TextMate v1.5 released
Posted by David January 06, 2006 @ 08:11 PM
TextMate is the editor powering the work of every single core contributor and now the best just got even better. The 1.5 release of TextMate is the first official in a long time. So if you last had a look at 1.0.2, it’s time to take another peak.
Oh, and if you haven’t switched yet, you can swing by Apple and pickup a Mac on the way to TextMate. It’s not now, nor ever, going Windows.
I really want to try a mac but I can only afford the mac mini. Is anyone doing rails happily on a mac mini?
I do Rails development on a Mac mini; it works perfectly well for that task.
I do Rails development on a 2 year old 1ghz G4 iBook just fine, a Mac Mini should be more than enough power for Rails development. Just make sure you upgrade it to a full 1 gig of memory.
Rails and OS X have many similarities, I think. If you enjoy the subtle conveniences and incredible intuitiveness of one, you’ll typically enjoy the same from the other.
If you’re anything like me, you’ll fall in love with the OS in a week or two. If you don’t need the convenience of a laptop, the mini should be just fine. The OS is what really shines, not necessarily the hardware.
Of the people switching to Mac, how many have you heard switching back?
I use a Mac mini and TextMate and it works great for Rails development
I’m another person on a Mac Mini (1.25 ghz with 1 GB of RAM) writing Rails apps with TextMate. Join the legions!
I keep dreaming that either my work will start supporting Macs, or Textmate will be released on Windows. Well I guess the second one is out.
Windows user could use http://www.radrails.org/ instead
Developing Rails applications on Mac OS using TextMate truly is bliss. Everything just feels right… other than hacking away PHP code in Dreamweaver on a Windows machine.
Should I mention TextMate is the first piece of software I’ve bought in a looong time, because it’s absolutely worth every penny? It doesn’t just complete code, people, it completes you. It’s genius, really.
My Mac Mini works great as a development platform (especially w/TextMate).
I just converted to Emacs. It runs on everything and the price is right.
I use a Mac for work, and am putting off the purchase of my own Mac and waiting for the Intel Macs to hit the street. Then I can boot into all three: Mac, Windows or Linux. I am supposing as well that VMWare will be made available for the Mac, which means I can run Windows or Linux inside the Mac.
Mac, Rails, TextMate, with the option of stepping into Windows/Linux quickly to do what I can do on the Mac. Folks, computing Nirvana is almost upon us!
RadRails is too bulky for my needs. Is there anything more elegant and simple for windows?? I use Explorer and the ScITE editor because it’s the only editor that is simple, yet doesn’t flood you with features you might not necessarily want.
I use JEdit(www.jedit.com), along with the Ruby plugin (http://jedit.org/ruby/). Works great for me in Windows and *nix!
My company runs several internal Rails apps on a Mac Mini. Works great. But the real reason to get the Mac is so you can use TextMate! Today, it finally hit me that I don’t even like using Vim anymore, and trust me… TextMate is that awesome.
doppler… Textmate may be cool… but VIm Rules Sucka !
At Hivelogic headquarters, not only do we code on Mac mini’s every day, but we’ve also been known to deploy apps on them.
Won’t be shelling out thousands of dollars for a Mac, so here’s hoping RadRails will equal TextMate.
Thousands? Try $800 for a maxed-out mini. And that’s with paying Apple’s prices for upgrades. OWC has better prices if you don’t mind a little DIY.
That’s not for a laptop though, is it? Gotta be a laptop. I still don’t plan on buying a whole new computer just to use a text editor and an OS that may be better in varying degrees.
“an OS that may be better in varying degrees”
Any OS that is closed is not an OS for me. I’ll stick to a Thinkpad, and one of the *BSD’s.
As I don’t plan on writing my own OS, open/closed doesn’t matter to me.
Someone please fix the duplicate comments. It is so annoying!
Sad….
The RAILs community is starting to push out Windows users.
The platform prejudice is subtle but unmistakable and the slide is a long slow curve, but still evident.
When the core team uses primarily one platform, the others will suffer, it can’t be avoided, as we’ve seen with things like MYSQL acceleration pre 1.0, but you had to recompile the c bindings on Windows (Try getting Windows based designers (yes there are a few) to do that). And the deployment issues arising from Switchtower/SSH issues on Windows.
A lack of love and an accumulation of statements like this recent one from the creator of RAILs will cause defection to other frameworks who DO actively care about their platform and won’t move to Mac.
Django on IronPython is starting to look better every day.
I like RadRails too, but as stated earlier, the java VM makes it very heavy, about 45M, and it can be sluggish.
It’s also buggy. Syntax coloring gets confused on rHTML pages and there’s no refresh so you have to close the file then reopen it. Not very interactive.
And, color scheme changes are a bitch unless you like the default. Textmate demos show colored text on a black background, which is very easy on the eyes and critical during late night dev sessions. To make this work in RadRails requires 3 to 5 color changes in 6 or 7 configuration panels. AND YOU CAN’T SAVE THE CHANGES. So when the next version comes out, there’s another 18 to 35 edits to color configs alone.
On top of that, editor font choices are limited to one global font for the editor view and and your commented text font is permanently italic. However, you can change every font and color option for the editor chrome like some bad KDE hangover. The logic behind these configuration choices is…well…illogical.
I’ve recently switched to PSPad. Out of the box, it comes with a great ‘dark’ default color scheme that is VERY textmate like and extremely pleasant to look at for long periods of time with excellent Ruby syntax support and decent RAILS/HTML sytax support (you can add your own keywords and really make this shine, but the defaults are VERY usable)
It has great mutliview/multifile support with tabbed editing windows and project import/conversion from a directory. It remembers all windows that where open when you close the editor and reopens them on the next startup. It even saves the line you where editing last on each open window. Very nice attention is paid to these small, but extremely helpul details.
You may be able (I haven’t tried this yet) use the TortoiseSVN subversion client for windows thru the directory view as it seems to support all standard explorer functions. You do lose the data views and the server start/stop from within RadRails, but console start/stop works just as well for WEBrick, data views from MySQL Admin and MySQL Query Browser work very well and with all 4 of these apps running your dev memory footprint is very small and zippy.
I highly recommend this editor.
http://www.pspad.com/en/
Oh yeah, I almost forgot the best part, it’s Freeware! However, if you like and use it, I recommend supporting the creators and drop them a few greenbacks.
