Filed under: Software
TextMate 2: He's working on it
For fans of Macromates' flagship text editor, TextMate, the current version may be all they need. For the last three years, TextMate has been stuck at version 1.5 (and change). In a blog post yesterday titled "Working on It," however, developer Allan Odgaard talked about what's coming in TextMate 2.0.
TextMate 2.0, according to Odgaard, is "taking shape" amid steady progress. It's not a small update, either: Odgaard says it's a "major undertaking with a long timeline" and he doesn't want to get people's hopes up about release dates or finished features just yet.
He says most of the modules for the application are nine-tenths complete, and he uses 2.0 day-to-day. The front end, he says, needs work, and an alpha release may be ready "before too long."
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Ben K. said 10:58AM on 6-15-2009
It's been called vapourware by some, but I can't wait to actually get my hands on this software; which hopefully now will come soon.
1.5 has weathered the storm, IMO. I've tried using Espresso, Coda, and a few others and NONE can match TextMate. Or maybe I'm just too used to it. It was some of the best money on Mac software I've ever spent.
I'd gladly pay for the upgrade, too.
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Matt said 11:17AM on 6-15-2009
There's no denying that 1.5 is a great piece of software but it's certainly showing its age. I use it every day and not having seen an update for so long is certainly frustrating. Things I'd like to see:
- Code completion (better than just using escape). Something like Microsoft's IntelliSense would be amazing.
- Improved Find and Replace. Coda does this right (though without regex), TM's is frustrating at best.
- Smart undoing, word-by-word instead of character-by-character
- As good as Coda at dealing with languages within languages
- Cleverer quotation marks, etc. when inside comment tags
- Easier bundle creation. Snippets and commands are easy enough but defining regex rules for a new language is rather hellish (and I say that as a confident regexer)
I've written tens of thousands of words of LaTeX in TextMate and combined with OmniGraffle it's a killer combination, and the number one reason my main computing platform is OS X.
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Dru said 12:01PM on 6-15-2009
Apple should buy TextMate and include it with Mac OS X
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Aaron Richard said 12:42PM on 6-15-2009
I don't know why they don't. The cost would be trivial.
no name said 12:59PM on 6-15-2009
i would buy it, but paying $56 for a text editor? Hell no!
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Luigi193 said 2:56PM on 6-15-2009
Its really geared towards programming...
Jash Sayani said 10:25AM on 6-16-2009
Well....... I purchased Espresso.
It is a "text-editor" as well. But it has tons of great features for programming like setting up code-snippets, built-in browser, CSS inspector, etc.
Joey said 1:00PM on 6-15-2009
The upgrade can't come soon, enough, really. Both the Coda and Espresso communities seem to be simply dominated by former TextMate users looking for a surrogate upgrade path. While I respect that there is plenty of overlap between these applications, and its probably in Panic's and MacRabbit's interest to woo TM users over, TextMate users tend to work more with scripting languages than front end design and as such their needs are very specific.
Moreover, as the TextMate workflow can be very rigid I find that TM users are much less open to hybrid solutions. Visual CSS editors, preview windows, reference materials and so on simply don't belong in their editor. And you hear this a lot in the respective communities. So you'll end up with web designers asking for better previews and CSS handling while the developers ask that those features be removed altogether. Its almost a conflict of interest, really, and I'd argue its impacting the development of both Coda and Espresso. Perhaps the best evidence of this is that Espresso looks a heck of a lot more like TextMate than CSSEdit (it can't even do visual CSS editing).
So I say bring on the upgrade. :-)
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JiN said 1:25PM on 6-15-2009
Well worth the money. I purchased Coda and Expresso and I always revert back to TextMate. Now if I can just get Expresso to let go of .htaccess files!
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brian said 1:50PM on 6-15-2009
JiN: try creating a blank file named blah.htaccess, then Get Info on it in the Finder and change which app to use there.
I'm in the opposite camp from most: I've tried various editors but am always happy to go back to BBEdit/TextWrangler. The other apps have nifty features, but never enough to make me leave what I'm used to.
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Dennis said 5:37PM on 6-15-2009
I find myself in the same position as brian. I try other editors, but keep coming back to BBEdit. It's been that way for over a decade.
But a new version of TextMate can only be a good thing, whether you actually use TextMate or just as some healthy competition!
-Dennis
Rembert said 5:49PM on 6-15-2009
Tried many editors but always going back to TextMate, with this genius bundle system. Just got the TM book and, while I thought I knew TM, I got my first 'wtf' within 10 pages.
Waiting for the 2.0 version but not eagerly. The 1.5 is ok with me. Updates are received without notice, always getting the cutting-edge updates, not the stable ones. Never had a problem with those cutting-edge versions - which should be regarded as beta. Bundle updates requires some terminal access, but heck, people using TM probably also know about terminal and subversion I guess.
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Mason Sklut said 10:42AM on 6-16-2009
The main reason I'm not a fan of TextMate is that it doesn't have FTP integration. I prefer to code websites with Coda because it gets the job done and I get FTP, WebKit Preview, Text/CSS Editor, and Command Line all in one screen. The interface is gorgeous as well.
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