- Subethaedit 4 1 – Collaborative Text Editing Using Bonjour Software
- Subethaedit 4 1 – Collaborative Text Editing Using Bonjour Download
- Subethaedit 4 1 – Collaborative Text Editing Using Bonjour Windows 10
- Subethaedit 4 1 – Collaborative Text Editing Using Bonjour Free
If you have anything to contribute -- e.g. configurations for editors, new editors, or opinion -- don't hesitate to edit or create pages.
Editing and Proofreading Worksheets. Correct your own works as well as the work of others is a critical skill to command at all levels of education. You should always be working to improve your skills on this topic. We give you a wide range of activities to work on here.
There's an EditorConfigurationHowto available.
SubEthaEdit is a collaborative real-time editor designed for Mac OS X.The name comes from the Sub-Etha communication network in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series. Apart from the usual text-editing capabilities, collaborative editing is one of SubEthaEdit's marquee features. SubEthaEdit is a full-featured text editor and live collaboration platform with many specialized tools for software developers. A single document simultaneously using a simple, Bonjour. Cocoa objective-c text-editor mit-license collaborative-editing collaboration html developer-tools creative-writing macosx macos desktop-application shell syntax-highlighting regular-expressions osx appkit mac ide code. Help your students with their reading and writing skills by using this printable activity in class. With this worksheet on editing and proofing, students will be asked to read through ten sentences and identify the ones that contain faulty coordination. Ideal for 5th – 8th grade, but can be used where appropriate.
Contents
Please keep wiki links as wiki links, use external links only if there is no existing page for the editor. Please add pages like BoaConstructor also to page IntegratedDevelopmentEnvironments.
Multiplatform Editors
Name | Platform | Impl. Language | License | Notes |
Linux, FreeBSD | Python, GTK | GPLv3 | Embed Vim. Little brother of PIDA | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Tcl/Tk | Proprietary | Extensible in Tcl, Tk; Can interact with python. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Python | MIT | Python language support for Atom-IDE, powered by the Python language server. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | Nordvpn 5 4 3. C++, wxWidgets | GPLv3 | class browser does not currently work for .py files, but it's still a nice IDE to use for python projects | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | C, GTK+ | GPLv3 | The link points to the features page. | |
Linux, Windows, FreeBSD | C | GPLv3 | Cream is a free and easy-to-use configuration of the powerful and famous Vim text editor for both Microsoft Windows and GNU/Lfinux. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | C, GTK+ | GPLv2 | CSS editor with syntax highlighting for Python, and embedded Python interpreter. Extensible through a Python API. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, wxPython | BSD | Extensible in Python; part of PythonCard. Includes PyCrust shell. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, PyQt | GPLv3 | Complete IDE, very well integrated with PyQT development, but usable for any kind of project. Supports projects, debugging, auto-complete, syntax coloring, etc. It is extensible via plug-in system. Integrated version control interface for Git, Subversion and Mercurial through core plugins. eric6 requires Python 3 (and, if desired, PyQt5), and supports CxFreeze and PyInstaller, Django and Pyramid, PyLint and Vulture | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Proprietary | BRIEF-compatible, supports Python syntax, in-buffer Python interpreter, supports lots of languages. Powerful macro language. | ||
Windows, Mac OS X, Linux | Tcl/Tk | Public domain | DRAKON diagram editor with code generation in Python. | |
Windows, Linux and Mac/MacPorts | Python, PyGTK | GPLv3 | Interactive shell with history box and code box, auto-completion of attributes and file names, auto-display of function arguments and documentation. Keeps your recent results, provides session history saving (optionally in HTML), interactive plotting with matplotlib. Extremely fast and responsive. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, wxPython | GPL | Simple, Highly Customizable Editor/Environment. A Tribute to DrScheme. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Java | EPL | Eclipse is .. an open extensible IDE for anything and nothing in particular.' Support for Python can be obtained via the PyDEV plugin. | |
Linux, Windows | Proprietary | Built-in Python syntax highlighting, Python class browsing, Python-compatible regular expressions, code folding, and extensive options for running external tools such as Python scripts. | ||