Signed,
Your friendly Windows based RAILs dev, The Wog
(There is yet hope for us)
It does seem contradictory that while Ruby and Rails are F/OSS, they’re showing so much preference for an editor and OS that aren’t.
Another Mac Mini promo…
I bought my Mac Mini for Textmate … oh, and Rails development. =)
Seriously, I was going to go the Windows route with Rails and then I saw Textmate. It made the decision easy. Too easy.
-Chris
Paul Boudreau: I thought I had heard of and tried every Windows editor, but I had never heard of PSPad. I’m 10 minutes into trying it out and think I may switch to it from Editplus/Ultraedit. Pretty nice editor, especially the FTP interface. Only complaint so far it that it doesn’t appear to support svn (or cvs), but neither do EP nor UE.
On windows, I use eclipse with the rdt plugin (http://sourceforge.net/projects/rubyeclipse/).
It is currently under active development but is already quite useful.
I was able to change the color scheme to a clear text on dark background by changing 2 settings only (though admittedly in 2 different parts of the preference menu) and eclipse remembered it when I restarted it.
The current version 0.7.0RC is not perfect,especially for a couple syntax higlighting bugs which are pretty frustrating and are already fixed in trunk.
It offers an outline, a pretty decent debugger, a code completion (not quite perfect yet but improving a lot at each release). A (very small) bit of configuration and you can launch your unit tests, your webrick.
Through the eclipse platform, it also provides CVS/SVN integration and project management.
Add in the web standard tools (WST) and J2EE standard tools (JST) plugin from http://www.eclipse.org/webtools/ , and you have html highlighting, an ASP highlight which is not too bad for rhtml , JS highlighting, database browsing, SQL highlighting etc … all a few clicks away.
Now, it does take 51MB of RAM. same as firefox actually, which on a windows system with 1GB of RAM should leave about 500MB free for your webrick process. Did I mention that I use cygwin’s RXVT to have a decent shell that does not depend on windows crapy cmd.exe.
When I get a bit of money and much more space, I’ll upgrade my mini memory and try out textmate. Until then, I’ll use my thinkpad for dev and my mini will play internet radios :)
Joe: Glad too hear that you like it so far.
Have you tried the TortoiseSVN (spelling) subversion client for Windows? It enables the Windows explorer to perform a subset of SVN commands. The directory view in PSPad exposes MS explorer very cleanly allowing right click menu support (where the Tortoise commands live). I haven’t tried it yet (no projects in subversion at the moment) but I will when I get the chance.
Give it a try! I’d love to hear your experience with it as would others I’m sure.
Paul: I’ve been using TortoiseSVN for about 3 months now and have been very happy with it. It modifies the icons of those files under SVN control and shows whether they’ve been changed since the last commit. When you go to commit your root folder, it lists all the documents in that folder which will be updated and also gives a list of those files in your root folder which are not under SVN control and allows you to check them off to add them in.
My only complaint was that it wouldn’t allow me to set SVN properties on my files like svn:executable or svn:eol-style which I have to set on my script files in order for Switchtower’s deployment to work properly.
Other than that, it sure as hell beats entering commands via cmd.exe.
Paul: Ah, yep, you’re right – that should do the trick.
Could someone please explain the special appeal that Textmate has for Ruby developers? I mean, is it just a very very good programmer’s editor, or does it have special features (beyond syntax highlighting) for Ruby development?
(I don’t have a Mac, yet)
Have to second Elise on that topic,
what is this whining “come on, buy a mac” about? I’ve thought that rails is, as well as every other good open source project all about choice! And even if it is not, many people are stuck to windows in their jobs and I know quite some, for whom this even isn’t a problem.
Spreading the word is fine but these osx, linux, windows advocacies to me always seem like missionary tasks. I for one like to make my own decisions regardless if it is about religion or a variety of os.
Jan
I don’t know why everybody is so focused on Textmate and nobody mentions Emacs. Emacs give you all (and I really mean ALL) the power and flexibility that Textmate offers. Shure it has a pretty steep learning curve, but once you master it, you won’t have to touch your mouse for hours. I’am really hooked on it and everytime I hear my coworkers complain about sluggishness of their eclipse/radrails I wonder why don’t they change to emacs?
JanPrill: I think “Missionary Task” is an excellent explanation of mac enthusiasm. I want you to experience the joys that I experience every day. I don’t own aapl stock, so it doesn’t benefit me in the least if you convert, other than the fact that a fellow human is going to be more happy possibly because of my help. And I think its great that you’re using an open mind to make a clear decision. I just truly believe that if you can afford the small percentage rate hike and aren’t planning on doing any kernel hacking, OS X is, by leaps and bounds, better than the competition.
Elise: The woes involved in OS X + MySQL or PostgreSQL aren’t particularly trivial, either. If development gets too easy, we won’t be able to make any money doing it! Recompiling is a bummer, admittedly, but it is a fact of life until all things become interpreted ;-).
I would be saddened to see the Rails team taking extra time to create “Wizards” for the Windows users. The majority of Windows users that I’ve talked to about Rails have the same problem: they can’t make everything work with just the mouse and no keyboard. I don’t intend to be rude by that comment, but I don’t think Rails can/should address that problem.
Hi, Chuck,
thanx, I’ve experienced osx. It’s an x with a definitly wonderful window manager. Would love to use aqua on linux as a CHOICE. Apple has got cool products, no need for discussion on that matter. The one thing that I don’t like about apple is that they are the true masters in locking people in. You want aqua, then you need one of THESES boxes. So I’am quite happily living with linux and windows for the moment…
Jan
Elise:
I think you’re exagerrating the point more than just a bit.
I bought a Mac Mini for Textmate. There are lots of things that annoy me about OSX, but then again, I haven’t been using it forever. There’s also lots of things I like. Like TextMate. Built in VPN and SSH. Shell scripts, etc.
At work I use Windows exclusively though. Sure, it’d be nice if SwitchTower supported Windows better, but that’s not really their fault that Microsoft doesn’t want to integrate properly with Unix. It’s not their fault that MS doesn’t support an out-of-box SSH client. It’s not the Rails team’s fault that Microsoft has stuck with ISAPI and hasn’t written an FCGI handler for IIS even though the most popular webservers and sites in the world by a large margin are built with CGI/FCGI.
