List of text editors

The following is a list of notable text editors.

Graphical and text user interface

The following editors can either be used with a graphical user interface or a text user interface.

Name Description License
Elvis A vi/ex clone with additional commands and features. ClArtistic
Extensible Versatile Editor (EVE) Default under OpenVMS. ?
GNU Emacs[1][2][3][4][5]/XEmacs[6][7] Two long-existing forks of the popular Emacs programmer's editor. Emacs and vi are the dominant text editors on Unix-like operating systems, and have inspired the editor wars. GPL-3.0-or-later / GPL-2.0-or-later
Language-Sensitive Editor (LSE) Programmer's Editor for OpenVMS implemented using TPU. ?
Textadept A modular, cross-platform editor written in C and Lua, using Scintilla.[8] MIT
vile (vi like Emacs) A vi work-alike which retains the vi command-set while adding new features: multiple windows and buffers, infinite undo, colorization, scriptable expansion capabilities, etc. GPL-2.0-only
vim[9][10][11][12] A clone based on the ideas of the vi editor and designed for use both from a command line interface and in a graphical user interface. Vim

Graphical user interface

Name Description License
Acme A User Interface for Programmers by Rob Pike. MIT
Alphatk Proprietary
Apache OpenOffice Writer Word processor and text editor of the Apache OpenOffice Suite, based on StarOffice's suite. Apache-2.0
Arachnophilia A source code editor which is successor to another HTML editor, WebThing. Free software
Atom A modular, general-purpose editor built using HTML, CSS and JavaScript on top of Chromium and Node.js. MIT
BBEdit A proprietary text editor originally developed for Macintosh System Software 6 Proprietary
Bluefish A source code editor with web development features. GPL-2.0-or-later
Brackets A modular, web-oriented editor built using HTML, CSS and JavaScript on top of the Chromium Embedded Framework. MIT
CodeWright An editing system or source code editor which can be configured to work with other integrated development environment (IDE) systems. Proprietary
Crimson Editor A text editor which is typically used as a source code editor and HTML editor. Freeware
CygnusEd (CED) Proprietary
E Text Editor Default under IBM OS/2 versions 2-4[citation needed]. Proprietary
Eddie An editor originally made for BeOS and later ported to Linux and macOS. Freeware
EmEditor extensible commercial text editor which supports Unicode, syntax highlighting and vertical selection editing, editing of large files (up to 248 GB or 2.1 billion lines) Proprietary
Epsilon A programmer's text editor modelled after Emacs. Proprietary
FeatherPad A lightweight editor based on Qt. GPL-3.0-or-later
Geany A fast and lightweight editor – IDE, uses GTK+. GPL-2.0-or-later
gedit Former default under GNOME until GNOME 42.[13] GPL-2.0-or-later
GNOME Text Editor Default under GNOME from GNOME 42 onwards[14] GPL-3.0-or-later
GoldED (text editor of Cubic IDE) Proprietary
HxD An editor for huge files, working with both binary data and texts. Freeware
iA Writer A multi-platform Markdown text editor with writing focused feature set Proprietary
jEdit A free cross-platform programmer's editor written in Java, GPL licensed. GPL-2.0-or-later
JOVE Jonathan's Own Version of Emacs JOVE
JuffEd A lightweight text editor written in Qt4. GPL-2.0-only
Kate A basic text editor for the KDE desktop. LGPL, GPL
Kedit An editor with commands and Rexx macros similar to IBM XEDIT. Proprietary
Kile A user friendly TeX/LaTeX editor. GPL-2.0-or-later
Komodo Edit MPL-1.1
KWrite A default editor on KDE. LGPL
Lapis An experimental text editor allowing multiple simultaneous edits of text in a multiple selection from a few examples provided by the user. GPL-2.0
Leafpad Default under LXDE.[15] GPL-2.0-or-later
Leo A text editor that features outlines with clones as its central tool of organization and navigation. MIT
LibreOffice Writer Word processor and text editor of the LibreOffice Suite, based on StarOffice's suite. MPL-2.0
Light Table A text editor and IDE with real-time, inline expression evaluation. Intended mainly for dynamic languages such as Clojure, Python and JavaScript, and for web development. MIT / GPL-3.0-only
mcedit A text editor provided with Midnight Commander. GPL-3.0-or-later
Metapad Windows Notepad replacement, GPL licensed. GPL-3.0-or-later
MicroEMACS JASSPA MicroEMACS GPL-2.0-or-later
Mousepad The default under Xfce.[16] GPL-2.0-or-later
Multi-Edit Proprietary
NEdit – "Nirvana Editor" GPL-2.0-or-later
Notepad Default under Microsoft Windows. Proprietary
Notepad++ A tabbed text editor. GPL-3.0-or-later
Pe A text editor for BeOS. MIT
pluma The default text editor of the MATE desktop environment for Linux. GPL-2.0-or-later
PolyEdit Proprietary word processor and text editor. Proprietary
Programmer's File Editor (PFE) Freeware
PSPad An editor for Microsoft Windows with various programming environments. Freeware
RJ TextEd Freeware
Sam MIT
SciTE Cross-platform, multi-user, multi-codepage, multi-language syntax highlighting, area selector, RE find/replace, and very customisable, allowing different font configurations for each syntactic group, user-defined menus and abbreviation expansion. HPND
SimpleText Default under Classic Mac OS from version 7.5.[17] Proprietary
SlickEdit Proprietary
Smultron A macOS text editor. Proprietary
SubEthaEdit
(formerly named Hydra) 		Proprietary
Sublime Text Proprietary
TeachText Default under Classic Mac OS versions prior to 7.5.[18] Proprietary
TED Notepad Freeware
Tex-Edit Plus Proprietary
TextPad and Wildedit Proprietary
TeXnicCenter GPL
TeXShop TeX/LaTeX editor and previewer.[19][20][21][22] GPL-2.0
TextEdit Default under macOS,[23] NeXTSTEP[citation needed], and GNUstep.[citation needed] BSD-3-Clause
TextMate GPL-3.0-or-later
TextWrangler Mac-only editor by Bare Bones Software, sunsetted. Final version released 09/20/2016,[24] replaced by free tier of [BBEdit].[25] Freeware
The Hessling Editor GPL-2.0-or-later
The SemWare Editor (TSE)
(formerly named QEdit). 		Freeware
UltraEdit Text and source code editor with syntax highlighting, code folding, FTP, etc., handles multi-gigabyte files. Proprietary
Ulysses Proprietary
VEDIT Proprietary
Visual Studio Code[26] An extensible code editor with support for development operations like debugging, task running and version control. MIT
WinEdt Proprietary
X11 Xedit MIT
XEDIT Default under VM/CMS. Proprietary
Yudit GPL-2.0-only
Xed GPL-2.0-or-later

