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spicyj

I can't tell from this page whether it's open source -- I hope it is.

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From ##atom IRC:

<DouweM> kevinsawicki: is the actual core going to be OS?

<kevinsawicki> DouweM: not during the beta

<tyOverby> How is atom both invite-only and open source at the same time?

<avidal> tyOverby: the engine isn't open source (or at least yet)

Welp, makes that decision easy. Not making the most important tool in my toolbox one that I can't hack to my liking.

Agree. It's a tough decision for them -- I'm sure the "Hot New Text Editor" market has a decent chunk of money associated with it. But it's pretty hard to commit to a text editor that you can't open up and recompile.

EDIT: Plus, if an editor is going to join the ranks of vim and emacs in history (something which neither Sublime nor TextMate are on track to do) it has to be open source. Anything else and it's just another product.

I agree on the open source nature. However if this editor treats github as a first class citizen (while being free/open) then it does have value to github. This is especially the case for new github features introduced in the future.

There are very few people who would opt in to a editor for everything only to use it with Github. Most of the world's developers don't even have a Github account.

Tools work in a strange way. I recently saw a whole team of embedded developers use TextPad. They haven't heard of anything called 'vim' or 'emacs'. From their perspective its either a vendor supplied IDE or TextPad. One of them was even startled to see this shiny new thing called 'Sublime Text' when I was using it. He went out with enthusiasm, but was hardly able to convince any one to use it.

There will always be outliers.

A code editor with first class prominent Github support is more likely to encourage creating Github accounts - it would just work. Compare to regular code editors which require jumping through various hoops (typically having to find relevant plugins, install them on all machines/users, and then figure out how to use them as they are extensions not core).

A pitch of "if you use this editor then all the team's work is automatically synchronized and available" is a very powerful sell.

TextMate 2 is GPL. It just isn't multiplatform. Yet. I think there was some work to make it run on GNUStep, but I may be mistaken.

But in some degree you can't hack the heart of Emacs and Vim as well: its too complicated.

Vim is available on all (relevant) operating systems. Vim doesn't require an invite.

Not for me. I do like to give new editors a try (fell deeply in love with LightTable just a short while ago), but OS X as main platform and yet another closed editor?

There are open source text editors of all levels of "easy to grasp". I've contributed to one myself. With Atom I simply don't have the option, and that's unacceptable as a professional in this craft.

I agree, I'm just saying that if some capable people decide to stop working on Emacs, it would die. So sometimes I prefer a paid product because there is incentive to continue working on it. (Ok, not that the karma/love one gets for working on Emacs isn't good enough).

I'm really hoping they make it completely open source with service-optional business model, they core needs to be open or it will have the same problems as every other closed source editor.

Usually if you don't see "free" or "open source" mentioned on the main page it means it's not going to be either of these two (or at least that it hasn't been decided yet).

At the least seems like there will be a paid version: https://github.com/atom/welcome/blob/master/lib/welcome.md

"free during beta" doesn't always imply "paid on launch" and I'd be surprised if the basic editor was paid. Github certainly doesn't need the cash and usage is oxygen.

https://github.com/atom

Yes, there are lots of packages but the editor core isn't posted there, as far as I can tell.

Just cause you can see the source, doesn't mean it's Open Source.

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