And why should the Rails team care? Linux is ostensibly more secure, and certainly a lot more flexible. Even with my limited Linux experience, and even though I’m a Win2KPro and Server MCP, I’m more confident I can setup a secure, performant Apache or Lighttpd server than I could an IIS box. I can tell you from my limited experience that besides the lack of a Finder integrated SVN client (svnX is nice enough for now), and current DarwinPorts or Fink release of Ruby 1.8.4, Rails development on the Mac is just much nicer than on the PC. At least in my opinion. And it’s nothing to do with Rails itself per-se. It’s just that Windows makes things like compiling libraries outside of VS.NET a pain. Terminal Services just doesn’t compare to the simplicity of typing “ssh someServer” for 99% of those tasks where I just want to create a new svn repository, copy a file to a Domain Member Server, or check the logs for a particular process.
But enough evangilism. Outside of Windows faults, Rails development itself with UltraEdit, Eclipse and TortoiseSVN is a breeze on Windows. (I’ll definitely give PSPad a shot though!) While to some Eclipse may look like a pig, after developing in VS.NET for awhile, and having to load up a new solution just to debug javascript in IE, and wait for Resharper to load (a refactoring plugin), Eclipse looks practically svelte in comparison. It loads much quicker than VS.NET, and besides the sluggish Tab-Close icon, it’s in every way a far better IDE in my opinion.
The NumberOne reason I love TextMate so much though? It’s easy on the eyes. I never knew how important this way until I tried the “Cream” editor. The color themes in Cream made programming so much nicer… I started to recognize that I would have a lot of eye-strain in the traditional black-on-white of most editors. In the end I just couldn’t stand the Vim core of Cream though, so I’ll just have to live with changing the background in Eclipse to a light gray until I can convince work that I can program in Ruby and surf the intranet just as easily with a Mac.
I went from a loaded Athlon64 custom built gaming system with a Western Digital Raptor HDD to a loaded Mac Mini at home with MS Office that I got off ebay for $700. I consider it a trade up. We have a Mini at work for testing with only 256MB of RAM and it’s an absolute dog. I have 1GB on my personal Mini and it’s (mostly) snappy. Compiling is pretty slow, but everything else is pretty comparable to the Athlon64. Pretty surprising considering the Mini’s HDD is probably 5400 RPM when the Raptor was 10,000 RPM.
I went from a widescreen 1680×1050 resolution Compaq Presario X1015US loaded Centrino laptop to an iBook 12” and I couldn’t be happier despite the lower resolution screen. The iBook was $999. I haven’t even bothered to upgrade from the default 512MB of RAM, and 40GB is more than enough for me when I’m not filling it up with games.
Admittedly there’s a pretty significant “Apple Tax” if you want decent dual screen capabilities (which I consider a requirement for peak productivity at work) since you have to step up to a Power Mac, but for home and family (from now on anyways) no more building custom PCs for me. Not when a good Mini can be had for $600 and provide all the functionality, more of that “it just works” joy, and a lot more style than any PC I’ve ever owned (and I’ve probably built 6 or 7 in the past 5 years).
The Mac Mini I use here is perfect for RoR work. Apple just shouldn’t ship them with less than 1GB RAM. And TextMate is a great app. Too bad I found out about TextMate a couple of weeks after paying $199 for BBEdit (which I never use anymore).
To Elise:
I don’t want to sound rude or anything, but if you want to use windows and have problems with something, by all means use something else.
I guess it annoys me when someone obtensibly threatens to move to another tool because their favorite platform is not supported.
And why is your preferred platform Windows? Still! Any serious developer has since moved to a Linux box, at the very least!
I am quite serious about that last statement. Unless you do .NET development exclusively, why are you using windows? Comfort? Familiarity? Fear? If you don’t/can’t learn something new, maybe you should stick with windows.
I have very little energy left for people who actively insist on using windows. The reasons to use windows are few and very, very far between. And the only reason not to use a mac, cost, is an absolute red herring argument at the very best.
So I recommend you quite your complaining and give the mini a shot. If not, just move on and leave the rest of us alone.
Now how about the core contributors give us a peak at custom macros/bundles they use to speed their development?
TextMate is Joy.
@Jason: Every serious developer has moved at home and at work to at least linux and left windows for all purposes but .net development? wow that is an interesting claim. could you back that up? I’m working together with some developers who are developing in java, ruby/rails, python and from whom I had the impression that they are working seriously and with fun on linux and windows boxes. could you tell me why i’m wrong? i really would love to capture some of that intelligence that lead to such impressive statements…
Jan
I’m also a w1ndowz user—obviously jealous of the greatness of TextMate ..
i’ve pretty much tried out all the alternatives – Editplus, Textpad, Crimson Editor, etc etc, but the best I’ve found is :
Scite
It will even run ruby scripts by pressing F5 !
JanPrill: Just a note, Aqua is not based on X11. OS X has had X11 ported to run on it. So in reality it’s not a WM.
Having recently tried desktop Linux again, I think it still sucks. Which is why I use Windows, which sucks far less, thanks very largely to third-party software.
You know I love Macs. I fully intend on my next computer purchase being a nice G5, or hopefully a G6? Apple makes better computers with better software and most importantly their OS kicks Windows ass.
But what I’ve lost patience for are Apple-Nazis. Yelling and screaming and berating those who still use Windows machines.
There are some of us who still use Windows not because we want to or because we’re too lazy to switch, but because we have no other choice. I do development at a place of business where the standard platform for all employees are Windows machines. Company policies don’t allow me to run Linux. My boss is not going to buy me a Mac Mini just to make me happier.
Some of us have to make Windows work and Windows is a fact of life in the computer world. So please quit it with the nasty snarks and tirades against those who are already frustrated enough working with the Windows platform.
If you’re all goofy about TextMate…. you should try IntelliJ IDEA – a REAL IDE. Best IDE I’ve ever seen… of course it’s only for Java. But still, it blows away textmate, eclipse, VS.net, etc. Phenomenal refactoring, code completion, navigation, etc.
I wish they had a ruby version :)
‘It’s not now, nor ever, going Windows.’
I’ve been trying to work out why this is ?
so which is it ? at the moment number 3 seems to be winning in my mind.
I bought a Powerbook to start developing with Ruby on Rails and TextMate, after seeing David’s 15min Blog video. After trying for a month textmate, I bought it! It’s wonderful! The best editor ever developed!
