Text Editor?

I am teaching a web design class tomorrow night and the PCs are all out of commision while they wait for a new server... this means I'll be using their MAC lab ... I've never used a MAC before ... can someone tell me what they have that's equivalent to Notepad? Or what text editor I can use to teach people to write HTML with ... I should probably also be asking how to find this application once I'm on the computer ... any help would be appreciated ...

the standard text editor that comes with OS X is called TextEdit. it can be found in the applications folder on any computer that has Mac OS X installed.

if the mac lab is running mac os 8 or mac os 9, then the program is called SimpleText, and it can also be found in the applications folder.

Thank you so much!!! I saw something about TextEdit on the MAC site, but it looked like it was more like a word processing program than a text editor ... will it work for teaching HTML?

While you certainly could use TextEdit, I would recommend using the basic text editor called TextWranger - it's free and far more powerful then TextEdit.

http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/18529

I'm not allowed to download anything to these computers ... since they belong to the school ... so I have to work with what I have.

Thanks though.

Well last night was a disaster ... let's start with the fact that 2 of the 3 computer labs wouldn't even let me open TextEdit ... but secondly, you can't save a file as HTML in TextEdit ... or at least not on the computers at that school ... we could only save as RTF & DOC. Is there anything else standard on OS X that I can use to write HTML and save as HTML?

There is no such thing as saving as HTML. An HTML file is just a plain text file. The only thing that makes it special is that it has a .html extension which certain applications use to interpret the plain text in a special manner.

Don't know why 2 of the 3 computers wouldn't let you launch TextEdit. What specific error was it giving you (if any)?

What version of MacOSX are you using?
TextEdit was doing the right thing under Panther (10.3) and Tiger (10.4). It is possible that TextEdit would not allow one to save as plain text under earlier versions of the OS.

However, if you are seeking another alternative, you can open up the terminal window and use something like emacs, vi or pico - with pico being the simplest in this list.

The terminal application should be in Applications:Utilities, unless they removed it.

Another option I can think of is to use the 'Stickies' application which should allow you to export as plain text. Of course, Apple's Mail application might allow you to do the same thing.

It was 2 out of 3 labs ... meaning rooms of computers ... it was a "You don't have permission" error ... it's a restriction the Network Admin put on them.

I understand that HTML is just text ... but I didn't have the option to save at text ... or to choose my extension ... it was RTF or DOC no choice ... I'm assuming it's something that Network Admin did ... but maybe it's the release they're using (like you suggested). I'm teaching people with very minimal computer knowledge I don't know if I want to get into using pico or vi with them ...

Thanks for replying though ...

I am guessing you are running an early version of MacOSX...

When you are entering the name of the file, try typing the .html extension and see what happens. Under later versions of TextEdit, it will ask me if that is the extension I want to use. If you get lucky, it may cause it to write out a plain text file.

Unfortunately, I no longer use a version of MacOSX before 10.3 so I cannot do this myself.

I certainly wouldn't recommend vi for new computer users, but pico is very simple - designed for just these kinds of users.

But, as I mentioned before, you could try the Stickies application...assuming that existed pre 10.3 - I'm pretty sure it did.

Yeah I saw stickies on the menu ... I'll see what I can come up with.

Thanks again!

in textedit, all you have to do is name the file something, erase the .txt and replace it with .html. the thing will ask if you want to append .txt and you click "Don't Append"

I see what I can do ... but you should know that .txt isn't an option ... there is no .txt to erase ... it's .rtf and .doc ... understand we're talking about a school environment ... I'm assuming the network admins didn't want the kids writing programs that could potentially be dangerous.

Regardless of whether it is an option or not, please do try entering the .html extension yourself when it asks you to enter a filename and see what happens.

for an HTML editor, SubEthaEdit is the Best i have ever used, its very light, has syntax highlighting, everyone can edit the same file if need be together over the network (works kinda like a chat room, but you can choose your spot), and best of all, it has a built in browser that can do live updates, just hit apple-R (IIRC) and a window pops up, as you type you html the windows updates immediately (or on a delay or when you say so)


linkey