Text user interface

System default

Name Description License
E is the text editor in PC DOS 6, PC DOS 7 and PC DOS 2000. Proprietary
ed The default line editor on Unix since the birth of Unix. Either ed or a compatible editor is available on all systems labeled as Unix (not by default on every one). Free software
ED The default editor on CP/M, MP/M, Concurrent CP/M, CP/M-86, MP/M-86, Concurrent CP/M-86. Free software
EDIT The default on MS-DOS 5.0 and higher and is included with all 32-bit versions of Windows that do not rely on a separate copy of DOS. Up to including MS-DOS 6.22, it only supported files up to 64 KB. Proprietary
EDIT The text editor in Novell DOS 7, OpenDOS 7.01, DR-DOS 7.02 and higher. Supports large files for as long as swap space is available. Version 7 and higher optionally supports a pseudo-graphics user interface named NewUI. Proprietary
EDIX The text editor in Concurrent DOS, Concurrent DOS XM, Concurrent PC DOS, Concurrent DOS 386, FlexOS 286, FlexOS 386, 4680 OS, 4690 OS, S5-DOS/MT. Proprietary
EDITOR The text editor in DR DOS 3.31 through DR DOS 6.0, and the predecessor of EDIT. Proprietary
EDLIN A command-line based line editor introduced with 86-DOS, and the default on MS-DOS prior to version 5 and is also available on MS-DOS 5.0 and Windows NT. Proprietary
ee Stands for Easy Editor, is part of the base system of FreeBSD, along with vi.[27] Free software
nvi (Installed as vi by default in BSD operating systems and some Linux distributions) – A free replacement for the original vi which maintains compatibility while adding some new features. BSD-3-Clause
vi[9][10][28] The default for Unix systems and must be included in all POSIX compliant systems[29] – One of the earliest screen-based editors, it is based on ex. BSD-4-Clause or CDDL