Thanks for this new release and for this amazing product!! It’s something special also for Latex!!
Bye and Good Work!
jakdak, don’t confuse Allan’s development goals with what some here would call the missionary work of the Apple-nazis. Allan works on OSX, develops on OSX, and finds it to be a development platform that allows him to do lots of things he may not otherwise be able to do (or know how to do) on another platform.
He developed TextMate because he wanted to, and it just so happens that a lot of other people enjoy it and want to buy it.
jakdak – It’s my understanding that TextMate is written in Objective-C using the Cocoa libraries. So option #1 “Windows doesn’t have the tech” would be appropos. #2 probably also applies, since the entire GUI would need to be rebuilt using something from the Windows (or Linux) world.
As Sam said above, it’s not the fault of Mac users that Windows tools are in many ways limited. That blame lands squarely in Redmond. The presence of a real shell in OS X was the issue that tipped the balance for me. Disdain for OS 9 is fine, but OS X just gets so much right.
Of course, none of this applies to those of you compelled by short-sighted employers to use Windows.
Doesn’t OSX have a Windows emulator? Somebody should write an OSX emulator.
Joe: they have. It’s very, very slow.
Anyhow, some more explanation for the txm-love. Fundamentally, it’s because it’s good out of the box. Emacs is probably the best comparison, in terms of the features you can bolt on. TXM comes, the moment you buy it, with great support not only for Ruby, but also Rails – and by great support I mean excellent syntax highlighting, and really, really useful code-snippets and macros. You could configure the same things in Emacs if you knew what you were doing in LISP with a modicum of effort – but it’s all here. Part of the reason I pay for software is for someone to do the work.
It’s also a great editor for any other language – again, great snippets/macros, some generic features (the command-t shortcut to jump to files a la Quicksilver is particularly awesome, as it the esc-auto completion), and it’s quick.
It’s all about the out-of-the-box experience. Install it, sort your preferences – colour scheme, position of things, habits you like/dislike – and you’re done.
In terms of the breadth of features and customisation, I’ve not found a Windows editor close. Emacs comes close, but requires work out of the box I just can’t do myself, I’m afraid. So i stumped up my €39. Never looked back (though skEdit is pretty lovely for PHP/HTMl/CSS – so I bought that, too).
Hmmm….
The Mac zealots are on the attack…again!
Jason: “I don’t want to sound rude or anything, but if you want to use windows and have problems with something, by all means use something else.” You don’t sound rude, you sound incredibly ignorant.
Having no patience for ‘Windows’ users borders on the phenomenon I’m trying to relate here. Regardless of any platforms short comings, there are users who will NOT switch becuse they LIKE what they have. You have your Mac, others have thier Linux, we have our Wintels. The Mac communities attitude here “Windows sucks for many reasons, get a Mac and learn to love it’s advantages or move on” will positively push Windows users away.
I’m not suggesting the core team divert attention away from the core RAILs dev to Windows “Wizards” or other Win32 solutions in any way. What I am suggesting is that there is a larger ‘forum’ given to non mac platforms and more attention paid to cross-platform issues. And that some of the platform bias is toned down.
Every thing expressed here is opnion. Like Jason’s incredibly juvenille and nonfactual statement: “And why is your preferred platform Windows? Still! Any serious developer has since moved to a Linux box, at the very least!”.
My own opinions are also just that, highly subjective opinion. However, one FACT does shine through. THERE ARE MORE WINDOWS DESKTOPS/LAPTOPS OUT THERE THAN ANY OTHER OS. This is NOT a platform preference problem. It’s a marketing issue. Ineffectively addressing this ‘fact’ will limit the RAILs community.
By the way, Macs are great! But I moved to Windows many years ago and all my clients use Windows. I have far too much experience, training and investment on this platform and prefer to stay. At least until I can dual boot an Intel/AMD PC with OSX or Windows. :)
Love always, Elise.
Windows will always be a priority for Rails. Granted, we need the help of Windows owners to do this because we don’t use that platform in the core group, but we’re highly appreciative of the help to get Rails working better on Windows.
But sure, there is a bias. Just as the core group is passionate about Rails, so are we about OS X. So its often a case of joint evangelism. It’s just a natural part of telling people about the tools you prefer.
All bullshit aside, I write better code on my Apple, period.
PJ: Bullshit.
I am with Jeremey (#42), It would be nice if the core team could share their time-saving snippet/command bundles which they use for their day to day development work.
Textmate is growing on me.
-A
Im with Joe: PJ Bullshit.
Erm, “I write better code on my Apple, period.” how exactly do you come to the bullshit conclusion, the logic escapes me. He writes better code on his prefered platform and you say bullshit? I don’t see him insisting anyone else would. Get a grip kids.
I just don’t get how the platform would lead to you writing better code? It may make writing code easier. But how does the platform make you write better code?
Its text, a screen and a keyboard. Now things may be easier on the eyes, or macros may make typing your code quicker, but a platform is not going to make you write better code. Unless there’s some exclusively Mac application that refactors your code for you?
All platform tension aside, I would really like someone to explain to me how this:
http://scintilla.sourceforge.net/SciTEImage.html
looks better than this:
http://macupdate.com/images/screens/uploaded/16157_scr.png
and if not, why you would actually bother, if even just to save a couple of bucks.
or perhaps staring at pixelated text all day bothers other coders’ eyes less than it does mine (I have excellent uncorrected vision).
Also, as a long-time Windows expert but Mac preferrer, I’m dog-tired of “windows people” (by which I mean people who exclusively use Windows due to either financial or mental constraints or some non-Mac-game addiction, yet seem to have no dearth of opinion to contribute on these topics), period.
Lastly, from a philosophical point of view, when an operating system has sucked up 95% of a market, it is no longer contributing to the good of that market, and I can’t fathom how a person who truly loves this industry can use something like that day-in and day-out with a clean conscience. Because I love the computer industry and would prefer more competition, and it bugs the hell out of me to even sit at a Windows machine these days (yet I do, whenever my friends or family ask me to fix them). I tend to support the underdog, whoever that may be. And in this case it’s Apple and/or Linux.
