Recent Freeware Discoveries: SciTE text editor, and MSN Desktop Search
I'm loving these two free programs: the SciTE text editor, and MSN Desktop Search.
What I like about SciTE: faster to load than jEdit, simpler (in the Zen sense) than xemacs, works on my computer unlike PSPedit, less clunky than ConText. I did have to do some special things to enable macros and autocomplete. And evidently it's extensible with an elegant language called Lua.
MSN Desktop Search -- I don't find myself highlighting Microsoft products often these days, but this one seems to be a winner -- funny that it hasn't gotten much press. Takes up very little memory (5 MB? For some reason Google Desktop Search was taking up 250 MB on my box). And it indexes my Outlook tasks and notes (unlike Yahoo Desktop Search -- though YDS has incremental searching in its main window which I will miss, and is based on proven technology (X1)).
What I like about SciTE: faster to load than jEdit, simpler (in the Zen sense) than xemacs, works on my computer unlike PSPedit, less clunky than ConText. I did have to do some special things to enable macros and autocomplete. And evidently it's extensible with an elegant language called Lua.
MSN Desktop Search -- I don't find myself highlighting Microsoft products often these days, but this one seems to be a winner -- funny that it hasn't gotten much press. Takes up very little memory (5 MB? For some reason Google Desktop Search was taking up 250 MB on my box). And it indexes my Outlook tasks and notes (unlike Yahoo Desktop Search -- though YDS has incremental searching in its main window which I will miss, and is based on proven technology (X1)).
posted by Jonathan at
2/07/2006 06:36:00 a.m.
9 Comments:
I use SciTE too. It's a fav.
By
Layfield, at 2/07/2006 11:12 a.m.
Jetru - cool!
By
Jonathan, at 2/07/2006 12:19 p.m.
What is the incremental search feature? And have you compared these to Copernic? I'd be interested to hear what you've got to say.
I'll also download a copy of scite and give it a whirl.
By
Anonymous, at 2/07/2006 4:33 p.m.
Hi Floozle - You won't be disappointed with SciTE -- it was voted a part of Pricelessware 2006.
By incremental search I mean you start typing and it narrows down results as you type each letter. Copernic might do this too - can't remember - haven't tried it in a couple of years. Does it index outlook notes and tasks?
GDS and MDS do incremental search only in the toolbar, not in the full app. YDS does it in the full app, and it is amazingly quick (probably because they are using X1's industrial-strength technology). Unfortunately it does not index my outlook notes and tasks.
Also I miss how GDS indexes all webpages I've encountered. Too bad it takes up so much memory on my box (haven't heard anyone else report this memory problem). If it weren't for the memory problem, I'd probably be using GDS, despite its lack of incremental searching.
By
Jonathan, at 2/07/2006 9:04 p.m.
cool blog. i like your style.
just a minor comment: why don't you mention URLs of software or websites that you mnention.
i know, i know: google is out there... nevertheless it would be useful to have links within your blogs.
AC.
By
Anonymous, at 2/09/2006 9:09 a.m.
Hi AC - Good to hear from a kindred spirit! Yup, I'll be better about including links from now on.
By
Jonathan, at 2/09/2006 10:03 p.m.
Hi there,
how did you enable macros and macro recording in scite?
Regards
Michael
By
Anonymous, at 9/11/2006 3:25 a.m.
Hi Michael--There is a SciTE macro add-on but it is a major pain--you have to start a separate program.
Probably the right way to do it is to download Notepad++, which uses the SciTE engine and has built-in macro recording.
By
Jonathan, at 9/11/2006 2:25 p.m.
Thanks,
the notepad++ editor is great.
Regards
Michael
By
Anonymous, at 9/13/2006 3:45 a.m.
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