Others

Name Description License
ECCE ECCE (The Edinburgh Compatible Context Editor) is a text editor designed by Dr Hamish Dewar at Edinburgh University. Free software
Emacs A screen-based editor with an embedded computer language, Emacs Lisp. Early versions were implemented in TECO, see below. Free software
JED Multi-mode, multi-window editor with drop-down menus, folding, ctags support, undo, UTF-8, key-macros, autosave, etc. Multi-emulation; default is emacs. Programmable in S-Lang. GPL-2.0-or-later
JOE A modern screen-based editor with a sort of enhanced-WordStar style to the interface, but can also emulate Pico. Free software
LE GPL-3.0-or-later
mcedit Full featured terminal text editor for Unix-like systems. GPL-3.0-or-later
mg Small and light, uses GNU/Emacs keybindings. Installed by default on OpenBSD. Public domain
MinEd Text editor with user-friendly interface, mouse and menu control, and extensive Unicode and CJK support; for Unix/Linux and Windows/DOS. GPL
GNU nano A clone of Pico GPL licensed. GPL-3.0-or-later
ne A minimal, modern replacement for vi. GPL-3.0-or-later
Pico Apache-2.0
SETEDIT A clone of the editor of Borland's Turbo* IDEs. GPL-2.0-or-later
The SemWare Editor (TSE for DOS)
(formerly called QEdit) 		Proprietary

vi clones

Name Description License
BusyBox vi[30] A small vi clone with a minimum of commands and features. GPL-2.0-only
Elvis The first vi clone and the default vi in Minix. ClArtistic
ex Or is vi an ex-clone? ex was an extended version of ed. It got a full-screen visual interface, thereby becoming the vi text editor. Free software
Kakoune A editor inspired by vi that makes use of multi cursor workflows and modal editing.[31] Unlicense
nvi A new implementation and currently the standard vi in BSD distributions. BSD-3-Clause
Stevie STEVIE (ST Editor for VI Enthusiasts) for the Atari ST, the starting point for vim and xvi Public domain
vile Derived from an early version of Microemacs in an attempt to bring the Emacs multi-window/multi-buffer editing paradigm to vi users. First published 1991 with infinite undo, UTF-8 compatibility, multi-window/multi-buffer operation, a macro expansion language, syntax highlighting, file read and write hooks, and more. GPL-2.0-only
vim[12] An extended version of the vi editor, with many additional features designed to be helpful in editing program source code. Vim

Sources:[9][10][28]

No user interface (editor libraries/toolkits)

Name Description License
Cocoa text system Supports text components of macOS. Proprietary
Scintilla (software) Used as the core of several text editors. HPND
sed (stream editor) The standard Unix stream editor based on the scripting features in ed. A utility that parses and transforms text, using a simple, compact programming language. Free software
Text Processing Utility (TPU) Language and runtime package, developed by DEC, used to implement the Language-Sensitive Editor and Extensible Versatile Editor, Eve. Proprietary

ASCII and ANSI art

Editors that are specifically designed for the creation of ASCII and ANSI text art.

ASCII font editors

  • FIGlet – for creating ASCII art text
  • TheDraw – DOS ANSI/ASCII text editor with built-in editor and manager of ASCII fonts

Historical

Visual and full-screen editors

  • Brief – a programmer's editor for DOS and OS/2
  • Edit application – a programmer's editor for Classic Mac OS
  • EDIT – a menu-based editor introduced to supersede EDLIN in MS-DOS version 5.0 and up and available in most Microsoft Windows
  • EDT – a character-based editor used on DEC PDP-11s and VMS
  • O26 – written for the operator console of the CDC 6000 series machines in the mid-1960s
  • Red – a VMS editor, written in Forth variant STOIC
  • se – an early screen-based editor for Unix
  • SED – cross-platform editor from the 1980s, ran on TOPS-10, TOPS-20 and VMS
  • STET (the 'STructured Editing Tool') – may have been the first folding editor; its first version was written in 1977
  • TeachText
  • TECO – a character-based editor, which included a programming language.