The worst were the “why doesn’t everyone just switch to Windows” people. In that case, why doesn’t everyone just vote Republican? It would sure eliminate a lot of (ahem) problems…
Oh, and antispyware/antivirus software really bogs windows down, but it’s a necessity on that. Fresh Windows install = zippy. Fresh OS X install = zippy. Windows with 10 programs installed = crap. OS X with 50 programs installed = still zippy.
/off soapbox
Yankee fans and Microsoft fans. I will never understand them…
Peter, plain and simple, it doesn’t look better ! Textmate clearly is nicer on the eye than Scintilla and probably nicer to use (never used it)
However I prefer Scintilla cos I don’t have a Mac !!
The Apple fans have failed to mention that it’s impossible to code worth a crap without at least two 24” Cinema monitors (four is really preferrable), a Herman Miller Aeron chair, and a glass of really expensive Chardonnay.
Nobody cares about your OS religion. You have no influence on anybody and if it makes you feel better to evangelize your favorite OS then you have serious issues to deal with. So many people just can’t be taken seriously when they are spewing OS advocacy about things they have no clue about. If you think that just the fact that you are not running windows makes you a better person, then you live in a very closed, sterile world.
Nobody cares about your OS religion. You have no influence on anybody and if it makes you feel better to evangelize your favorite OS then you have serious issues to deal with. So many people just can’t be taken seriously when they are spewing OS advocacy about things they have no clue about. If you think that just the fact that you are not running windows makes you a better person, then you live in a very closed, sterile world.
@peter: it does’nt, just because that images is probably years old when nice themes for gtk, good fonts and good antialiasing where still lacking on *nix, I’m using SciTE on my linux box and it is just as nice to see as textmate.
(No opinion on the rest of the mine is better than your flame)
Hey, Windows users, I made a simple VB script for PSPad last night to make the editor to do code completion for Ruby source file with .rb extension. Because it was a work of just a few hours, and I was totally newby to VB script, it might look very bad code. :)
Anyway, it was pretty easy to implement, and it works for ‘class’, ‘def’, ‘do’, ‘while’, and ‘if’ statement. http://www.geocities.com/sskimbox/Completion.txt Change the extension to .vbs and save as C:\Program Files\PSPad editor\Script\VBScript\Completion.vbs
Anyway, don’t blame me about lack of functionality. Its version is “0.001a” at most. :P
BTW, PSPad is pretty impressive editor. Try it if you use Windows.
Oh, I forgot one thing. You have to install Windows script. :( Download here:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=C717D943-7E4B-4622-86EB-95A22B832CAA&displaylang=en
Just the other day I was telling my boss how glad I was to see a good technology being backed by a diverse set of developers. From Java to PHP to .NET, all are enjoying Rails. I went so far as to say I hadn’t seen any of the usual zealatory and that Rails was all about getting the job done and enjoying it.
Then the very creators of Rails goes and says something like this.
It is a bit sad and I don’t see the need to highlight what is true about many apps in both directions.
Not to mention TextMate on Windows would work just fine if someone sat down and did it.
Joe and Greg: I call bullshit on your bullshit.
Premise 1: Happy coders write better code. Premise 2: OS X makes Person A more happy. Conclusion: OS X makes Person A write better code.
or
Premise 1: Coders with tools they like write better code. Premise 2: OS X has tools that Person A likes. Conclusion: OS X makes Person A write better code.
or no?
Whoa, Paul, the Rails creators haven’t taken part in any of the zealotry at all. They work on OSX, but Rails works cross platform.
But because they’re on OSX, does that mean that they shouldn’t use an OSX-only editor? They like it. They recommend it. It happens to run only on OSX. That’s zealotry? For every OSX-only app, I’ll show you 50 Windows-only apps.
Yes, I’m sure someone could write TextMate for Windows. There’s no secret magic. But there is a lack of (strong) support for certain things in Windows that OSX has built into their APIs and developer resources. I’m sure you can find alternatives. That I won’t argue. But Allan of TextMate works on OSX. If he’s happy with the work he’s doing and the money he’s making, why should he add the extra workload?
It’s like telling the folks at http://www.commutercars.com/ that their product is awful because it doesn’t go off road. It’s not meant to!
I never said TextMate should work on PCs. Allen can and should work on whatever he wants to. Macs rock.
I’m suggesting people try PSPad for Windows. It can do some very TextMate like things (or at least look like it).
That’s all. No flames, no bashing, only positive suggestions.
Okie dokie. I take back any intended or perceived flaming, bashing, etc. :)
I have been happy with Sakura Text Editor. Unfortunately, it is only in Japanese. http://sakura-editor.sourceforge.net/ If you can read Japanese, check it out!
You can call bullshit on what I said all day long, here’s the rub, I really couldn’t care less. Ironically, I would have said the same thing before I bought my iBook.
So, PJ’s essentially saying that all code that wasn’t written on an iBook is of inferior quality. How did Kerrigan and Richie ever manage?!?
Joe: If nothing makes you code better other than intellect and wisdom alone, we should all be programming assembly. Good tools do make a difference for me. If not for you, cool.
Did you mean Kernighan and Ritchie? or who is this duo of whom you speak? I’m not as smart as you (obviously), but certainly want to know what I’m talking about. Inform me.
As a recovering mac cult member even I can see that this:
“Oh, and if you haven’t switched yet, you can swing by Apple and pickup a Mac on the way to TextMate. It’s not now, nor ever, going Windows.”
sounds an awful lot like zealotry. Mac are too expensive. To buy, and mor importantly to fix. My ibook went down and I had to buy an $80 powersupply. $80!!!
I can fix my own PC, I can replace the hardware whenever I want. I can play games, I can use Maya (Maya for Mac sucks) it just works for me. I’m not a Windows zealot either, but Ruby could do alot more to curb this mac zealotry.
While i’m on that topic. Mac isn’t “cool” or “hip.” It’s an fing corporation for gawd sakes. They want your money. That’s it. Get over it you freaks.
As a recovering mac cult member even I can see that this:
“Oh, and if you haven’t switched yet, you can swing by Apple and pickup a Mac on the way to TextMate. It’s not now, nor ever, going Windows.”
sounds an awful lot like zealotry. Mac are too expensive. To buy, and mor importantly to fix. My ibook went down and I had to buy an $80 powersupply. $80!!!
I can fix my own PC, I can replace the hardware whenever I want. I can play games, I can use Maya (Maya for Mac sucks) it just works for me. I’m not a Windows zealot either, but Ruby could do alot more to curb this mac zealotry.
