Your preferred text editor? Nano, Gedit, Kwrite, other?

I prefer nano.

 

Gedit is my favorite, but when i'm in the CLI with no way to get to the GUI i use Nano just fine. I'm a firm hater of KDE so i wouldn't even think of Kwrite.

 

Usually when editing important files inside the desktop environment such as xorg.conf, I do the equivalent of "sudo gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf"

This way I can clearly see the entire document, its much better layed out and I can edit it with ease.

When troubleshooting and no gui available nano does the job well, vim although more capable is just a hassle to use at times (at first I couldn't even figure out how to exit vim after editing the file)



PS: Calvin, when did you become a Linux junkie, thought you were one of the "go to" guys for Windows stuff.

 

I mad him do it

 

I'm still a go to guy, i've just decided to join the Linux ranks. I got rid of vista on my machine and use Linux exclusively. I've done a lot of reading so i'm slowly becoming a linux "go to" guy. =]
EDIT: It's lies than Tom spreads, lies. I made myself do it, he just helped me elope. =P

 

LOL, if walking you through i counts
j/k( I did walk him through though)

 

Well that was for Xubuntu on my old desktop which i don't use so it still doesn't count. =P I installed it myself on this one. About 7 times now.

 

If it's for programming or script/config file editing then vi and emacs. If I just want to create a basic text file with notepad type capabilities I like Kate. If I want more robust formatting then Open office.

 

Gedit in GNOME, Kate in KDE. Of the two, I'm going to have to lean towards Gedit since I prefer the Gnome GUI more...

 

I use vim in CLI or kwrite in GUI

 

You forgot vi! I always use vi in CLI.

 

Notepad!

Just kidding, Gedit.

 

Gedit always messes up my formatting in my Windows .txt files...

 

Kwrite....sometimes Kate.....both for editing files, etc.

 

I use Gedit if I am on the GIU. Otherwise through SSH I use Vim.

 

Man, I can't believe this hasn't tuned into a vi/emacs flamefest. A couple thoughts on this:

1. Most people here are relatively new to linux, so may not know much about either of these editors, neither being particularly newbie friendly.
2. This is a laptop board more than a linux board.

I'll put in my vote for (x)emacs. What more could you want than your own OS inside an editor?

All that said, for those who value productivity, I suggest either vi or emacs. Once you get past the steep learning curve, you can do wonders. I will admit, from a pure productivity perspective, certain tasks (coding Java/C++ for example) may be better within an IDE like eclipse where you have auto-complete, on-the-fly syntax checking etc., but for many, many things, it's tough to beat these old-school eds.

 

Seriously, once you try vi (or emacs), and see how fast you can do things with it, you won't want to use anything else.

 

What more could I want? Pinkies that aren't all swollen from pushing modifier keys after I'm done editing. I'll stick with vi, tyvm.
http://briancarper.net/2008/06/08/emacs-pinky/:

Sorry I couldn't resist

Or you could have both vi and Eclipse: http://www.satokar.com/viplugin/ or http://vimplugin.org/ (I've only tried the first, as I heard it was better).

Yeah, getting past the learning curve is the hardest part. Until you do, it seems completely useless. That's probably what keeps them from being widely used.

 

Ok, now I'm using emacs (x)

 

I think i might get into using vim.

 

I use vim.

 

Ah, nostalgic tear for the old vi/emacs flame wars

I relatively recently, last 3 years, had to learn 'vi' for work, and it has now got to the stage that when I go back to using Micro$oft Word I forget that I am on Windows and I try to esc to 'vi' command mode!

 

I'm playing around with Java programming, which version of Eclipse should I download from the Kubuntu repos?

EDIT: Nevermind, I found it...

