[Text Editors] Comparison

[REMbranded]

Bob Adkins <[email protected]> wrote:

I think you're comparing apples and oranges

Yes, most are new to me and I'm not certain exactly how to classify
them at this point.

Did you notice the correlation between program size and ability to handle
large files?

For most this holds true. For many of these the program file sizes are
larger because of the additional features, NoteTab Light for instance.



* Editor² - 98k .exe
no registry changes - <= 50 meg file

* NoteMaid v1.55 - 84k .exe
No registry entries - <= 10 meg file. (fast)

* The Gun v 2.5 - 6k .exe
No registry entries - <= 10 meg file.

* Quick Editor v3.0f - 35k .exe
No registry entries - <= 10 meg file.

These stand out though as small and powerful, if powerful equals
handling large files. I doubt many people will edit a 10 meg file, but
the ability to do so is there. These also don't muss with the
registry, which is a plus. There is not a great deal of functionality
with these though.

There are big, heavy-duty editors, and small "Notepad replacements". A HD
editor should handle huge files, as code can run up to hundreds of thousands
of lines and a jillion characters.

NotePad only opens very small files. A good Notepad replacement should
handle much larger files than NotePad while being smaller, faster, and more
feature rich.

True. I think NotePad has a limitation of 64k, if I'm not mistaken.
I'd consider one meg the bottom limit for a replacement, where someone
else might do with 640k. I'm leaning towards the Cetus WordPad

Some of these are WordPad type replacements also. And some are just HD
editors that allow for RTF, syntax highlighting and other features
that make them larger in size.

I place a great deal of value on fast, compact programs, and especially my
much-used 45KB text editor. No way am I going to use a 2MB Notepad
replacement, nor am I going to open any 100 MB files any time soon.

Which is your preference as a NotePad replacement?

What do you use for larger files?

I am not discouraging your work. I enjoyed your very enlightening report. I
want to see more.

I still use DOS edit.com pretty often. It is up to most tasks.

Anyway I do hope to get the apples in one basket and the oranges in
another as I do learn the programs better.

 

[Graydogg]

No registry entries - <= 10 meg file. (fast)

On attempting to download NoteMaid from:
http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_download/0,fid,4701,fileidx,1,00.asp
Spybot s&d resident popped up and said it had bloocked the download of
"Enliven!"

 

[REMbranded]

"Graydogg" <[email protected]> wrote:

<[email protected]> wrote in message news:[email protected]...

* NoteMaid v1.55 - 51k

On attempting to download NoteMaid from:
http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_download/0,fid,4701,fileidx,1,00.asp
Spybot s&d resident popped up and said it had bloocked the download of
"Enliven!"

http://www.freewareweb.com/cgi-bin/archive.cgi?ID=648

Here is a link from Freeware web. I got (I think) the first popup that
made it past Avant in checking it. Otherwise, it's a good link.

I tried your link and got nothing from Spybot. There were a bunch of
ads Surely PCWorld doesn't allow advertisers to use malwares.

I downloaded and unzipped the file and ran Spybot. I'm clean, so I
suspect it was either an advertiser or maybe contamination from
another source. I run SpywareBlaster also, but Enliven is not on the
list of protected items. Maybe someone else can verify that the file
is clean from the link below?

http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_download/0,fid,4701,fileidx,1,00.asp

 

[REMbranded]

Blinky the Shark <[email protected]> wrote:

(e-mail address removed) wrote:

I can't tell you how weird it looks to see registry entries attributed
to vim. I know, I know -- but this hammers home how much I'm just
thinking "vim" when I think "vim", as versus thinking "vim and the OS".
Even knowing that this is a Windows-editors discussion!

"(+)(REG VAL) (Default) = 'Allows integration of Vim as the text
editor in Developer Studio.'"

Many are for the above. I have Visual Developer Studio. I'm not sure
if they were inserted because I have it or not. It looks like there is
another Developer Studio specifically for VIM though.

41 registry entries for such a program is a small price to pay. It's a
goofy aspect of Windoze that might make sense to utilize sometimes.

And my compliments to you on committing to this monster of a project.

It's interesting and I'm certain to add several nice editors to the
stockpile. CryptEdit has been OK, but I can see many that are far
better as a general duty editor and as a heavy duty editor. I must
admit that most of these I would never have tried, partly because I
thought CryptEdit served me well and partly because the names of
some of these sounds "lightweight," like Cetus CWordPad. It just
sounds like a WordPad clone when in truth it is far superior.

I'm far from being a vim guru. But as a user, if I can help you with
anything (short of doing your whole review <g>) specific, let me know.

I could (and will) spend much time exploring VIM in itself. It's quite
a program. I tried commandline VI on Open VMS and it was very
intimidating. The GUI provided for VIM is much more user friendly.
Thanks for the interest and support! If you can handle ant generic VIM
questions it will be a great help. I'll try to dig out any pertaining
to Win32.

 

[FoF]

* The Gun v 2.5 - 16k
No registry entries - <= 10 meg file.

* Quick Editor v3.0f - 140k
No registry entries - <= 10 meg file.