While i’m on that topic. Mac isn’t “cool” or “hip.” It’s an fing corporation for gawd sakes. They want your money. That’s it. Get over it you freaks.
My bad, the $2500 30” Cinema display is what is absolutely necessary to write better code. Two of ‘em likely makes for even better code.
Joe = Troll, or he is quite dillusional, or doesn’t know how to read correctly. PJ in no way implied that anyone else would write better code with osx, are you daft?
Go Ryan, Elise, Joe and others!
There is TOO much Mac zealotry going on in the RAILs community, DHH’s comment here is quite dismissive of that.
DHH: “Windows will always be a priority for Rails. Granted, we need the help of Windows owners to do this because we don’t use that platform in the core group, but we’re highly appreciative of the help to get Rails working better on Windows.”
I’m surprised by this piece of obvious marketing BS. Windows is NOT a priority. If it were, there would be Windows people on the Core team getting RAILS to work on Windows themselves!
Fizz: So PJ’s different from everybody else?
Joe, you’ve put on a clinic in the straw man. Bravo.
Ryan: Damn your lucky my HP Laptop Power supply died and it was 120 to replace.
Chuck: I’ve done no such thing.
Fascism is alive and well.
“Ryan: Damn your lucky my HP Laptop Power supply died and it was 120 to replace.”
That’s insane!
Mac powersupplies in their attapt to be pretty and small have always been bad though. They always go out. My work toshiba, though it is a total pieceOS has a bulky power supply that wont fail. And, even if it does because the coord is detachable it I can just replace that part.
Anyway, I have been thinking alot about this whole topic and really we should think of macZealots with pity, not scorn. They have a disease braught on by the best marketing team on the planet.
Also, has anyone noticed that most ROR servers are running on Linux??? Is this true? Or is it just mine? I am actually slipping in a hardrive to dual boot again so I can develop ROR without worriing about messing up my GTK installation.
I would finally like to say thanks to the ROR team for all your hard work. Even if you are macZealots, you do a great job.
“My bad, the $2500 30â€? Cinema display is what is absolutely necessary to write better code. Two of ‘em likely makes for even better code.”—Joe (emphasis mine)
“A straw-man argument is the practice of refuting a weaker argument than an opponent actually offers.”—Wikipedia
I’ve never stated that OS X is necessary to write better code, only that it does help me write better code.
And yes, you did set up a straw man.
“A straw-man argument is the practice of refuting a weaker argument than an opponent actually offers.�—Wikipedia
Nice – thanks. This is what Republicans do all the time in debates. New word yay!
LOL, Democrats like using terms like ‘strawman’ and ‘fascist’ inappropriately.
ryan, while you’re learning new words, look up ‘alot’ in the dictionary sometime.
Mark, while your posting on weblogs, try not to be an @$$. Also, you have given me the oppertunity to use another term describing rebublicans during debates: red herring.
“A distractor that draws attention away from the real issue.”
For example: pointing out typos in people’s posts to draw attention from the said person’s point.
Excellent!
(Also, i’m not a democrat. Not even close.)
ryan, you’re the one being an @$$, polluting this thread with politics. And if you really expect anybody to take you seriously, cut back on your numerous spelling mistakes (3 minimum in your last post alone). Finally, since you deny being a Democrat, it’s obvious we can assume you’re a socialist/communist, since that’s a favorite ploy of theirs (yours).
You know what they say about @$$uming…
I’m actually a balance of powers kind of guy with some states rights thrown in. Basically, I don’t trust anyone to do the right thing on their own accord. Love them checks and balances!
The political addition was to draw a comparison towards the mac/cool/liberal thing.
Anyway – enough post pollution—back to RUBY.
You know what they say about @$$uming…
I’m actually a balance of powers kind of guy with some states rights thrown in. Basically, I don’t trust anyone to do the right thing on their own accord. Love them checks and balances!
The political addition was to draw a comparison towards the mac/cool/liberal thing.
Anyway – enough post pollution,—back to RUBY.
Okay, I got the point. This very post is about advertising Mac OS X and numerous friends’ text editors. No Ruby, no Rails, just “buy it if you want to be like the BIG guys”.
Unix with a slick UI – how can people not dig the loveliness of OS X?
Apple’s hardware is pretty good but it is OS X that rocks.
Linux sucks – it’s very powerful but it’s ugly and difficult to use.
Windows “gets it done” – it’ll never win any beauty awards but most of the time Windows gets it done.
OS X – The best UI by a country mile. Not perfect at all, but much better than the rest. And then there is the power you can unleash at the command line. Tiger makes Windows look like a lost kitten. Linux matches OS X for power, but loses due to the fact that it sucks for every-day-do-it-in-the-GUI stuff because it’s ugly and difficult to use.
Take cost out of the equasion and OS X has the best blend of power and usability. Windows will do, but when I have the option, OS X is much better.
But, of course, you only get the premium by paying the premium!
All 100 comments were well worth the time to read. =)
“It’s not now, nor ever, going Windows.”
This kind of remark is disturbing and childish. I hope DHH was just kidding when he said this. I’d love to find a capable editor on Windows or Linux that could do those fancy code snippets in Textmate and do them as nicely as Textmate. I haven’t found one yet that just works well and is easy to configure/change (enlighten me).
I also see this blatant pushing of Textmate going on in the Turbogears world.
Hearing how good Textmate is all the time is getting old.
Seeing every tutorial video done on a Mac with Textmate center stage is getting old too.
Seeing the snide remarks like “If you use Linux or Windows then screw you, you’ll never get a good editor like Textmate” type of comments is also getting very old.
I don’t think I’m far off in saying that the open source world needs an editor like Textmate (No not vim or emacs with various scripts and programming modes). Something I’d gladly pay for.
Just because I can’t throw down $500 – $800 for a Mac Mini does not mean I can’t throw down $40 for an sweet killer editor like Textmate (If there was one for Linux or Windows I’d be sold).
Frank:
Seriously, try Eclipse with RadRails plugin (RadRails guys—you are awesome!). “Text Editor wars” are not interesting on Windows platform for years already, just because everyone GOT an IDE that suits him perfectly. Eclipse is the one.