Line editors

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Cameron, D., Rosenblatt, B., Raymond, E., & Raymond, E. S. (1996). Learning GNU Emacs. " O'Reilly Media, Inc.".
  2. ^ Glickstein, B. (1997). Writing GNU Emacs Extensions: Editor Customizations and Creations with Lisp. " O'Reilly Media, Inc.".
  3. ^ Halme, H., & Heinänen, J. (1988). GNU Emacs as a dynamically extensible programming environment. Software: Practice and Experience, 18(10), 999-1009.
  4. ^ Schoonover, M. A., & Schoonover, S. (1991). GNU Emacs: UNIX text editing and programming. Addison-Wesley Longman Publishing Co., Inc.
  5. ^ Cameron, D., Elliott, J., Loy, M., Raymond, E. S., & Rosenblatt, B. (2005). Learning GNU Emacs. " O'Reilly Media, Inc.".
  6. ^ Stallman, R., & Goyal, R. (1994). Getting Started With XEmacs. One of a complete set of manuals for XEmacs, all available at www.xemacs.org/Documentation/index.%20html.
  7. ^ Ayers, L. (1997). A Comparison of Xemacs and GNU emacs. Linux Journal, 1997, 4.
  8. ^ "Textadept". Retrieved 2014-08-14.
  9. ^ a b c Robbins, A., Hannah, E., & Lamb, L. (2008). Learning the vi and Vim Editors. " O'Reilly Media, Inc.".
  10. ^ a b c Robbins, A. (2011). Vi and Vim Editors Pocket Reference. " O'Reilly Media, Inc.".
  11. ^ Schulz, K. (2007). Hacking Vim: a cookbook to get the most out of the latest Vim editor. Packt Publishing Ltd.
  12. ^ a b Neil, D. (2015). Practical Vim: Edit Text at the Speed of Thought. Pragmatic Bookshelf.
  13. ^ "Apps/Gedit - GNOME Wiki!". projects.gnome.org. Retrieved 8 April 2018.
  14. ^ "GNOME Release Notes". GNOME.org. Retrieved September 26, 2022.
  15. ^ "Leafpad" Archived 2008-10-14 at the Wayback Machine
  16. ^ "Apps:mousepad:start [Xfce Docs]".
  17. ^ http://manuals.info.apple.com/en_US/0307163ASYS75UPG.pdf [dead link‍]
  18. ^ "System 2.0 (4.1/5.5) 800K Disk Contents (9/93)". support.apple.com. Retrieved 8 April 2018.
  19. ^ Mittelbach, F., Goossens, M., Braams, J., Carlisle, D., & Rowley, C. (2004). The LATEX companion. Addison-Wesley Professional.
  20. ^ Lamport, L. (1994). LATEX: a document preparation system: user's guide and reference manual. Addison-wesley.
  21. ^ Hoenig, A. (1998). TeX unbound: LaTeX & TeX strategies for fonts, graphics, & more. Oxford University Press, USA.
  22. ^ Syropoulos, A., Tsolomitis, A., & Sofroniou, N. (2007). Digital typography using LATEX. Springer Science & Business Media.
  23. ^ "Mac Basics: TextEdit". apple.com. Retrieved 8 April 2018.
  24. ^ Charles Moore (6 March 2017). "So Long Textwrangler, Hello BBEdit". macprices.net. Retrieved 28 August 2019.
  25. ^ "TextWrangler". barebones.com. Retrieved 28 August 2019.
  26. ^ Del Sole, A. (2018). Visual Studio Code Distilled: Evolved Code Editing for Windows, macOS, and Linux. Apress.
  27. ^ "Chapter 3. FreeBSD Basics | FreeBSD Documentation Portal". docs.freebsd.org. Retrieved 26 August 2022.
  28. ^ a b Lamb, L., Robbins, A., & Robbins, A. (1998). Learning the vi Editor. " O'Reilly Media, Inc.".
  29. ^ "vi". pubs.opengroup.org. Retrieved 8 April 2018.
  30. ^ Wells, N. (2000). BusyBox: A swiss army knife for linux. Linux Journal, 2000(78es), 10.
  31. ^ Voinov, Philippe; Rigger, Manuel; Su, Zhendong (2022-12-01). "Forest: Structural Code Editing with Multiple Cursors". Proceedings of the 2022 ACM SIGPLAN International Symposium on New Ideas, New Paradigms, and Reflections on Programming and Software. Onward! 2022. New York, NY, USA: Association for Computing Machinery. pp. 137–152. arXiv:2210.11124. doi:10.1145/3563835.3567663. ISBN 978-1-4503-9909-8.