Had a quick look at them but had to adjust window size every time I
started the programs. Makes them rather useless imo, whatever their
merits. I'll stick to Metapad as Notepad replacement. Its 2 registry
entries can be removed quite easily upon deinstallation, but an .ini
file would be better of course. If the the Q.Ed. author fixes the
problem I'll give his program a longer try, and, on 2nd thought, I
don't like the icons either (please fix also). The scripts are
interesting provided people make theirs available (I am not so good at
writing these things).

FoF

 

[=?iso-8859-1?Q?Mal=F9?=]

Sat, 23 Aug 2003 13:17:59 GMT
(e-mail address removed) ha scritto:

Maybe someone else can verify that the file
is clean from the link below?

http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file_download/0,fid,4701,fileidx,1,00.asp

Hi REMbranded,
the downloaded file is clean (checked with Avast).
The web page attempts to put three cookies from ad.doubleclick.net.
That's all.

 

[REMbranded]

Malù <[email protected]> wrote:

Hi REMbranded,
the downloaded file is clean (checked with Avast).
The web page attempts to put three cookies from ad.doubleclick.net.
That's all.

Thank you. That's pretty bad. I'm not sure why I got no alert. Maybe
it was Cookie Wall. I tend to expect more from PcWorld, but that's the
breaks I guess.

 

[Blinky the Shark]

(e-mail address removed) wrote:

A Must-Have Bookmark:



Be aware:

In *nix, we have a .vimrc file, where user configuration is kept.
It's read when you run [g]vi[m]. I dunno what you call it in Windows.
But that's where you can plug in stuff like keystroke macros and
abbreviations, as well as other stuff. For example, and this is an
extremely simple one, here are two lines from someone's file:

:ab #b /************************************************
:ab #e ************************************************/

They're for drawing the top and bottom of comment boxes, in program
code.

:ab = this is an abbreviation
#b = if I enter "#b"
/*********... = change it to this

Among others, I have one for my site URL.

Right here ----> http://blinkynet.net/

... just typed "bnet".

 

[Andy]

Remember Q-Edit? What a honey! Soooo fast under DOS, and very customizable.

Qedit you mean? Great program. It's still on my ancient 386sx laptop.
I used it for all my text editing and elaborate batch files, it was
very configurable with your own key definition and macro files, your
own help file. Very fast once you knew the key combinations, no need
for a mouse. O, nostalgia! Have they ever made a Windows version or
gone out of business like so many who clould not, or did not want to,
make the transition from DOS to Windows? Oops, Qedit was not freeware.

Andy

 

[Bob Adkins]

Qedit you mean? Great program. It's still on my ancient 386sx laptop.
I used it for all my text editing and elaborate batch files, it was
very configurable with your own key definition and macro files, your
own help file. Very fast once you knew the key combinations, no need
for a mouse. O, nostalgia! Have they ever made a Windows version or
gone out of business like so many who clould not, or did not want to,
make the transition from DOS to Windows? Oops, Qedit was not freeware.

QEdit is alive and well in TSEPro. QEdit was the grandfather of all quick,
simple, yet powerful text editors. Many if not most editors today are based
on some of Sam Mitchell's brilliant features and functions.

Bob

 

[REMbranded]

QEdit is alive and well in TSEPro. QEdit was the grandfather of all quick,
simple, yet powerful text editors. Many if not most editors today are based
on some of Sam Mitchell's brilliant features and functions.

I found a page that lists the features. Most are included in the some
of the other editors.

"Wordwrap and paragraph-reformat options (including automatic
wordwrap)"

This is one feature I've looked for and VIM is the only one that
rewraps text and saves it (so far). The others do a "cosmetic" screen
wrap which is not saved. New text will be wrapped and saved, but the
old text usually comes out as it was wrapped before.

 

[tlshell]

This is one feature I've looked for and VIM is the only one that
rewraps text and saves it (so far). The others do a "cosmetic" screen
wrap which is not saved. New text will be wrapped and saved, but the
old text usually comes out as it was wrapped before.

Usually the "cosmetic wrap" is something that I consider a feature,
not a bug. However, it is interesting that VIM, which I thought was a
somewhat lowly text editor, acts in some ways like a higher level word
processor.

 

[REMbranded]

I use MetaPad every day. Great program. I like the changeable font size and
the clickable links.

But there is a "surprise" buried away when a person uses:
"3) Replace notepad (for maximum notepadiness)"
http://www.liquidninja.com/metapad/faq.html#Q3

When you do this procedure and replace notepad.exe in this fashion there is
a random replacement, that can be hours or days apart, of the notepad icon
with "blood-dripping eyeball" modified notepad.ICO that's in the
metapad.exe file . This modified notepad.ICO does not get registered by
windows in the usual places so a Find search of *.ico will not display it.

The time it happened to me it put me into an eye-popping, jaw-dropping,
head-scratching state trying to figure out what this 'virus' was and where
it came from. I haven't had a virus infection and I couldn't figure out
what was going on. The modified notepad.ICO would reset itself to the
default notepad.ICO when I rebooted. Virus scans didn't show anything. It
kept reappearing at random intervals. After some help in a newsgroup I
learned that this modified notepad.ICO was in the metapad.exe file.