Yaroslav, I have Rad Rails. It’s shaping up nice but it is definitely not (in my opinion) a Textmate replacement. Well at least not yet. I’ll hold my breath and pray.
Frank: I don’t believe DDH’s comment was either disturbing or childish in any way. It is his assessment of the situation, whereby TextMate’s codebase is not easily portable to Windows.
Tired of hearing how good TextMate is? Then please take the needed action to limit your exposure to positive comments about TextMate. We all have a choice as to what we read and the type of content we expose ourselves to. And I say this as somebody who has never used TextMate.
And FWIW, I don’t recall anybody saying that something like TextMate will never exist on a non-Mac platform. It seems to be the general consensus is, instead, “We’re sorry that TextMate doesn’t exist on either platforms. It would be nice if it did. Now please stop whining about it and solve the problem as best you see fit.”
Little tip with PSPad – it doesn’t support FTP projects (it’s planned in the next version). Novell’s free Netdrive works pretty well in the meantime: http://www.acs.uwosh.edu/novell/netdrive.htm
BTW, there’s a (seemingly mandatory) $2000-2500 upgrade for TextMate due in February ;P Ouch! http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/72804/wo/0.SLID?nclm=MacBookPro&mco=E27B7429
Joe: I’m assuming your comment about the “mandatory” upgrade for TextMate is supposed to be tongue-in-cheek. Either way, I don’t get it. :)
I purchased a used powerbook just to use with TextMate. I’ve been using windows for the last 12+ years and the experience of OS X was a very pleasant surprise.
Took a while to surrender to its logic and simplicity. It feels very solid, connected, responsive and is just… sexy.
I am running a trial of TextPad and love it so far – feels like a perfect assistant standing idle by your side (=nonintrusive) but handling you the right tool when you need it.
I haven’t used it enough to experience any super tools or features. But this feeling of reliability, responsiveness and “correcness in action” creates a pleasant and un-crowded environment to work in. I will vote for it with my ~$50.
As for the Mac vs PC vs David vs Bill Gates vs W. “nucular” war taking place above in this thread—c’mon people, we are all human, imperfect and different and most of us are here because of one common thing our love for coding/ruby/ror.
I am running a trial of TextPad… meant TextMate.
I purchased a used powerbook just for my ROR/TextMate endeavors. I’ve been using windows for the last 12+ years and the experience of OS X was a very pleasant surprise.
Took a while to surrender to its logic and simplicity. It feels very solid, connected, responsive and is just… sexy.
I am running a trial of TextMate and love it so far – feels like a perfect assistant standing idle by your side (=nonintrusive) but handling you the right tool when you need it.
I haven’t used it enough to experience any super tools or features. But this feeling of reliability, responsiveness and “correcness in action” creates a pleasant and un-crowded environment to work in. I will vote for it with my ~$50.
As for the Mac vs PC vs David vs Bill Gates vs W. “nucular” war taking place above in this thread—c’mon people, we are all human, imperfect and different and most of us are here because of one common thing our love for coding/ruby/ror.
I purchased a used powerbook just for my ROR endeavors. I’ve been using windows for the last 12+ years and the experience of OS X was a very pleasant surprise.
Took a while to surrender to its logic and simplicity. It feels very solid, connected, responsive and is just… sexy.
I am running a trial of TextMate and love it so far – feels like a perfect assistant standing idle by your side (=nonintrusive) but handling you the right tool when you need it.
I haven’t used it enough to experience any super tools or features. But this feeling of reliability, responsiveness and “correcness in action” creates a pleasant and un-crowded environment to work in. I will vote for it with my ~$50.
As for the Mac vs PC vs David vs Bill Gates vs W. “nucular” war taking place above in this thread—c’mon people, we are all human, imperfect and different and most of us are here because of one common thing our love for coding/ruby/ror.
I’ve been reading the above hundred or so comments with amusement, largely resisting the urge to refute what I believe are a number of unfair and inaccurate accusations. It looks like, at some point today, I could resist no longer. I present you with:
http://www.servercodex.com/archives/2006/01/12/rails-platform-tools/
For those of you with better things to do, I’ll summarize: “Either make a positive contribution to the community, or stop whining.”
does your non-textmate editor do this ???
Heh, being the proud author of “comment #18”, I think somebody should do a study on Mac vs. everybody else productivity. Perhaps Mac+TextMate coders can code marginally faster. Or perhaps not, since they’ll have to work more for more expensive slower machines (well, until Feb. when they’ll pay even more for machines “4x faster”).
I think everybody probably agrees that OSX is good and TextMate is great, but the statement “Oh, and if you haven’t switched yet, you can swing by Apple and pickup a Mac on the way to TextMate. It’s not now, nor ever, going Windows.” is likely what raised everybodys’ hackles since it’s taking sides. In F/OSS, people use a great many environments, tools, operating systems, etc. It’s ironic (and hypocritical) that everybody laments closed-source software from Microsoft, but they’re just fine with that if it comes from Apple. I think Rails should be rallying behind RadRails or some other F/OSS IDE that would make the entire Rails experience completely F/OSS. Or maybe a statement that TextMate’s author is thinking of open-sourcing it. Or porting it, to become even more wealthy. Or helping with RadRails. Or maybe Apple will open source OSX, which is really FreeBSD. Or…
And providing feedback is making a positive contribution to the community, not whining. I myself don’t have the time nor expertise to write a Windows TextMate clone.
What the hell is the matter with you people?
If you think rails isn’t supported enough on Windows, put up or shut up. dev.rubyonrails.com is the first place to start looking if you’d like to report bugs or submit a patch.
If you think X editor is better than TextMate, wonderful. Use that.
If you are upset that the core team would endorse a non F/OSS product, stop bitching because you have no grounds. People choose to work on a community project for many reasons. Those on the core team are good at what they do and everyone in the Rails community (no Elise, rails isn’t a fucking acronym) benefits from their knowledge and work. Not everyon is a F/OSS zelot or purist. If you are, there are many fine alternatives to TextMate but people are entitled to an opinion and allowed to express their enjoyment for an application.
Joe: Stop now. Read the last section again. David has always been known as an antagonist (it is one of the reasons Rails has taken off) so if you are easily offended by someone suggesting that their system is better, stop reading the rails blog. Get your news somewhere else. Certainly stop trolling here.
