[TxMt] Re: Honest assessment of TM2's state please!

[Watts Martin]

Apricot AN wrote:

> The reality is that TM2 isn't ready and may never be, and people who are
> really dissatisfied with TM need to be looking at alternatives.  If TM2
> comes out, that will be the nicest present.   So what alternatives are
> there?

You mentioned BBEdit. While TM positioned itself as the anti-BBEdit very 
early on, it's worth noting that BBEdit hasn't been standing still, and 
it's actually pretty extensible -- it's just that to do most of the neat 
stuff with it you need AppleScript. BBEdit can handle huge files with 
ease, though, and does a better job when it comes to handling 20+ files 
open at once than anything else I've seen.

The problem with most of the other alternatives out there is that 
they're just Not There Yet, if you get the meaning. The 
previously-mentioned Kod has some really interesting design ideas but 
it's a long way from being usable. It's unique for being very modern and 
open source, though. Others I'd really keep my eyes on --

Sublime Text 2: currently in alpha, but based on an existing Windows 
program that already has a bit of a community around it. Openly inspired 
by TextMate, and compatible with TM color schemes and some bundle 
components (snippets, .tmPreferences and .tmLanguages files).

Coda: Panic's "one-window" web development system also has a plugin 
system and some TextMate compatibility, which I'm not sure people know 
about. Panic has said that they're working full steam on version 2.0, so 
even if version 1.x isn't your cup of tea (it's not mine), big changes 
are ahead.

Espresso: MacRabbit's competitor to Coda is kind of wonky right now, but 
it's very extensible in a fashion that's similar (albeit more 
convoluted) than TM's bundles. I suspect it has a lot of power under the 
hood that isn't being exploited yet. Also like Coda, it's a program I 
haven't warmed to but am expecting possibly big things in its version 2 
release.

...and, of course, I'm expecting possibly big things in TextMate's 
version 2 release. Lest anyone get *too* much on my case for 
recommending competitors: despite a few serious attempts to move to 
BBEdit or MacVim, I keep coming back to TM. It just seems prudent to 
hedge my bets at this point. :)

-- 
Watts Martin <layotl at gmail.com>

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