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, wxPython | wxWindows | A general purpose developer's text editor written in Python/wxPython. It supports python syntax highlighting, auto-ident, auto-completion, classbrowser, and can run scripts from inside the editor. Extensible with plugins written in python. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS | C, Lisp | GPLv3 | Python support with EmacsPythonMode. Extensible in Python using pymacs | |
Linux, Windows, FreeBSD and OS/2 | Proprietary | Customizable Python mode, syntax coloring, function tagging. | ||
Linux, Windows, Mac OS | Python, PyQt4 | GPLv3 | Extensible editor written in Python, Python/C/Nim code tree browser, 3-window editing, text diff, multi-language support, Python REPL, manipulate editor text with Python code | |
Unix/X, Windows, DOS, OS/2 | C++ | GPL | Supports lots of languages, including Python; doesn't seem programmable | |
Unix/X, Windows | C, GTK+ | GPLv2 | A small and lightweight GTK+ IDE that supports lots of languages, including Python. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS | C, Python | GPLv2 | gedit is the official text editor of the GNOME desktop environment, with Python syntax highlighting. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS | Python, PyQt | Proprietary | Ideas is a feature rich IDE that supports debugging, interpreting and project management. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | Java | GPLv2 | syntax coloring for python, extensible with jython, supports many file formats, has folding, fully customisable, has sidebar for class and functions, fast for a Java application | |
Unix, Windows, Mac OS | Java | GPLv3 | IDE with Jython Shell. Syntax coloring for python, extensible with jython, supports many file formats, fully customisable, has sidebar for class and functions | |
Unix, Windows | C | GPLv2 | Supports Python syntax and a Python-specific menu. | |
Unix, VMS, MSDOS, OS/2, BeOS, QNX, and Windows. | C | GPLv2 | Syntax highlighting and indenting, (optional) emacs keybindings, programmable with s-lang. Note: comment out 'msw_help(..' line in pymode.sl if you are having problems on Windows. | |
Unix, Windows, Mac OS | Java | GPLv2 | Has three plugins - one for Jython and one for Python/Jython JpyDbg - interactive editing debugging, code browsing, highlighting. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS | Java, Python | GPL | NetbeansjEdit cross IDE plugin | |
Unix/OSX/Cygwin/Interix (curses), MS-DOS (DR DOS, FreeDOS, Win, OS/2 DOS-Box) | C | GPL | Versatile WordStar-like editor (JOE fork) with many colourised syntax-highlighting modes | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS | C++ | GPLv2 | Kde main developping app. Code folding, syntax highlighting, navigator. projects, class browser, version control, customizable keybindings. Comes also with some typical python project models: pyton Qt app, Tkinter app and simple script. | |
Unix, Windows, Mac OS X | Proprietary | Komodo is an award winning Python IDE from ActiveState. Fully-integrated Python 3 support featuring code intelligence with autocomplete and calltips, Python debugger (includes remote debugging), interactive shell, remote file support, macros, templating, emacs command support and great help documentation. There is also an open-source version called Komodo Edit (Source), as part of the Open Komodo project started November 2007. | ||
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Proprietary/Open Source | scaled-down version of Komodo IDE which also supports Python, but excludes the integrated debugger. | ||
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, wxPython | GPLv3 | Python IDE with focus is on simplicity and ease of use. It is fast and lightweight. It features Python indentation, line numbers, code folding, syntax highlighting, shell access, code completion, a program runner, a source browser, indentation guides, a white space indicator, autosaving, an edge line, multiple tabs, printing, jumping to a specific line, word searching, word replacement, zooming undo/redo, pastebin.com code submission, Python syntax checking, the ability to change the indentation of many lines at once, autocompletiton, and bad brace checking. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, PyQt | MIT | Outlining editor, fully scriptable and extensible, supporting literate programming. 100% pure Python code. | |
Unix, Windows | C, GTK+ | LGPL | Gtk editor with python bindings, allows plugins written in python. | |
Linux, Windows | C | GNU GPL | Small, terminal-based editor, Syntax highlighting | |
