immediately see pico or nano (but I would not recommend them for continuous development: they are ideal for quick editing).

Answer 25

If it's just you? Use what you want to use today; switch in the middle of the stream if you want.

Is this a team? Try to be an aggressor. Set standards for white space (are tabs acceptable? How many spaces are displayed on the tab?), But otherwise, allow any user to use the editor that they need.

Is this a pair programming team? Where you might need a command line editor, just so that programmers can easily hand over the keyboard.

To implement a standard white space policy in a store where one or more coders use Emacs: you can tell Emacs about your white space policy with some comments stuck at the bottom of each file in the source file. For example,

# Local Variables: # tab-width: 2 # ruby-indent-level: 2 # indent-tabs-mode: nil # End: 

Anyone who uses emacs (or xemacs) in this file will automatically receive a standard group indent.

Answer 26

Sublime Text 2 is my favorite. Intuitive and powerful enough.

Answer 27

You can try Emacs with ruby ​​mode, Rinari (for Rails) and yasnippet , which provides automatic snippets like Textmate.

Answer 28

I like TextMate on OSX.

There is a kind of TextMate cloning for Windows, simply called "E" ( e-texteditor.com ). Its author promised that there will be a Linux version soon. Even if you have already chosen your favorite, TextMate (or E) is worth a look, simply because it is different.

I would say that there are basically four different families of text editors:

• classic menu-based editors like WinEdit, Gedit or BBEdit
• Emacs and his brothers XEmacs, Aquamacs, etc.
• VI / Vim / Cream, etc.
• TextMate and E

You can distinguish these families according to different usage paradigms:

• Classic editors rely mainly on menus and some Ctrl keys.
• Emacs-style editing uses complex keyboard commands, such as Cxs, and even whole words to invoke commands.
• The VI is mode-based and controlled by commands with a single key or whole words.
• TextMate is based on fragments and classic labels.

Emacs and TextMate are also easily extensible using user-created scripts in Lisp (Emacs) or any other command-line language (TextMate). (Classic editors and VIs are also extensible, but the effort is usually much greater)

I would recommend that everyone try at least one good example of each of these families (if possible) and find out what suits them.

Answer 29

TextMate is a great editor, and there is a way to replicate some features in GEdit. Check out the article here: http://rubymm.blogspot.com/2007/08/make-gedit-behave-roughly-like-textmate.html to modify GEdit to behave like TextMate.

Answer 30

Vim is a good update for Vi that offers decent features and a more convenient set of keys and default behavior. However, graphical versions such as GVim, KVim, and even Cream, in my opinion, are extremely absent. Recently, I often use Geany , but also has its drawbacks.

I just can't find anything in the Notepad, Sutron, or TextMate programmers' league in Linux. Shame, since I want to live in all open source cyber worlds, I got stuck jumping from one almost right editor to another.