Notepad Replacement

[bledd]

holy thread revival!

using notepad2 here

[jimmsta]

I prefer Notepad++, as it's opensource, supports Win9x, and offers practically everything that ConTEXT offers, except it's a bit more stable than ConTEXT.

I've used Metapad, and Notepad2. Of those two, notepad2 is far better IMHO.

[jdoe]

I'm another Notepad2 user because it is self contain into a single exe. It is a very smooth syntax highlighting for coding purpose. Support ASCII and UNICODE. And it is very stable.

The only thing that was annoying to me was the message "Are you sure you want to open this large file...". I removed this message by patching offset 56ECh from 7338 to EB38 (version 1.0.12).

I tried all the others text editors mentionned but they are too much for my needs. BTW, one bad side about Notepad2... it seems to be no development on it anymore.

Edited December 26, 2006 by jdoe

[E-66]

I've never tried any of these replacement Notepads apps.... are they capable of more than Wordpad?

[celtish]

I've never tried any of these replacement Notepads apps.... are they capable of more than Wordpad?

The basic differences are

(1) Wordpad has a greater capacity than the standard Windows notepad

(2) Wordpad text can be formatted whereas the standard notepad cannot

Note that some of the third-party notepads (e.g. metapad) have capabilities beyond those of the standard notepad.

[E-66]

The basic differences are

(1) Wordpad has a greater capacity than the standard Windows notepad

(2) Wordpad text can be formatted whereas the standard notepad cannot

1. I know

2. I know

Note that some of the third-party notepads (e.g. metapad) have capabilities beyond those of the standard notepad.

Right, that's what I'm asking about - how does Wordpad compare to the replacement Notepads? I don't use Notepad, I just use Wordpad. What do the replacement Notepads offer that Wordpad doesn't?

[BenoitRen]

When I open plain text files with Wordpad, I don't get a horizontal scrollbar. Plus it loads slower, and has a funky mouse selection method.

[E-66]

When I open plain text files with Wordpad, I don't get a horizontal scrollbar.

Wordwrap on/off in options for text settings?

Plus it loads slower...

What, a few hundreths of a second?

...and has a funky mouse selection method.

I don't know what that means.

[BenoitRen]

Wordwrap on/off in options for text settings?

Off. It's plain text after all.

What, a few hundreths of a second?

Notepad: appears instantly

Wordpad: 3 seconds

Keep in mind that I'm on a Pentium II 233 Mhz PC here.

I don't know what that means.

Try selecting exactly the letters you want when there are slashes or full stops nearby. You have to see it for yourself.

[celtish]

Note that some of the third-party notepads (e.g. metapad) have capabilities beyond those of the standard notepad.

Right, that's what I'm asking about - how does Wordpad compare to the replacement Notepads? I don't use Notepad, I just use Wordpad. What do the replacement Notepads offer that Wordpad doesn't?

Your aim should be to try out the various replacement notepads and see which one suits you best. Checking through this thread will give you a good idea of what is out there.

[Tarun]

I prefer Notepad++, as it's opensource, supports Win9x, and offers practically everything that ConTEXT offers, except it's a bit more stable than ConTEXT.

I've used Metapad, and Notepad2. Of those two, notepad2 is far better IMHO.

Agreed, I use and prefer it now over many; including UltraEdit32.

[NL-Stitch]

I am using Notepad++ for batch files, PHP and more. Notepad++ gives the script different collors etc., so you can check if you forgot a ";" or something.

Greetings,

NL-Stitch

[Jaymo]

i myself use metapad and have for quite some time. used notepad2 briefly and it was pretty cool with the colorizing.

i had some problem with tab (probably user prob ) and switched back.

still have a copy somewhere, haven't really used pfe; (just haven't fiddle-farted with it.) have it somewhere too.

everything i do(which isn't much) i use metapad for. i don't even really recall anymore what all features it has.

i use remove trailing space, convert-uppercase/lowercase, the links. that's about it.

i'm actually checking this thread out to see what's different out there. here's some things that i've been curious about lately.

sorting lines/selecting columns/maybe tabs(like kmeleon or firefox?)/multiple text storage maybe(not sure what to call it).

now if i just get off my butt and take a closer look at some of these, that'd help.

i don't think there is a "best" notepad out there. we all have different interests. what people don't normally use could easily be considered useless bloat by them. even tho' i'm curious about some of the features i mentioned, i may decide no... i like a little bit smaller notepad.

and it's true; what we are talking about is normally for simple text. anything more... scripting, programming, etc. may have a more useful app for it. me? i just use metapad, keep it in my quicklaunch.

i have to say i am really pleased that this thread has kept a positive attitude. some i've seen are quite horrendous.

kudos to everyone here. -jaymo

[HyperHacker]

Textpad is great, but it's no Notepad replacement. (BTW, it has Block Select Mode which lets you select columns or blocks of text, as someone asked.) Personally, I'm fine with XP's Notepad for simple things; I guess there's no way to use it in Win98?

[BenoitRen]

NotepadEx doesn't really support Unicode, it seems. I'm using Unired now when I need Unicode support. But it's quite slow, so I looked at a couple other Notepad replacements.

Notepad2 - Requires IE4+ SHLWAPI.DLL because of an unresolved dependency.

Metapad - Requires RICHED20.DLL. I downloaded the recommended one, and then it ran. But no real Unicode support.

The reason I need Unicode is because I'm converting a site that uses Japanese characters for the Japanese titles of games. If only SeaMonkey's Composer used a good DOCTYPE and didn't destroy the mark-up you feed it.