Hi
First of all, TextMate is great work. I only had to try it out for a
few seconds and it was instantly obvious to me that TextMate just
_feels_ great to use. It's powerful yet doesn't feel clunky or
bloated, unlike some other editors which shall not be named.
The only thing missing for me to be able to use it in my day-to-day
work is the possibility to have projects synchronize with an
ftp-server. I'm a web developer, and most of the time I work against a
remote ftp-server (not always, but quite often).
The only editor I've found that does this in a simple fashion is
Dreamweaver MX, which, while not terrible as a code editor, it isn't
exactly optimal either.
I hope ftp-support is added soon, not just being able to edit a remote
file, but actually being able to associate a project with an ftp
account. Because, then I'd have no reason to use Dreamweaver MX again,
instead of using it all the damn time.
Best regards,
Tomas Jogin, Sweden
http://jogin.com/weblog/
I've got a rough cut at python support bundle[1]. It includes syntax
and three snippets: klass, def and deff. The snippets rely on a de
facto python standard of 4-spaces for indentation. I'll keep making
minor updates, but feel free to use it in the future TextMate releases.
The editor is rather neat so far. Keep up the good work.
[1] http://glyf.org/TextMate/pythonsyntax.tgz
---
Philip f
Greetings,
(this was cc-ed to feedback(a)macromates.com and contains screenshot
attachments, which I hope the ML server won't strip out).
A little background first: I'm a long time BBEdit user, I think that
it's a great product but I also think that it really starts to show its
age. It really looks like the BareBones guys are trapped in the
technology they used from day 1 and that if they'd want to get fresh,
they'd have to restart from scratch, which they probably won't. That's
why TextMate looks promising, and because it's built on top of modern
technologies it has the potential to become really great.
However, this v1.0 looks like nothing more than a good draft to me.
Yeah, shoot me, but that's David's hyping machine fault... :p
So here's a first batch of random comments about my first impressions.
They are mostly cosmetic and usability related, since I didn't really
used the product a lot yet, but I'm pretty sure I'll have some more as
time goes by.
- Ok so, I'm one of those who was very surprised not to find a
preferences dialog. When you think about configurability, you usually
think about preferences. I just saw a post about this on the MacroMates
blog, so let's just avoid this subject right now.
- Now let's go straight to the GUI itself. Here's a screenshot of a
TextMate default window (with my own default background color):
What I see here:
+ The color contrast between the gutter and the text area is pretty
low so the distinction is hard.
+ The gutter can only have 4 digits line numbers (no, files larger
than 9999 line are not that rare).
+ The (orange) wrap column line is almost invisible.
+ The lower status bar has loads of useless empty space.
+ The empty corner at the intersection of the scroll bar looks, well,
empty.
Here's my (photoshop) take on this:
+ A simple gray line to separate the gutter from the text area.
+ The gutter is a bit larger to allow 5 digits line numbers.
+ The outside limit of the wrap line is drawn in the same color than
the text area but with a lower brightness (that's currently how BBEdit
8 does it, it looks really nice imho).
+ The status bar is collapsed and put at the same level than the
horizontal scroll bar, saving lots of empty space. The left indicator
is the current line number, the right indicator is the column number
(again, that's how BBEdit does it, but they do it for a good reason).
Small icons could be added to make this more obvious.
+ No more weird empty corners.
Doesn't this look much tidy and cleaner like that ?
Let's move on to the project window. Here's how a basic project
currently looks in TextMate:
What we have here:
+ Weird looking tabs. They're not even tabs actually, and they really
look like they're quick hacks to me.
+ Weirdly sized icons in the drawer list.
+ (same comments than above for the text window itself).
Here's my take on this:
+ Tabs looking like tabs (actually stolen from NetNewsWire and
resized a bit).
+ Smaller icons in the drawer list allowing for a more balanced look
(quite impressive to see what a couple more pixel space can do uh ?).
+ Folder name is bold.
+ (same modifications than above to the text window).
Let's move on to features:
- Find and replace feature:
+ There should be a "Use selection for replace" menu shortcut.
+ There should be a "Replace" menu shortcut.
+ There should be a "Replace all" menu shortcut.
+ There should be a "Replace and find next" menu shortcut.
All these would allow to perform basic search & replace operations
straight from the keyboard, *without* having to open the find panel at
all.
- I guess that you guys already know that and are already preparing
something to fix this problem, but I'll say it anyway: having to
manually go and edit plist files from the guts of the app to have some
decent colors (relax, I'm kidding, I just don't like thos ugly black
backgrounds) is ridiculous. Tell me you're working on something before
I start my own Cocoa 'tmbundle' editor.
- Something which I found pretty weird: each tmbundle defines its very
own color settings right ? So if I want to have the same background
color for *all* languages I have to change *all* tmbundle syntax files,
right ? Wouldn't it be much simpler to have "default" settings which
each tmbundle would inherit from and could then override or not ? So
just like CSS elements can inherit from their parents, a syntax file
could either inherit attributes from the defaults, or override with its
own values. That would greatly simplify the whole coloring settings I
think. Thoughts ?
