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Open Source Software

NotePad++ 20th Anniversary Edition Includes New 'Multi-Edit' Feature (notepad-plus-plus.org) 56

Posted by EditorDavid from the incrementing-the-decades dept.
The free open-source text editor Notepad++ is celebrating its 20th anniversary, the blog OMG! Ubuntu reported this week, "with a new release filled with some neat new features." In Notepad++ 8.6 (the 238th release since 2003, for those keeping count) the Windows-based code tool [which can also be used on Linux] adds to its extensive feature set with an improved multi-edit feature.

A few 3rd-party Notepad++ plugins have offered similar functionality for a while, including BetterMultiSelection. And a bug report requesting to ability to "transform the column mode to multi-caret on HOME/END/Arrow keys" led to this native addition.
Their blog post includes an animated GIF of Notepad++ multi-edit in action.

"You can install Notepad++ on Ubuntu straight from the Ubuntu Software/App Center app (it's a Snap Store). Alternatively, install the Windows build via WINE/CrossOver or, if you got the l33t skillz, build it by hand, from source."
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NotePad++ 20th Anniversary Edition Includes New 'Multi-Edit' Feature More

NotePad++ 20th Anniversary Edition Includes New 'Multi-Edit' Feature

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  • Let's not. Let's trim it back a bit and just have the original. There are enough programming environments and office suites.

  • Actually had no idea there was a Linux variant (Score:4, Informative)

    by devious_malcontent ( 2752947 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @03:56AM (#64052403) Homepage
    I was today years old when I discovered that you can install notepad++ on Linux and here I am still struggling with vi.

    • Re:Actually had no idea there was a Linux variant (Score:4, Informative)

      by devious_malcontent ( 2752947 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @03:59AM (#64052409) Homepage

      I was today years old when I discovered that you can install notepad++ on Linux and here I am still struggling with vi.

      Edit: the articles linked in the document referred to using wine so not actually a native Linux port.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Anonymous Coward

        I mentioned it in the other thread, but SciTE is the "same text editor" (without the heavyweight IDE) as Notepad++ and it's native cross platform:
        https://www.scintilla.org/SciTE.html [scintilla.org]

        Since I have to wait to post again I'll also add that it does have some lightweight IDE features. It has (and you can add/customize) compile/go commands and there's an output buffer (and it'll jump to lines in the source on errors and exceptions and things with a ctrl-click).

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by rea1l1 ( 903073 )

          SciTE lacks the key feature of notepad++: persistence. NP++ never asks you if you want to save/discard changes to a file when you are closing. It just resumes its previous state upon reopening. You can type away without every worrying about losing anything if your system shuts down.

      • Re:Actually had no idea there was a Linux variant (Score:4, Insightful)

        by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @09:58AM (#64053009) Homepage Journal

        One thing I've always thought was odd about Linux, given that it's the world's largest open source project and the platform of choice for many hard core developers, is that it doesn't have any particularly good text editors or IDEs.

        Well, there is one good IDE for Linux, and that's Visual Studio Code, from the Evil Empire. Eclipse seems to be the main competition, and it's truly awful.

        Am I missing something?

    • I am still struggling with vi

      Try Kate. It's actually native, and there's even a 'vi mode' in case you end up missing it for some reason

    • Re: (Score:2, Troll)

      by znrt ( 2424692 )

      many one would argue that vi is a more capable tool than notepad++ but ... did really none of the probably several dozen text editors available for linux suit you?

  • Great Editor (Score:4, Insightful)

    by PIC16F628 ( 1815754 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @05:15AM (#64052519)

    I have been using Notepad++ for several years. I am amazed at the small size of the executable, yet it does so many things lighting fast. Long live Notepad++ and its plugin contributors!

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by Calydor ( 739835 )

      Same here. Despite all the things it can do (and I admit I haven't even scratched the surface, as all I really need is a quick text editor and easy ability to search through log files) it takes up no space at all. I suspect they don't add 100 MB libraries for each single little feature they want to add unlike SOME programs out there ...

