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Getwild2

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Nov 2, 2007
5
0
I'm looking for a text editor that provides great macro support. I often export raw data files from a database that need cleaning up. I used to use an ollllllld Windoesn't program called "Programmer's File Editor" (PFE) as its macro recording and looping ability was second to none. The LOOPING functionality is the single most important feature of my next text editor as the actions I must perform to clean up a file need to occur sometimes thousands of times. PFE could scrub a 100K line file in a couple of minutes with a few short commands such as *Loop, *EndLoop, EditRepeatLastFind, etc. I typically focused in on a consistent item such as a page break, record ID, and the like, and I use the "Find" feature in conjunction with the "EditRepeatLastFind" switch in my macro. This commanded the macro to keep performing the above actions on every one of the "last find" until the end.

So given my above macro requirements, what do you guys recommend? Right now I'm playing with two, EditRocket and TextMate. So far I've not determined how to use either in the above fashion. I also played with BBEdit and Tex Edit Plus. Again, the key is with the macro looping, that's been the failing point of all of these editors so far.

Thanks in advance!!
 

mysterytramp

macrumors 65816
Jul 17, 2008
1,334
4
Maryland
If by macros, you include AppleScript, my vote's for Tex-Edit. (which is not what arrived with OS X). It does a lot of the cleanup right out of the box, its search handles grep and wildcardsm, and it acts like a real Mac app.

GRREATT!

mt
 

angelwatt

Moderator emeritus
Aug 16, 2005
7,852
9
USA
You can use TextWrangler. It's scriptable through AppleScript and also has Text Factories, though I've never used that feature so not sure how powerful it is. Best of all, TextWrangler is free.
 
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