There isn't any harm done but if you aren't expecting it it can leave you
scrambling around for a bit. A programmer's sense of humor there. Just put
everything back the way it was before using metapad as the default notepad
replacement and all will be well.

To avoid this experience use the other suggestions on the web page such as;
the Send To folder for the right-click menu, etc.

I haven't heard it discussed very often so I guess people use other
programs for notepad replacement.

Personally, I use EXDOR as the default notepad type program and registered
it as such by right-clicking on a notepad icon and using "Open with" EXDOR
and "always" checked. MetaPad is in my Send To folder.

Not sure if this heads-up should be part of your comments with MetaPad in
your review or leave it for users to 'discover' for themselves. It would
have saved me some consternation if I had known about it.

I consider the heads up a plus. Jeez, that is not something I'd have
expected and I'm sure I would have gone through the same scramble that
you did! While humorous after the fact I doubt it is during the fact.

Thanks Gary!

 

[Bob Adkins]

Not sure if this heads-up should be part of your comments with MetaPad in
your review or leave it for users to 'discover' for themselves. It would
have saved me some consternation if I had known about it.

Never done that to me in nearly 2 years of frequent use.

In XP, do a search on "Notepad.ece". Hold down the shift key, and delete
all. Rename Metapad.exe to notepad.exe, make it read only, and send it to
the windows\system32 folder. Works fer me!

That said, that eyeball is ugly! First time I saw it I had a good laugh.

Bob

 

[Sammy Mitchell]

Remember Q-Edit? What a honey! Soooo fast under DOS, and very
customizable.

Hey thanks! We certainly appreciate the kind words!

 

[ms]

Hello Mike. Yes I do and yes it will. I'm in the process of trying to
put it into a usable form now. I'm still playing with the programs to
make sure I haven't overlooked features and such also.

The main site is mostly progams that went commercial, that were
abandoned, or just tough to find. I've neglected to make additions
recently and really need to get what I have marked to get online.

http://www.woundedmoon.org/win32_freeware.html

I'll probably add a text editor section with the results and an on
site download for any program listed, so they don't disappear on us.

Hopefully I can add to it as I find the time.

I can use any feedback of the display when I do get it on. Creating
attractive pages isn't a strong point of mine. And of course, if
anyone knows of any other outstanding editors or word proessors I'd
like to hear of them!

I still use Editpad Classic, which is not AFAIK your favorite. Have used
it for years. Once in a great while, it opens 2 files, I have to use
Task Manager to exit, otherwise, fine.

Mike Sa

 

[REMbranded]

ms<[email protected]> wrote:

I still use Editpad Classic, which is not AFAIK your favorite. Have used
it for years. Once in a great while, it opens 2 files, I have to use
Task Manager to exit, otherwise, fine.

Both Classic and LE are nice editors that can handle huge files.

It's difficult to define exactly what the editor is to be used for,
because everyone has differing needs and requirements. If huge files
are important EditPad is certainly up for the job!

I prefer more features though. I like having a spell checker and file
stats as a minimum. I like syntax highlighting, especially for text
with html links in it. I like an editor that does RTF. Or, basically,
I prefer to skip over the "NotePad" replacement and start off with a
"WordPad" type replacement that has many extra features. Another
editor for more specialized tasks seems a good idea, and I imagine
EditPad will remain as a tool to work with large files.

 

[Bob Adkins]

Hey thanks! We certainly appreciate the kind words!

Woa...chatting with one of my heroes from back in the 80's. Hey, you must be
getting as old as dirt. I certainly am.

Bob

 

[Bob Adkins]

I prefer more features though. I like having a spell checker and file
stats as a minimum. I like syntax highlighting, especially for text
with html links in it. I like an editor that does RTF. Or, basically,
I prefer to skip over the "NotePad" replacement and start off with a
"WordPad" type replacement that has many extra features. Another
editor for more specialized tasks seems a good idea, and I imagine
EditPad will remain as a tool to work with large files.

I use my favorite editor (Metapad) for a text viewer, and for editing INI
files and such.

For longer docs, I use the free version of Atlantis Nova. Cool little rich
text word processor with spell check and many features. Even reads Win Word
DOC's! 460K, 1 executable. Saves RTF and plain TXT.

Bob

 

[BillR]

http://www.woundedmoon.org/win32_freeware.html

I'll probably add a text editor section with the results and an on
site download for any program listed, so they don't disappear on us.

Hopefully I can add to it as I find the time.

I can use any feedback of the display when I do get it on. Creating
attractive pages isn't a strong point of mine.

<Snip>
Nice "homestead" you have. And cute pygmy goats. Downloading the
pictures was slow, but I liked the site enough to send the URL to my
Mom. I remember making the trek to the outhouse when visiting her
parents in the '60s. The well and backporch were enclosed and running
water added in the kitchen long before my time, though. I also spent
many hours splitting wood for the kitchen stove and parlour furnace.
BillR