Unix, Windows, Mac OS X | C | GPLv3 | Easy to use, small, powerful, fast, terminal-based editor. Supports UTF-8, syntax highlighting, undo, autocomplete, macros, regexes, bookmarks. v2.4 released 2012-04 | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | C | GPLv2 Topaz adjust ai 1 0 45. | X-Based, Python support builtin. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X, others | Java | GPLv2 | Netbeans is an open extensible cross platform IDE ; Support for Python can be obtained via the JpyDbg plugin. A new plugin exists for Netbeans 6.5 or newer - info. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS | Python, PyQt4 | GPLv3 | Lightweight and extensible editor. Class browser, project manager, PEP8 finder, virtualenv, plugin support | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, wxPython | GPLv2 | wxPython based editor. Can be easily extended with mixins and plugins, and has many features. Seems to be biased towards Python web development as contains FTP GUI, RSS aggregator and HTML preview. | |
Windows NT, Linux (with GTK+ 2) | C++, wxWidgets | Freeware | Easy to use text editor with syntax highlighting for Python. Embeds the Python interpreter to extend functionality of the application | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | Java | Apache 2.0 | Full-featured IDE for Python. Has Free and Open Source edition fully supporting Python as well as proprietary Professional Edition with Django, Flask, Pyramid and Google App Engine support. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | Java, Eclipse | EPL | Eclipse plugin. Code-completion. Debugger. Under active development. (ShowMeDo Videos) | |
Linux, Windows | Python, Tk | GPLv3 | Ultra-lightweight Python/text editor made in Python with Tk. Emphasis on easy customization and no-bloat attitude. | |
Unix, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, wxPython | GPLv2 | Written in Python - code folding, snippets, unicode, multiple documents, code completion, several languages, macros. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | MIT | Free open-source extension for Visual Studio Code. Supports syntax highlighting, debugging, code completion, code navigation, refactoring, with support for Django, multi threaded, local and remote debugging. | ||
Windows/Linux/Mac (wxPython) | Python | GPLv3 | An interactive environment for python features include: Multiple independent python interpreters. Interactively program with different GUI toolkits (wxPython, TkInter, pyGTK, pyQT4 and PySide). Matlab style namespace/workspace browser. Object auto-completions, calltips and multi-line command editing in the console. Object inspection and python path management. Simple code editor and integrated debugger. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Python, PySide | BSD License | Open-source Python IDE focused on interactivity and introspection, which makes it very suitable for scientific computing. Its practical design is aimed at simplicity and efficiency. Pyzo consists of two main components, the editor and the shell, and uses a set of pluggable tools to help the programmer in various ways: e.g. source structure, interactive help, workspace, file browser (with functionality for searching). Also includes a post-mortem debugger. | |
SciTE | Windows, Linux (GTK+) | C++ | MIT-Like | A highly configurable light-weight source code editor (about 50 file formats) based on widely-used Scintilla rich text widget/control. Features: sytax highlighting, code folding, auto-indent, brace matching, codepage/unicode support, multiple documents, context help, code execution, output pane, external tools support, RegExp find/replace, text export (HTML, RTF, PDF, LaTeX, XML). Python API for calltips and autocompletion available. |
Windows, Linux, Mac OS X | Python, wxPython | GPLv3 | Stani's Python Editor. Auto indentation, auto completion, call tips, syntax coloring/highlighting, UML viewer, class explorer, source index, auto todo list, sticky notes, integrated PyCrust shell, Python file browser, recent file browser, drag&drop, context help. Blender support with a Blender 3D object browser, runs interactively inside Blender. Ships with WxGlade (GUI designer), PyChecker (source code doctor) and Kiki (regular expression console). Extensible with WxGlade. (ShowMeDo Videos) | |
Windows, Linux, macOS | Python, PyQt5 | MIT | Spyder is a powerful scientific environment written in Python, for Python,and designed by and for scientists, engineers and data analysts. It features a unique combination of the advanced editing, analysis, debugging and profiling functionality of a comprehensive development tool with the data exploration, interactive execution, deep inspection and beautiful visualization capabilities of a scientific package. Furthermore, Spyder offers built-in integration with many popular scientific packages, including NumPy, SciPy, Pandas, IPython, QtConsole, Matplotlib, SymPy, and more. Beyond its many built-in features, Spyder's abilities can be extended even further via first- and third-party plugins. It is conveniently integrated in the cross-platform Anaconda distribution, and is the centerpiece of the Python(x,y) and WinPython distributions for Windows. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Proprietary | Syntax coloring, popup function arguments, class hierarchy browser, graphical debugger, and other nice Python features. Context tagging with class/module namespaces, code navigation, and smart indenting are also supported. | ||
