Long-Delayed TextMate 2 Arrives as Public Alpha

[MacRumors]

In 2004, a developer by the name of Allan Odgaard released a new text-editor by the name of TextMate. Over the next few years, the application became extremely popular with coders because of a number of powerful features, including extensive customization, macros, and much more.

TextMate 2.0 was originally announced in 2006, and three years later Odgaard wrote in a blog post that he was still hard at work on TextMate 2 and it was 90 percent complete. He hoped that "an alpha version will be ready before too long, but I can't make any promises about dates." Time passed, and Wired named TextMate 2 to it's year-end vaporware list in 2009, along with StarCraft II and the US release of Spotify.

TextMate 2.0 has finally been released to the public in the form of a public alpha -- typically the development milestone that precedes beta.

The excitement for a new version has been tremendous and today we're finally able to repay the much appreciated loyalty and moral support from the community by releasing the first public alpha: TextMate 2.0 alpha (r8930).

It's important to stress though that being an alpha release; it is not complete. It has reached a point where it may suit some early adopters and provide some relief to those who have been questioning TextMate's future. For the time being, the alpha builds are only for people who already have a TextMate license and an Intel Mac.

Being a complete rewrite there are too many changes to sum up but here is an overview of notable changes since TextMate 1.5.10.

The TextMate 2.0 alpha is only for current TextMate license holders and will only work on Intel Macs.

TextMate is available for EUR39 (just over $50 at current exchange rates) from the MacroMates website.

Article Link: Long-Delayed TextMate 2 Arrives as Public Alpha

 

[KnightWRX]

What advantages does this offer over MacVim ?

 

[Raptor235]

hell has frozen over!

 

[LittleChief]

PowerBook G5 Next Tuesday? (Sorry!!)

 

[MacSince1990]

What the hell is textmate?

 

[Skika]

I have no idea whats going on.

 

[Tastic Bycrom]

Then we all overload poor Allan's site. Looking forward to checking out the changes.

 

[wikus]

Is it anything like Notepad++ for Windows?

I use Espresso for web development but a few things bug me about it.

 

[Tastic Bycrom]

What advantages does this offer over MacVim ?

Mostly that it's not Vim ;-)

Actually, I do love vim, but it takes a long time to learn all it's little tricks. TextMate is incredibly powerful and you can browse through the menus for it's bundles to find damn near anything.

 

[maxinc]

Here comes hope

 

[PlipPlop]

When I used to use a Mac I used this text editor a lot. I liked how it formatted Java.

 

[nokq]

How is this front page worthy? It has NOTHING to do with Apple.

Sure it does. Textmate is a Apple only text editor popular with developers.

 

[kingtj]

re: TextMate

I've used this before. I think the main reason people got so excited over a "text editor" is because TextMate tries to be the ULTIMATE text editor, catering to the ways people actually use one.

I'd argue that it's possibly a little bit overpriced and a lot of people who'd potentially get some good use out of it are turned off by that fact, so they never really give it a try.

But for example, if you use it to write programming code, it knows how to intelligently format the code as you key it in, color-coding sections to indicate where you've placed open brackets/braces but not yet closed them, etc.

Long before Lion started adding the feature, it was also able to automatically re-open right where you left off, with the last text document you were editing.

It makes a good HTML editor too, (again, intelligently formatting and color-coding parts of the code as you work with it).

And why does this get on the front page?

 

[Sofabutt]

Seems like a lot of anticipation over nothing.

Better replacements are out there. More active developers have proven their love for their warez, and this pathetic article promotes a developer that hasn't seen fit to update his own software for several years.

What a waste of good publicity.

 

[iCrizzo]

Can't wait to play with it.

At least it didn't take as long as Duke Nukem to get released.

 

[bushbeat]

How is this front page worthy?. It has NOTHING to do with Apple.
Rest in peace. Steven Paul Jobs 1955-2011 (56) Thanks for your intelligence, role model, and innovations. I miss you.

Well, textmate is mac only, and the rumors about this version has been going on for years.
An innovative app, intelligent made. Some would even say that Allan Odgaard is a role model developing this by himself

 

[Yvan256]

How does TextMate 2 compare to TextWrangler and BBEdit?

 

[GorillaPaws]

This is great news and long overdue. I'm willing to approach this with a "better late than never" attitude. I think holding grudges is foolish if that means you're denying yourself the opportunity to use a fantastic tool. I'm still reserving my final judgment for when they release a shipping version.

 

[savar]

How is this front page worthy? It has NOTHING to do with Apple.

TextMate is Mac-only and has a cult following.

Edit: I haven't been to macrumors in a while, but I clicked through to read the rest of this article when I saw it on the RSS feed.

What's with all the hatred and vitriol? Is that what this site has become? Geez...

I routinely read news sites where I'm not interested in every single story they publish, but I don't resort to personal insults against the editors or the subjects of the news articles. I just skip the articles that don't interest me.

TextMate hasn't been updated in a long time, but I happily use it every single day because it's fast and stable and the bundle system allows me to add just about any feature that I'm missing.

 

[ouimetnick]

TextMate is Mac-only and has a cult following.

Then it belongs on the Mac section. Nothing amazing here. This is like Page 3 news. Arn and Eric at least know how to run this site.. Jordan, no offense, but this isn't your personal blog. No one really gives a damn about your iCard mishaps, and this still isn't directly related to Apple. Just some lazy dev got off his ass and finished coding the app.

 

[tigres]

Is this word perfect for DOS?

 

[ckelley]

I love how some of you guys think you run this site. It's so cute.

 

[rmwebs]

I hope Coda 2 gets the same front page treatment. Much bigger audience and way more useful.

 

[leman]

How is this front page worthy? It has NOTHING to do with Apple.

TextMate is oen of the best programmer's editors on the planet and its Mac OS X only. Hell, this is one of the main reasons I am using a Mac actually ^^


Although, I am considering to move to Sublime Text 2 now...

 

[PhoneI]

Then it belongs on the Mac section. Nothing amazing here. This is like Page 3 news. Arn and Eric at least know how to run this site.. Jordan, no offense, but this isn't your personal blog. No one really gives a damn about your iCard mishaps, and this still isn't directly related to Apple. Just some lazy dev got off his ass and finished coding the app.

How about you start you own website? Then, you can decide what should and should not be front page material.