November 4th, 2009
Bare Bones updates BBEdit
BBEdit, Bare Bones Software’s leading HTML code and text editor was updated to Version 9.3 on Tuesday with new features and interface tweaks.
The product page for BBEdit 9 is topped with “It doesn’t suck.” And they are right.
Bare Bones said the update is free for all customers with BBEdit 9.0 through 9.2.1. Here are some items from the change list that caught my eye:
Invisible File handling. In previous versions, BBEdit would let users search inside SCM administrative directories when they uses the “Search Invisible Folders” command. Now, that’s an option that customers must turn on via a pref.
When scanning folders for various purposes (multi-file search, Find differences, and others), SCM administrative directories are specifically ignored, even if “Search Invisible Folders” is turned on: CVS, .svn, .git, .hg, .bzr. This avoids potential disasters that can result from indiscriminate search and replace in such directories. If, however, you choose to live dangerously, you can allow BBEdit to see inside of these directories:
defaults write com.barebones.bbedit Misc:SkipSCMAdminDirsWhenScanningFolders -bool NO
Unlearning. Don’t you hate it when your dictionary adds wrong words? Now, when running Mac OS X Leopard or later, the contextual menu offers “Unlearn Spelling” so that you can remove learned words from your the spelling dictionary.
Where did that go? In this case, quotations aren’t as smart as before.
The “Smart Quotes” option has been renamed to “Use Typographer’s Quotes” where it appears in the preferences (Editor Defaults, Languages -> options), and editing controls (options menu in the toolbar, “Text Options” command).
Project handling. If you work in projects you will like this.
BBEdit offers a new behavior: when you ask it to open a folder, rather than creating a disk browser (which allows only one document open at a time), you can ask it to create a temporary project. This provides the multi-document behavior of projects, without requiring you to manage and save a project document anywhere.
Note the limitation that the project is rooted at the folder you drop on the application; there’s no “Go To…” for navigating outside of that folder, nor can you double-click on a folder to “drill down” into it. Nonetheless, for some purposes, the multi-document behavior may outweigh these considerations.
There is no GUI for changing this behavior. If you want the old behavior back, use this command line:
defaults write com.barebones.bbedit Misc:MakeTempProjectForFolderOpen -bool YES
David Morgenstern has covered the Mac market and other technology segments for 20 years. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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