{ Code: Impossible }

Notepad++ has been my text editor of choice for the past 6 years. I've always found it to be a productivity aide and it's always just worked. However, lately, Notepad++ has a nasty habit of losing all of my settings and it's becoming unbearable.

I asked on twitter the other day if anyone had a better editor that they had used on Windows. I got a lot of good suggestions and most of them were for Sublime Text.

First things first: you should be aware that SublimeText is not free. It has an unlimited time trial but you'll get a semi-annoying popup asking you to buy a copy. Currently, SublimeText costs $59 per user.

The good news is that SublimeText is licensed on a per-user basis, not per-machine. This means you can install your licensed copy of SublimeText on as many machines as you like. Also, SublimeText uses a hosted version of Python v2.6.5, so you can build some pretty awesome plugins. I'll have a post soon on how to build a pretty sweet plugin in a few days.

SublimeText has an awesome set of features. I've pointed out a few of my favorites in the screenshot below but there are others that deserve a mention. 

Totally Configurable and Extendable
All of the user/global settings are stored in editable JSON files. Need to add a custom keybinding? No problem. Select Preferences\Key Bindings - Default or Key Bindings - User and start editing. All key bindings call python-based plugin methods so adding a keybinding for your plugin is really simple.

Auto Completion
SublimeText has a really great tab autocompletion system. It auto-completes local variables, local methods and it seems to have an uncanny knowledge of what you meant.

Finding stuff is easier
The find function is incredibly easy to use, just hit ctrl+f and start typing. SublimeText will bring you to the first match and start highlighing all the other matches. Find and replace uses real regular expressions, not the strange hybrid that notepad++ uses and definitely not that filthy mess that visual studio tries to pass off as regular expressions.

I'll be evaluating SublimeText for another couple of days, building out some plugins and using it as my default for a while before I make the decision to buy it, but it's already impressed the hell out of me and made me want to stop using Notepad++.

Have you used SublimeText or another text editor? Let me know what your favorite is in the comments!