 

vim for short edits, xemacs for serious stuff

 

Did nano/pico for a long time, but finally took the plunge and learned vi. Regular expressions make my job SO much easier... people actually come to me most of the time when they have a text file they can't work with because vi lets me do all kinds of nifty stuff Not to mention that the "modal" interface just makes sense to me. (It's not really modal in a GUI sense, but that's the best word I can think of to describe it)

 

You sure about that? The version in the repos ( http://packages.ubuntu.com/hardy/devel/eclipse) is 3.2, which was released almost 2 years ago, whereas the newest stable release is 3.3, released a year ago. You should download it from the Eclipse website. Since it's Java (boo!), you don't have the usual autoconf setup (./configure;make;make install). You just run the shell script, which uses your Java install to launch Eclipse. However, before you do, make sure you do

Code:

sudo apt-get build-dep eclipse

, so you have all the dependencies for using Eclipse from the source package.

 

srunni, thanks for the info....yes, I do have the repo version to check it out...I'll upgrade. to install, all I need is a ./install.sh ?

 

wearetheborg, I'm the exact same

 

No, you don't even need to do that. There's an executable file called 'eclipse' in the tarball you get from the Eclipse website. You just run it:

Code:

./eclipse

and you're good to go. So the Eclipse install can just stay in your /home folder, though you could install it to /usr/local/lib and create a symlink in /usr/local/bin if you want to. I don't suggest putting it in /usr/lib or a symlink in /usr/bin, as those are typically reserved for packages installed using the package manager.

Also, Eclipse isn't just for Java - you can use it for plenty of other languages too, given you've installed the appropriate plugins for syntax highlighting, compiling, etc. Though Java is the only language that I've found cumbersome enough that Eclipse's lagginess is bearable in return for the automation it provides. I am using a fairly old desktop though (Pentium D 3 Ghz + 2GB DDR2 RAM), so that may be part of the problem.

 

Thanks. I realized that shortly after examing the file. I have it extracted to /opt/eclipse, and created a menu item.

How do I make sure my Java JRE is current and set properly in Ubuntu? Thanks, I'm still in a learning phase with all this for a while yet I suppose

 

Gedit is my preference.

 

I'm seeing a pattern here...

I use vi for quick stuff and emacs for more involved editing.

 

You need to install the package sun-java6-jdk (sun-java6-jre and sun-java6-plugin are useful for other purposes as well). Make sure you're not using/don't have installed sun-java5-* packages.

To ensure you have the right version in use, use the command

Code:

java -version

This is what I get:

Code:

java version "1.6.0_03"
Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.6.0_03-b05)
Java HotSpot(TM) Client VM (build 1.6.0_03-b05, mixed mode, sharing)

Make sure the numbers are the same. If not, use

Code:

sudo update-alternatives --config java

to set the Java version. See https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Java for more information about this.

 

QFT (10 Character)

 

Gedit when local, vi when remote.

 

I guess I'll have to vote Gedit, since that's all I'm familiar with...

 

This is what I get after setting Sun Java....anything wrong?

Code:

john@C90s:~$ java -version
java version "1.6.0_06"
Java(TM) SE Runtime Environment (build 1.6.0_06-b02)
Java HotSpot(TM) Server VM (build 10.0-b22, mixed mode)

 

I use Notepad++ with wine whenever possible. Nothing is easier to use or more feature-filled for my purposes. I'm sure there's an easy way to do this that I haven't found, but I'd like to find a text editor that can be configured to run custom commands like Notepad++ does in windows like running code or opening the file in a web browser and such. Any thoughts?

 

Notepadd++? Come on, use vim or gedit even. Why do you use it?

 

Familiarity and customization Any text editors for linux that supports Octave/MATLAB, Java, C++, C#, and HTML(and other web formats), has customizable toolbars, and has customizable commands like to compile code or something? I'm sure its out there, so I'm hoping you know.

 

I think vi/vim or Emacs might have that. I just started using vim not too long ago so i'm not too experienced.

 

Thanks. I just took a look and vim looks promising.

 

There's a GUI for vim if you want, gvim.

 

Looks good!

 

Vim and Emacs both definitely have full support for syntax highlighting for all of those languages. You can also compile the code if you want to, as you can access a terminal through either Vim or Emacs. However, for Java you should probably use http://www.satokar.com/viplugin/ with Eclipse, as it helps to deal with Java's wordiness while also letting you use the vi editing paradigm.