- Another pretty obvious one: there is no "function popup", or any
other way to quickly navigate through the list of functions or methods
of a code file, or the structure of a markup file.
- Snippets are great, but the snippet menu is already pretty crowded. I
think that allowing snippets to be grouped in families (based on the
tmbundle they're coming from, to begin with) or categories or whatever,
could help minimize the clutter. Ditto for macros and commands.
- How about the ability to have the snippets, macros and commands in a
palette ?
- How about giving some basic abilities to a command to specify when it
is actually applicable ? A command menu item (or palette entry ;))
could then be disabled if it is not. For example, the "Compile" command
does not make sense for a '.html' file, or the "Reload in Safari"
command does not really make sense for a '.rb' file.
- Being able to write commands in something else than shell scripts
could be cool. Like, being able to directly write applescript instead
of having to go through 'osascript' commands.
- Hey, you seem to have pretty good text editing widget (that
OakTextView thingy), so why not also use it for command editing ? Heck,
why not even also use it for colored regexp editing in the find panel ?
- Detail: it seems like a lots of ATSUI related debug messages are
still being sent to the console.
- Snippets, macros and commands are good ways to automate a lot of
stuff, but are there any plans to allow TextMate plugins, for those
tasks which would require an elaborate GUI ?
Oh, and one final comment: I *R*E*A*L*L*Y* *H*A*T*E* the icon. It's
butt ugly. Really. Heck, you have John 'Magic' Marstall on the mailing
list, I'm pretty sure he could do something about this :))
--
Luc Heinrich - lucsky(a)mac.com - http://www.honk-honk.com
Hi,
I've searched the documentation and the list archive for any mention
of "invisibles", i.e. the ability to show tabs and spaces, a la
BBEdit's "Show Invisibles" and "Show Spaces" or SubEthaEdit's "Show
Invisible Characters". Now, maybe it's there, but I can't find it; in
that case I'd appreciate a hint.
If not, and since we're supposed to send feature requests to the
list, that would be mine.
Best, Mic
Can anybody get this to work? Is it not implemented yet or am I just
screwing up?
Ian.
#ifndef __COMMON_SENSE__ | Ian Phillips
#include <std_disclaimer> | http://ianp.org
#endif
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On 7.10.2004, space aliens observed Mats Persson saying:
>I just downloaded the PHP & Smarty syntax bundle, and found that it
>too was based on a dark background. Can someone please explain this
>seeming 'obsession' with dark backgrounds when 99% of all other apps
>are the basic white background with black/coloured text ???
A lot of people who spend the day writing on a Computer prefer dark
backgrounds because for them it is less tiring. Dark text on white
background works well on paper, because paper reflects light and doesn't
emit it. A screen, however, emits light, which makes white really
bright.
I prefer dark backgrounds and find them more readable and a lot less
tiring for the eye than bright backgrounds.
lucas
- --
"No one ever attains very eminent success by simply doing what is required of him; it is the amount and excellence of what is over and above the required that determines greatness."
-- Charles Kendall Adams
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(pardon my english)
Having seen the 'rails_setup.mov' I thought Textmate's interface would
be more Xcode like, but I see that you finally opted for something more
Mail.app like. I wonder why, I see the splitview metaphor more adequate
for Textmate.
OS
Cmd-E to enter search string is a nice start.
Cmd-Opt-E to enter replacement string.
Cmd-... to replace and find next
Cmd-... to replace all
I use these commands more than almost any other when editing text. To
have to use a dialog to enter the replacement string...to have to use
the mouse to replace next...ouch. That's a big showstopper for me.
Oh...and why does 'Ignore Case' get greyed out when you use regular
expression (and yet maintain the state last set to, as though it's
either locked on or off)?
--
(-, /\ \/ / /\/
I've been having fun poking around Textmate. I spent today picking
through the internals to create my own syntax coloring for PHP and
Smarty. Smarty ( http://smarty.php.net/ ) is a templating system for
PHP.
http://www.spahr.org/share/PHP_Smarty.tmbundle.zip
Anyone is welcome to download and modify at as they please. Of note : a
complete php function list is included in the php syntax file. I'm
quite please with the Smarty coloring, all html elements are in cool
and muted tones, and all smarty template logic is in saturated and warm
tones -- it's rather easy to see what's what.
James.
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On 7.10.2004, space aliens observed Benny saying:
>>BTW, what the heck is "Freehanded edit"?
>It is an editing mode in which the caret is free to go anywhere in
>the display i.e. it is not limited horizontally by newlines. Kind of
>like in really old-style editors.
Ah! That's pretty awesome! No more of this foolish entering of spaces!
:-)
lucas
- --
"You'd have to kill me and prop me up in the seat of my car with a smile painted on my face to get me to go near Hollywood."
-- Philip K. Dick
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