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | C++, Python | Proprietary | Beautiful interface, Python syntax highlighting, Python plugins. | |
Linux, Windows, Mac OS X | Python | MIT | For teaching/learning programming. Focused on program runtime visualization. Provides stepping both in statements and expressions, no-hassle variables view, separate mode for explaining references etc. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS | C | Charityware | Highly configurable text editor built to enable efficient text editing. Syntax coloring, indenting, autocompletion, and source-navigation tools for Python. Can be scripted in Python. See also Cream. | |
Unix/X, Windows, Mac OS X | Proprietary | Powerful commercial IDE designed specifically for Python. Auto-completion, call tips, syntax highlighting, goto-definition, keyboard modes for emulating Visual Studio, VI/Vim, Emacs, & Brief, graphical debugger, code browser, integrated shell, scriptable in Python, and much more. (ShowMeDo Videos) | ||
Linux, Windows | Python, wxPython | GPL | Simple text editor written in python. Syntax highlighter, Code fold, Export code in HTML.. |
Unix-Only Editors
Name | Platform | FreeSoftware? | ZeroPrice? | Notes |
Unix + GTK | X | Supports debugging Python, Tcl, Ruby, Perl, Lua scripts. Code intelligence (Code completion, folding, auto-complete, code snippets, syntax highlighting matching tags, show keyword or variable information when mouse over..). Keyword help and improved script document. Integrated commonly-used scripting libraries (Tk, wxPython, Pygame, Pmw, Numeric..). Supports compiling python scripts to Windows EXE files. |
Windows-Only Editors
Name | Platform | Impl. Language | License | Notes |
Windows | C++ | GPL | Notepad++ is a free source code editor and Notepad replacement that supports several languages. Running in the MS Windows environment, its use is governed by GPL License. Based on the powerful editing component Scintilla, Notepad++ is written in C++ and uses pure Win32 API and STL which ensures a higher execution speed and smaller program size. By optimizing as many routines as possible without losing user friendliness, Notepad++ is trying to reduce the world carbon dioxide emissions. When using less CPU power, the PC can throttle down and reduce power consumption, resulting in a greener environment. | |
Windows | Pascal/Delphi | MIT | Free and open-source Python IDE created with the ambition to become competitive in functionality with commercial Windows-based IDEs |
Macintosh-Only Editors
Name | Platform | Notes |
Mac OS | Python-mode extensible in Tcl | |
Mac OS X 10.4 or later | Full-featured text editor; includes Python support. TextWrangler is the free version (see below). | |
Mac OS X 10.7 or later | General purpose editor with autocompletion for the Python standard library, plus inline documentation. | |
Mac OS X 10.4 or later | 'text editor + file transfer + svn + css + terminal + books + more = whoah. welcome to coda. grow beautiful code.' | |
Mac OS X (Cocoa) | Programmer's text editor with Python syntax highlighting. Written in Python with PyObjC. Open-source (GPL). | |
OS X (Cocoa) | Fork of Smultron. No longer under development | |
Mac OS | Included in MacPython distribution. | |
Mac OS 68k Mac OS 9 Mac OS X | Does not initially include Python support but new language modes can be created. One available here Mi_Python | |
Mac OS X | Python syntax coloring. Allow multiple author to edit the same file collaborativelly over the network using 'Bonjour' (previously Rendezvous). | |
Mac OS X 10.4 or later | Free and full-featured text editor based on BBEdit. Includes Python syntax highlighting. | |
Mac OS X | Free IDE and text editor. Viper ftp 5 2 4 player games. Includes Python syntax coloring. | |
Mac OS X 10.3.9+ | Great Cocoa editor with Python support including syntax coloring, integrated documentation, and a runtime wrapper with hyperlinked tracebacks. Note that code-folding of classes is currently broken for PEP 8 compliant code. | |
Mac OS X 10.6 or later | Again under active development, support for Python syntax coloring. Only available in the Mac App Store. | |
Mac OS X 10.3 or later | Free OS X based IDE for the Python (and other) programming language (replaces discontinued PyOXIDE), with syntax coloring, completion, tool tips, source level debugger, help browser, etc.. | |
