Comment by lotsofpizza | Hacker News Reader

Comment by lotsofpizza | Hacker News Reader

This is slightly off topic but might be helpful to some people who use both Notepad on Windows and TextEdit on Mac but are tired of the open document screen that starts by default when opening TextEdit. For example, I take calls while at my Windows based workstation. When I'm starting a phone call, I instinctively open notepad and jot down notes while on the phone. I don't usually save the file but I will complete the task I wrote down and/or document the call in another program after the fact. However, when I'm on my Mac I can't just quickly open TextEdit and jot down notes. When opening TextEdit I'm prompted to open a file or click the new document button. This throws me off my workflow since I'm used to NotePad immediately opening a new document buffer to write in. I found a workaround on the Apple support forums here:

1) Quit TextEdit 2) In the Terminal, type the following command: defaults write com.apple.TextEdit NSShowAppCentricOpenPanelInsteadOfUntitledFile -bool false 3) Open TextEdit and presto!

https://discussions.apple.com/thread/253444981?sortBy=best

I use notepad++ on windows and have open all the time. Any more I want to write down I open a new tab. Notepad++ keeps the tabs even if not saved and automatically reopens them next time you start it. Combined with search in open files feature it makes it extremely useful.

I love notepad++ and use it a lot when I need raw text.

I do like WordPad since it will do fonts, embedded pictures, etc. I really hate that MS is moving things to the cloud. I'm often in places that don't have wifi/cell coverage so getting to the cloud is impossible.

I use the autosave and take notes plugin in notepad++ which makes it perfect for this use case. I have it set to autosave when the window loses focus. And the take notes plugin lets me set a default filename with timestamp and save directory, which I set to my dropbox. The plugin also has an option to delete all empty text files when notepad++ is closed.

It feels as friction free as writing on a physical notepad with a paper and pencil.

Just keep in mind that at least in the old versions it had bugs that lead to occasional loss of all the autosaved files.

I don't know if they fixed them since, I haven't used it in three or four years.

This situation happened to me, and just in case it helps someone I thought I’d mention that the files are all saved on the disk - just go into settings and look up the location of the temporary save directory. Open that in explorer and you’ll have all the temporary files available.

No, I meant that the "temporary" files themselves got deleted!!

There were different bugs, some deleted session.xml and some the files themselves.

I had actually found the reasons and prepared bug reports, but then had some life messes and lost the reports themselves.

Maybe I'll try to see if I can find the code again (it was plain calls to "deletefile" or something like that ended up being called by an error handler, if I'm not mistaken - it was so reckless code that I moved away from Notepad++)

I've never run in to that issue in the last 10+ years of using notepad++ with these plugins. Since my autosave location is dropbox, it's automatically backed up the moment the file is saved. I've set my control+n to a new note and not an empty file. The take notes plugin doesn't rely on the built in temp auto saves.

If a file is saved and then gets corrupted for whatever reason, I can also use dropbox to grab the previous known good version. I've tested it, but I've never had to actually use it.

Yes, BBEdit on the Mac has always done that, too. I often open a new tab and paste something in there to keep it around for some indeterminate time. BBEdit saves the temp content until I decide to close the tab or to formally save it and give it a name. It does that even when closing the app or rebooting.

Nice find, you can also do it like this:

System Preferences > iCloud > iCloud Drive ( Options ) > uncheck TextEdit.

Starting with macOS Ventura, it is System Settings > Internet Accounts > iCloud > iCloud Drive > Options > uncheck TextEdit.

https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/61406/how-to-make-...

Thank you!

I just use Sublime Text for that. It opens immediately on all OSs

+1. Sublime user on windows and mac. Never failed me last 6 years.

I was a longtime Windows user and used Notepad similarly. When I eventually transitioned to Apple I shifted to Notes, curious why you’d not use this in lieu of TextEdit?

because Notes is not a text editor.

I can open TextEdit and immediately start typing within a few milliseconds. Notes opens the last note used and takes a few seconds to load. Then I have to manually create a new blank note. Also, I have to remember to delete the note when done because they're saved automatically. When I'm done with TextEdit I can easily choose not to save the file. Using TextEdit is more of a seamless process and doesn't clutter up my files while also using less screen space.

Some update to Windows 11 recently made Notepad open your last tabs when opening it. This keeps throwing off my muscle memory because I'm so used to just launching notepad and pasting or typing immediately, but now that might mean typing into a random spot in some existing file. I'm guessing I can turn that off but I haven't bothered. Plus it's kinda nice to keep those random notes if I don't save them.

I always found that weird too! Apple should know better. On the other hand, I like that I can just quit the app and open it (even after restarting) and jump back to my __unsaved__ tabs.

A gripe I have with TextEdit (an app that I love for its simplicity) is that UI elements (like font selection windows) are too small.

Oh my god, thank you! This has been a constant minor annoyance to me since switching to a Mac. I always use Notepad as a kind of extended clipboard on Windows.

I use this workflow on my Mac all the time and don't remember having to change this setting. Could it be because I don't have iCloud set up?

It seems like it is related to iCloud settings, as mentioned in another comment.

GVim on windows, macvim on macOS and vim on Linux. All work the same way. Open in empty doc.

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