FTP Server Support

TextWrangler can open files directly from (and of course, save them back to) FTP servers--perfect for making quick changes to Web pages, server config files, and similar sorts of things. The simplest way to open a file via FTP is to choose the Open from FTP Server command on the File menu.

A more powerful option is TextWrangler's FTP Browser. Choose New FTP Browser from the New submenu in the File menu.

Open Recent

TextWrangler automatically remembers files you've worked with recently. You can open any of them using the Open Recent submenu of the File menu.

Disk Browsers

Disk browsers give you quick access to the contents of your disks inside TextWrangler, without going to the Finder. You can "peek inside" your files and open them for editing from one convenient window. To get started, choose Disk Browser from the New submenu of the File menu.

Backups

TextWrangler can make backups of your documents automatically or on demand. Choose Backup Options from the File menu to get started.

Printing

Of course you can print your documents. Printing Options are on the Edit menu, and the usual Page Setup and Print commands are on the File menu.

Find Differences

TextWrangler can look at two versions of a file and tell you exactly where the differences are. It also allows you to merge some or all of the differences to either file. To invoke this command, choose Find Differences from the Search menu.

Quick Search

Just looking for a little piece of text? The Quick Search window stays open once it's selected from the Search menu, and is just the thing for doing, well, quick searches.

Text Editing

Don't forget to check out all the items on the Text menu, including

• Balance selects the next innermost set of parentheses or brackets (useful for programming).
• Exchange Characters switches the characters on either side of the insertion point (hold Option to switch the words on either side of the insertion point).
• Shift Left and Shift Right insert or delete tabs in front of each line of the selection.
• Un/Comment Selection will add or remove comment characters from the selected text for any programming language that TextWrangler supports.
• Apply Text Factory allows you to run text factory documents which have been created in BBEdit. Text factories offer an easy way to apply multiple text transforms, including searches, to your text documents. For more information on text factories, please see the user manual.
• Convert to ASCII converts all eight-bit Macintosh characters in the active window to their 7-bit ASCII equivalents. This plug-in is useful for preparing text for use online or in email.
• Educate/Straighten Quotes converts straight quotes (" and ') to typographer's quotes (" " and ` '), or vice versa.
• Prefix/Suffix Lines adds or removes the prefix or suffix string you set to all the lines of the text of the active window or of the selected text.
• Process Duplicate Lines finds duplicate lines in your file and lets you delete them or move them to the Clipboard or to a new document.
• Process Lines Containing finds lines that contain the specified string and deletes them, or copies them to the Clipboard or to a new window.
• Sort sorts lines in alpha-numeric order. You can apply various options to control how the sort is done.
• Zap Gremlins helps you get rid of 8-bit and unprintable characters.
• Check Spelling lets you correct the spelling in a text file.

Tools Menu

TextWrangler lets third-party programmers write add-on programs called plug-ins which will appear on the Tools menu. You can also access any available plug-ins by using the Tools palette, which you can open from the Palettes submenu of the Window menu. The Tools palette also contains a Set Key button which lets you assign keyboard shortcuts to any tool.

Programming Support

TextWrangler includes many features to make life easier for programmers.

• The Shebang (#!) menu lets you run Unix scripts and filters written in languages such as Perl or Python directly from TextWrangler.
• Syntax coloring for popular programming languages.
• A pop-up menu in the window status bar that lists all the defined functions in the current source file
• "Find Differences" is especially useful for programmers who need to check what's changed from one version of a source file to another, or compare the contents of two folders on a file-by-file basis.
• "Find In Reference" lets you find documentation on Carbon functions and Cocoa methods in the Mac OS X Developer Help Center.

Wrapping It Up

This concludes our tour of TextWrangler. We've exposed you to TextWrangler's most important features, but unfortunately, we only had space for a brief mention of some of our favorites, so this last lesson may have seemed a bit chaotic.

If you'd like to learn more about TextWrangler from people who use it, try signing up for the TextWrangler-Talk mailing list:

http://www.barebones.com/support/lists/textwrangler_talk.shtml

Even with all TextWrangler already does, we're always thinking of ways to make it do even more. We hope you'll agree that TextWrangler is the most powerful, yet most accessible, program of its kind of any platform. And it's available only on the Macintosh. Thanks for giving it a try!