Mac OS X 10.6 or later | Free text editor, with Python syntax highlighting. A paid pro version with more features is also available. |
Online Editors
Name | Notes |
A general web-based IDE with support for Python. Provides a full Ubuntu environment with Python 2.7.6, and support for Django workspaces. | |
An interactive Python IDE for data exploration and visualization. Provides a full online Anaconda-based Python environment, with real-time collaboration, interactive IPython sessions, and easy publishing of output figures and code. Includes syntax highlighting and autocomplete. The service was shut down on 2nd Jan 2017 | |
'Host, run, and code Python in the cloud!' Free and paid plans include access to multiple versions of CPython, PyPy, IPython notebooks, a large selection of third-party modules, bash and MySQL shells, and more. | |
An online IDE for numerical and data science computing experiments - includes: real-time collaboration, a customizable editor, a console and much more. The basic account is free of charge. | |
A collection of computational mathematics tools in the cloud, including IPython notebooks, SageMath, Numpy/Scipy/Matplotlib, and Cython. | |
Continuum Analytics' (distributors of the Anaconda Python distribution) hosted data analysis environment. Includes IPython notebooks, data visualization methods like matplotlib and bokeh, ability to add AWS nodes and clusters, command-line shells, file storage, SSH access, and other elements. (Some features require paid account) |
Glorified Editors
'IDEs' that don't integrate anything Python-specific go here.
Name | Platform | Notes |
Unix + GNOME | Cross-language IDE; syntax coloring & folding for Python. | |
Linux x86 | Commercial IDE with support to 30 other languages. | |
Unix | Commercial cross-language IDE; nice multi-user project manager. | |
Windows | Cross-language IDE with integrated SQL support and automation features (currently German only GUI) | |
Python + wxPython | Simple, Highly Customizable Editor/Environment. A Tribute to DrScheme. | |
Java + Jython + Python | An OpenSource IDE for Python, Jython, and Java. Supports Syntax highlighting, Code Completion and many more. Developed in Java. | |
Python + Tkinter + Tix | An extended version of IDLE using Tix. | |
Java | Java IDE with Python support through Pythonid plugin - includes code completion, syntax & error highlighting, intra-file refactoring | |
Unix + KDE | Cross-language IDE for KDE - supports Python syntax/projects. | |
Java | A Java IDE with an optional plugin for Jython. | |
Windows/X (Python+wxPython) | Written in Python - code folding, snippets, unicode, multiple documents, code completion, several languages, macros. | |
Windows | Available either as part of ActiveState's ActivePython distribution (which is not open source) or as part of the Win32All extensions from Mark's pages (which is open source). | |
Unix/Windows/Mac | rope is a python IDE aimed at providing a rich set of software refactorings. | |
Unix/Windows with Tcl/Tk | Cross-language IDE & Source code analysis tool. | |
Eclipse | Python and PHP IDE; available in commercial Professional and open-source Foundation versions | |
Windows | GUI designer for wxPython. | |
Linux/Windows/Mac | Full featured, free IDE bundled with wxPython, features projects, scintilla, and debugging | |
Unix/Windows/Mac | Non-free Cross-language GUI dialog designer with integrated support for editing your Python callback functions. | |
Unix/Windows/Mac | A 'designer' for WxPython (requires wxPython) | |
Unix/Windows/Mac | Multi-language editor that support python autocomplete, Direcotry/class browser, tags/multi-views editing, unicode, and Django wizard(requires wxPython) | |
Python Tkinter | GUI, class browser, file manager, with code completion. Licensed under the GPL. |
Enhanced Python shells
Name | Platform | Notes |
Python + PyCrust | Interactive Python shell included in wxPython. | |
Python + PySlices | New 'notebook' version of PyCrust with save/load features and the ability to run blocks of code in separate 'slices'. | |
Unix, Mac OS X, Windows | Enhanced interactive Python shell. Also usable as pythonic system shell (bash/cmd.exe) replacement. Supports autocompletion. Inline syntax highlighting. (ShowMeDo Videos) | |
Java, at least 1.4 | Interactive, embeddable Jython shell with code completion. Licensed under the QPL. | |
Python, Windows | Interactive python shell using wxPython. py script and exe for win. Data plotting capability from within the shell. Free. | |
KDE | An interactive Python shell using PyKDE and a KHTMLPart (for HTML rendering). | |
Python 2.3 (or higher) and PyQt | An interactive Python shell using PyQt. | |
Unix, Mac OS X | Interactive shell with highlighting and autocomplete. |
Mobile Device Editors
'IDEs' that run on mobile devices and tablets.