  • Bad coding practices now supported (Score:3)

    by fleeped ( 1945926 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @06:20AM (#64052593)
    I mean, look at their example GIF [pressablecdn.com]. What if 1) you want to add a new variable 2) you change the name of the field. Now you have to hunt down every occurence and change it, and the compiler (or interpreter) won't complain.
    Does any of you have a legit use-case?
    Disclaimer: Notepad++ is awesome, I use it every day.

    • It really isn't trying to replicate the feature set of an IDE, it's just getting improved multi-editing functionality, for when you want a specific action replicated on multiple lines. The use case is exactly the one depicted: say you have a list of fields, and you want to create a JSON string with those fields as the keys, etc.

      Notepad++ already had multi-edit, but you couldn't move the cursor, you could only type where you placed them with Ctrl+Click or Alt+Click&Drag.

    • Re:Bad coding practices now supported (Score:4, Informative)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @10:02AM (#64053013) Homepage Journal

      The use case in the example GIF you linked to shows creating a definition and declaration of a structure from a comment. It shows how you can avoid repeatedly typing the same names, which is prone to errors, or individually copy/pasting them.

      That seems pretty legit.

      What you describe sounds like refactoring, which I think you can do with a plugin but is not natively supported. That's more the sort of thing you do with a full IDE that understands the language beyond mere syntax highlighting.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by znrt ( 2424692 )

      there is nothing wrong with that snippet of code, you'll even have a hard time suggesting any better pattern without knowing the context, but that a simple multiedit demo/example triggers you that much suggests a level of narrowmindedness/fundamentalism that would be a bit concerning if you actually work on software.

  • WTF Editors (Score:5, Insightful)

    by thegarbz ( 1787294 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @06:54AM (#64052621)

    A summary is supposed to summarise a story, not make clickbait about a feature by not explaining what it does.

    Sentence one tells us about a new feature. Sentence two tells us the name of the feature. Sentence three and four tell us the inspiration for the feature. Sentence five tells us there's a GIF of the feature. And Sentence six tells us what OS it's available for. WTF IS THE ACTUAL FEATURE.

    Finally we have a story that is actually news for nerds and you screw up the most basic part of the news itself.

    • The new feature is AI, of course.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      Basically you can use the mouse to add additional cursors. If you have say 3 cursors, everything you type appears at all 3, backspace deletes at all 3, pasting pastes into all 3, and so forth.

      • Basically you can use the mouse to add additional cursors. If you have say 3 cursors, everything you type appears at all 3, backspace deletes at all 3, pasting pastes into all 3, and so forth.

        Yeah I gathered that after I looked at the GIF. Which incidentally I found in the second link I clicked on because even that sentence was mangled enough that it wasn't clear which link goes to the blog.

        Have you considered joining Slashdot's editorial staff? I mean I think you could replace all of them with 5 minutes of work in your day and still keep doing your normal job :-)

  • Where the OSX version? (Score:3)

    by thesjaakspoiler ( 4782965 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @07:07AM (#64052635)

    Since Github decided to dump Atom because of a lack of interest, I would like to go back to Notepad++.

  • is it any good?

  • Keeping count (Score:4, Insightful)

    by The-Ixian ( 168184 ) on Monday December 04, 2023 @07:52AM (#64052703)

    I hate it when people write:

    the 238th release since 2003, for those keeping count

    What you actually mean to say is "[...] for those not keeping count"

    If I was keeping count, then I wouldn't need you to count for me...

    • it meant, "for those who care about the count"

      • That would be nobody. It was a happy day when I disabled update notifications in Notepad++

      • it meant, "for those who care about the count"

        Then people should just say "for those who care about the count." Say what you mean and mean what you say.

        • I think it was more of a joke. Obviously nobody is keeping that count. But it can be an interesting fact about the software.

    • What you actually mean to say is "[...] for those not keeping count"

      I could care less what they actually mean to say. /s

      English is dead. Time to move on.

  • V8.6 was released on November 23rd (which was the 20th anniversary of V1.0)

    That was like 2 weeks ago...

  • 238 seems like too few times I've had to click through 5 or so dialogs with NO CHANGES to update notepad++ instead of it just having an automatic update service. Then multiply that by 10 VMs of my own, plus dozens more on customer systems...

    So badly needs background updates.

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