What truly confuses me is why people feel locked to any given platform when developing web applications. Given Rails and Ruby’s relative platform independence (except for some holes in windows support), why can’t you get a cheap rails dev machine and deploy on whatever?
Rails does a terrific job at bridging the gap between platforms. So why are people upset that one platform may have a better editor? A lot of things are better in their mac incarnation, I suggest people get used to being left out of apps like TextMate or Quicksilver or GarageBand, or buy a freakin’ mac.
Providing positive, constructive feedback is making a contribution. Whining is whining.
Speaking of hypocrisy… If you’re such a diehard F/OSS fanatic, Joe, why are you using Windows?
Kevin Clark: LOL, I’m not upset, just raising some points and engaging in debate. And I’m certainly not trolling. Judging from your heated, profanity- and ad-hominem-laden rant, you’re the one who needs to chill.
“If you’re such a diehard F/OSS fanatic,”
Never said I was.
Joe: Ok, so my post was a bit heated. Granted. The fact is you
aren’tjust bringing up issues. You’re prodding people into arguments with things like:Heh, being the proud author of “comment #18â€?, I think somebody should do a study on Mac vs. everybody else productivity. Perhaps Mac+TextMate coders can code marginally faster. Or perhaps not, since they’ll have to work more for more expensive slower machines (well, until Feb. when they’ll pay even more for machines “4x fasterâ€?).
or
It’s ironic (and hypocritical) that everybody laments closed-source software from Microsoft, but they’re just fine with that if it comes from Apple.
or
BTW, there’s a (seemingly mandatory) $2000-2500 upgrade for TextMate due in February ;P Ouch! http://store.apple.com/1-800-MY-APPLE/WebObjects/AppleStore.woa/72804/wo/0.SLID?nclm=MacBookPro&mco=E27B7429
Whatever. I’m over it.
My point is that if you don’t want to use a mac, thats fine. Feel free to use any OS of your choosing. Rails is supported on windows. When there is a bug, it is fixed when someone can fix it. If you think the core team is unfairly weighted towards Mac people, maybe you should get good enough at ruby that you can be the windows person on the core team.
It however isn’t hypocritical for David to like TextMate (it’s a great product). He isn’t Stallman. This isn’t the GNU project.
Whoever wants to is welcome to write a better editor for Windows. I have to deploy there often and would welcome one.
Also, my previous post, although perhaps profaine at times, is hardly ad-hominem ridden. It can be summarized as such:
If you don’t like something, fix it. If you like something better, use it. If you think it is objectionable for David to sing TextMate’s praises, well, that is something you’ll have to deal with one way or another, but stop complaining here.
Stupid textile.
Joe: If you’re not a F/OSS diehard, then why say this?
“I think Rails should be rallying behind RadRails or some other F/OSS IDE that would make the entire Rails experience completely F/OSS.”
Consistency.
Which is exactly my point—your posts are all over the place. I can’t find any consistency. What’s consistent about your combination of Windows and F/OSS?
I was referring to Rails, not me.
Why ask that Rails be consistent at the same time you’re admitting that you aren’t? I just don’t get it.
Obviously. See my post about desktop Linux sucking.
Whatever, Joe. You still haven’t answered my question: Why ask that Rails be consistent at the same time you’re admitting that you aren’t?
Why can’t you just answer the question?
Justin, you’re the troll. I’ve answered and explained.
Like hell you have.
The hell I didn’t.
We’ve completely devolved.. time to close comments.
Kevin Clark: Fuck off you overblown piece of Mac sucking shit! Drop the holier than thou attitude and let those of us who have other opinions ‘whine’ if we want to. If you dont want to hear it, DONT READ THE POSTS DICKWAD!
ahh.. The wars that editors create!
This is insane.
Wow. Talk about degrading conversation.
Fact of the matter is that TextMate is a fantastic editor, and David (with or without the rest of the core team) is allowed to back any editor he would like.
There is also a huge difference betwen supporting a buggy piece of software that has become the defacto standard with no support in sight, and backing a small, lightweight, inexpensive editor that is developed by one guy… a guy who you can talk to and ask questions to at almost any hour on IRC.
TextMate definitely has my vote, and I must say, after switching from Windows two months ago.. my life in general is much happier.
One more thing:
The entire attitude of RubyOnRails seems to about doing something one way, or doing it the hard way.
I don’t see why people are so suprised or upset that the minds behind RoR are being snobby about support for Windows. The fact of the matter is that David and MANY RoR developers are on Mac and firmly believe it is a great OS to work on. Given the already accepted attitude of Rails, the obvious attitude would be “Do it on Mac, or do it the hard way.”
Personally, I bought my Powerbook almost exclusively because of the BSD features and TextMate.
As KevinClark said, until we get windows developers who are advocates of their platform enough to do something about it, I see no reason why we should all cater to an OS that doesn’t make it easy for us to do so.
I just have to say: jEdit on Windows (or whatever you like, it’s Java) with the SuperAbbreviations plugin (like TextMate’s snippets). Guys, this rocks.
Wake me when it works on something other than a mac.
Yawn…....
Tired of fighting the Mac zealots.
Django doesn’t seem to have this bias. And from my first pass at it, it looks pretty good!
Don’t feel any love Windows Users? Trot on over to Django on Python. They have a great Admin tool BUILT RIGHT IN!
Latta!
140 messages later..
I faintly recall this post being about TextMate, correct? And since that’s the case i find it only fitting that the author mention the OS that it runs on.
This shouldn’t be a place to argue OS preference. And the author of TextMate shouldn’t have to port his software if they don’t want to.
Group hug time! : )
People need to argue less..
Thanks… job well done…
http://www.radrails.org/blog/show/44
Mac fan boys are very good at alienating everyone and everything that doesn’t agree with them.
Alex: Stop making mountains out of molehills. You’re creating drama where there isn’t any.
Nowhere in Kyle’s post is there evidence for your claim that Mac folks are alienating those that don’t agree with them. Kyle simply said that some folks are switching to the Mac platform just for TextMate, which he feels isn’t necessary given that RadRails runs on nearly any operating system.
I happen to agree that people shouldn’t switch to the Mac platform just for TextMate—there are a multitude of other (better) reasons for considering switching to Mac OS X than just to use a particular text editor. I also think that RadRails is a fantastic project, and I look forward to the enhancements Kyle proposed for future releases.
That’s a stupid concept !