Name | Platform | Notes |
iOS | Universal iOS (iPod Touch, iPhone, iPad) IDE. | |
iOS | Universal iOS (iPod Touch, iPhone, iPad) IDE. | |
iOS | Universal iOS (iPod Touch, iPhone, iPad) IDE. | |
iOS | Universal iOS (iPod Touch, iPhone, iPad) IDE. | |
iOS | A patch of Python-3.7.1, designed to make it compile on iOS. Python becomes a framework, and your programs call python_main(argc, argv) to execute python scripts. | |
iOS | IDE for iPad | |
iOS | IDE for iOS with native graphic and sound support through high-level API; games and interactive demos included | |
iOS | IDE for iPhone and iPad with Python 3 support. Custom library is supported. See Python Box page for details. |
Other Resources
- PySmell provides autocompletion for Vim, Emacs and TextMate
Never ending debate
- EmacsVsVi
CategoryEditors
The new version 5 of SubEthaEdit, the Apple Design Award winning text editor for macOS, is now available free of charge in the App Store and as direct download. The complete source code with history going back 15 years is also available under the MIT License.
This release fills me with great pride and joy. SubEthaEdit always has a special place in my heart. It is where my journey as a developer in the Apple ecosystem started. I owe it the position I am in today. This connection is why I'm taking the time to maintain it again and try to lead it towards a long lasting future. Therefore I think it is worthwhile looking at how everything came together.
History
It all started with the initial set of peers at our university at the end of 2002: Ulrich Bauer, Martin Ott, Martin Pittenauer and me. As university students we wanted to build something real. So we searched for a project to grow into a fully grown app. Motivated by the Apple Design Awards competition, we challenged ourselves with a fitting deadline to do submit an entry.
At that point in time there weren't many good native text editors on the platform, so doing a general purpose text editor was always an aspiration of mine. I had recently switched from my old Acorn RiscPC over to the Mac, and was really missing my then beloved StrongEd (fair warning that website is quite a sight, as sadly most of the RiscOS ecosystem is and almost always was in terms of style).
I was playing around with the existing text editors, but BBEdit really wasn't for me (and at this time very Carbon, and as such looked dated and did not integrate too smoothly into the new OS X). Personally I went with MacroMedia's Dreamweaver as the least bad option for my web development work.
Luckily one of us dug up an old Xerox Parc Paper that showed how latency free live collaboration can be done. At that time it fit perfectly with the newly released Bonjour technology to allow for networking without configuration between Macs. That was super exciting and we quickly got to a point where we could see this technology as viable and so we went on to build our application.
It was with great joy that we submitted our freely available work, then named Hydra, to the awards, and with even more joy that we won in the student category we applied in.
At that time we didn't charge any money for it. Only at the end of our university careers, the three remaining of us started out our luck as TheCodingMonkeys to live the dream of a Mac indie studio. We all started out doing this part time, the transition from free software to paid shareware did not support more than one person at that time. And while it was fantastic to see SubEthaEdit being used in conferences all over the world, the financial aspects weren't looking great for us.
