[Pdxpw-staff] notes on editor choice

[Barbara Shaurette]

I'm such a slacker sometimes - I just finally got some instructions
written up for installing Sublime Text 2 on Mac OS X:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1yGXTXRbwZKWkGrCpgx5LvAwpzNwQPrrGQ3zYHoTChNs/edit

I noticed something unfortunate as I was walking through the process -
Sublime Text 2 is only available for OS X 10.6 or 10.7 (Snow Leopard
or Lion).  One of the things I noticed about last month's event was
that a lot of people with Macs were using old Powerbooks or MBPs with
older operating systems, so I think those users will have to stick
with TextEdit or SimpleText.  The up side is that one or the other of
those editors should already be installed; the down side is that
neither of them has tab-to-space configuration.



On Mon, Jul 9, 2012 at 5:02 PM, Barbara Shaurette
<barbara.shaurette at gmail.com> wrote:
> I'd be happy to whip something up for OS X.
>
> - Barb
>
>
> On Mon, Jul 9, 2012 at 4:59 PM, Michelle Rowley <mrowley at gmail.com> wrote:
>> I appreciated all the thoughtful responses to Kevin's original thoughtful post about editor choice for workshops. I agree that we should try something different for the next workshop.
>>
>> I think Sublime Text 2 seems like a good choice, defaulting back to Notepad or TextEdit for systems that don't support it. It's got the dual benefits of being easy to use *and* having a following of actual developers who use it.
>>
>> Anyone able to volunteer to write a rough draft of install steps for one or more operating systems? We can test them at hack night next week!
>>
>> Thanks guys,
>> Michelle
>>
>> On Jul 9, 2012, at 12:11 PM, Amy K. Farrell wrote:
>>
>>> I don't have an opinion about any of these editors on their merits, as
>>> the only ones (on Kevin's list) that I've used are emacs and vi[m]. I
>>> agree that they aren't good choices for this purpose.
>>>
>>> I did notice that Sublime Text 2 for Mac OS X requires OS X 10.6 or
>>> 10.7. We did have some students with older versions of Mac OS X, didn't
>>> we? I don't think that's necessarily a strike against it; just something
>>> to be aware of. We might list "supported configurations" (primarily OS
>>> and version) for the class and encourage people to contact us if they
>>> have something different.
>>>
>>> I like the idea of getting a "site license" for classes, even though the
>>> evaluation license would probably suffice. I doubt that such a license
>>> would cover users once they left the class (maybe it would be
>>> time-limited?), but the single-user license fee doesn't strike me as
>>> unreasonable for someone who gets into programming and decides she
>>> really likes the editor.
>>>
>>> - Amy
>>>
>>> On 07/08/2012 11:15 AM, Selena Deckelmann wrote:
>>>> Re: licensing costs -- this is the type of thing that we could
>>>> fundraise for, IMO. Given that we're also engaging in a non-profit
>>>> endeavor, with some careful maneuvering I'll bet that we could get a
>>>> substantial discount for a "site license" for the tool.
>>>>
>>>> I know one issue in the past has been a desire for using FOSS tools.
>>>> But our use of CodingBat sort of throws all that out the window, IMO.
>>>>
>>>> Let's use the best tool for the job! :)
>>>>
>>>> -selena
>>>>
>>>> On Sun, Jul 8, 2012 at 10:42 AM, Emily Strickland <emily at zubon.org> wrote:
>>>>> I was just reading this post and the comments espousing IDLE. I hope it's
>>>>> fine if I continue the discussion in this thread among us staffers.
>>>>>
>>>>> I hate IDLE. I cannot imagine any dev candidate where I work saying they use
>>>>> or ever used IDLE. Probably the reason for my especial hate was, when my
>>>>> friend Shawna was picking up Python, IDLE threw her for a loop. It has a
>>>>> quite unintuitive interface. I had to actually show her (in a menu) how to
>>>>> get to an editor rather than an interactive console.
>>>>>
>>>>> I feel Sublime Text 2 is the best bet. Yes, it costs, but it seriously
>>>>> *only* nags occasionally, in perpetuity (I still haven't paid for it), and
>>>>> it's amazing and a respectable, beautiful tool that works identically
>>>>> cross-platform.
>>>>>
>>>>> I'd be interested in hearing reasons we shouldn't recommend this awesome
>>>>> tool. It comes even with the cachet of being used by *real devs*. We're not
>>>>> just suggesting a text editor in recommending Sublime; we're passing along a
>>>>> part of dev culture.
>>>>>
>>>>> On Thursday, 5 July 2012 at 21:07 , Kevin Turner wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>> I wrote down some of our concerns about Python editors, and some
>>>>> evaluation of the options available: http://goo.gl/SQ6Hk
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> Pdxpw-staff mailing list
>>>>> Pdxpw-staff at lists.openhatch.org
>>>>> http://lists.openhatch.org/mailman/listinfo/pdxpw-staff
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>> Pdxpw-staff mailing list
>>>>> Pdxpw-staff at lists.openhatch.org
>>>>> http://lists.openhatch.org/mailman/listinfo/pdxpw-staff
>>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Pdxpw-staff mailing list
>>> Pdxpw-staff at lists.openhatch.org
>>> http://lists.openhatch.org/mailman/listinfo/pdxpw-staff
>>
>>
>> ---
>> Michelle Rowley
>> @pythonchelle
>> http://www.meetup.com/pdxpython
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> Pdxpw-staff mailing list
>> Pdxpw-staff at lists.openhatch.org
>> http://lists.openhatch.org/mailman/listinfo/pdxpw-staff