Topic: Text Editor: NoteTab Light

[Neon]

Text and HTML Editor

NoteTab Lite v.4.85[/url]

Download NoteTab Lite

(1.487 MB)

If you use Windows much, you know the text editing tools NotePad and WordPad. If you do any text editing, such as preparing HTML pages, you know that the design of each does not improve the efficiency of your work. Although either can be used to get the job done, both are very limited in functionality, and yet still manage to have some annoying quirks.

Many full-blown document editors such as WordPerfect or MS Word are useful for formatted documents, but are rather bloated. Further, they are difficult to configure so that you can go back and forth between bona fide text editing and document formatting/layout. It is also inconvenient in all 3 apps to quickly switch between documents for rapid cut-and-paste operations.

Thus, there exists a niche for the dedicated text editor. Note that I am a cheapskate, and that this review covers the freeware version of NoteTab by Fookes Software. It is also available as payware, which of course is more feature laden.

Things I like:

• Tabbed interface - allows rapid one click switching between documents.
• Search files, find and replace text.
• Save chunks of boilerplate text.
• Strip HTML tags from a document.
• Text macros - extensive sample macro libraries are supplied (additional frequently updated macro libraries are available for download), and you can build your own to customize the application. The HTML elements library is great for adding HTML tags with just a double click.
• No ads or nags.
• Upon exit, NoteTab remembers which files are open, and opens the same files the next time you launch it. So if you modify the same file frequently, it opens as soon as NoteTab launches. It is not necessary to wade through menus to find that file(s).

Things not included in the Free version:

• Spell checker and thesaurus
• User-defined toolbars
• URL and HTML-tag highlighting
• Multiple-level undo/redo
• Show nonprinting characters
• Bookmarks
• Real-time wrap-to-column
• Line-number ruler

In addition, the Free version is somewhat slower at file loading, text processing, and large "Replace All" operations.

NoteTab Light is very similar to EditPad Lite, which is available on the Poasters downloads page. EditPad Lite includes URL and HTML-tag highlighting, multiple-level undo/redo, and line numbering. The text macros are the main strength of NoteTab Light over EditPad Lite, in addition to the ability to strip HTML tags. In this respect, it is more "HTML-aware" than EditPad Lite, so if you are writing your own HTML, try a version of NoteTab.