Marketing wise we shoehorned ourselves into the collaborative aspects, and failed to communicate the fact that SubEthaEdit was a great general purpose text editor of its own right. Worse, the commercial start of SubEthaEdit was overshadowed by the then not yet released TextMate. This was mainly based on David Heinemeier Hansson's well deserved hype of the initial ruby on rails videos featuring it. So we lost the race for the second most popular text editor on the platform (BBEdit still got the first place because of Mac users loyalty and steady development), and therefore the commercial success too.
SubEthaEdit icon history. Unused initial draft, Hydra, SubEthaEdit 2.x, 3.x-4.x, now.
Subethaedit 4 1 – Collaborative Text Editing Using Bonjour Software
It was at this point that we began struggling a little. While we had enough success to sustain one person, we were not on track to support more than that. Developing and maintaining SubEthaEdit easily consumed most of our time though. It is by that fact, that we all had still day jobs. And while we dabbled in other product ideas (one of the bigger ones a more creative writing based collaboration tool codenamed 'Fenchurch') we didn't get to produce any.
Instead we got another lucky break. The great folks at Panic were planning their then secret Coda, and were looking for something they could base their editing engine on. And that influx of financial support was what enabled us to become a real working company. We are forever grateful to Panic for this, as they essentially gave us this opportunity. This was the point in time when Martin Ott, our third co-founder left us, and we started venturing to build Carcassonne for iOS. Another project of mine that was very close to my heart. I have been a board game geek from my early teens on, and joining this with my professional world was just a fantastic opportunity. It also gave me the opportunity to do real production work with Erlang.
The success of Carcassonne also had a somewhat unfortunate side effect for us: With still no real viable long term business story for SubEthaEdit it moved more and more on the back burner. We still maintained it and brought it up to the App Store eventually, but sadly it couldn't prove its financial viability. A big shout out goes to Lisa Brodner and Michael Ehrmann, who took the bulk of the work to create the 4.x releases.
And while it served us well, even for our own development – SubEthaEdit was our main editor to develop it, in the times of Project Builder with external editor support – it did not plant roots in any specific community. And with Xcode slowly getting better, moving to the single window layout only and providing all the Project aware metadata we couldn't, even our own top use case went away. However, we are still very fond of it and use it for all things scripting and of course text creation and collaboration.
Fast forwarding to 4 years ago, I left TheCodingMonkeys to try my luck in the US working for UIKit at Apple while Martin Pittenauer took over the company. It was with both surprise and delight that I experienced how SubEthaEdit still resonated with many of my colleagues there. Even with the success of Carcassonne, SubEthaEdit seemed to have been the product that was part of many of their pasts.
So now that I'm back to a more independent life I feel that SubEthaEdit deserves a future. Although I'm not rejoining TheCodingMonkeys, we are on good terms and we were able to make an arrangement that hopefully proves beneficial to everyone. From today on SubEthaEdit will be free and open source.
What was the focus for this release?
Subethaedit 4 1 – Collaborative Text Editing Using Bonjour Download
- Bring the code base into a state that builds fine and fully supports macOS Mojave
- Generate a nice repository with as much history as possible, both for reference and educational purposes (Fun fact: SubEthaEdit started out in Subversion, had a long time in Mercurial and very much later moved on to git)
- Update and or remove dependent libraries, support current Mojave features
- Get into shape for dual App Store and Website download releases, so contributions can have a quick turnaround time
- Remove the dependency on the Website for system integration, e.g. the see tool and authorization scripts are now part of the distribution
What are my hopes for the future?
Subethaedit 4 1 – Collaborative Text Editing Using Bonjour Windows 10
- Attract contributors to ensure a long term thriving ecosystem
- The free availability both in and out of the App Store should reduce the barrier to entry to the collaborative use cases in education, pair programming, etc, leading to good bug reports and use cases that are worth investing some future development in
- Support for more languages, modes and contributions thereof
- Longevity of SubEthaEdit as a product
Subethaedit 4 1 – Collaborative Text Editing Using Bonjour Free
So I hope you all share and enjoy this release, file bug reports, enhancement requests and contribute the scripts, modes and styles you make.