WinVi

Editors are usually not meant to be pretty, focusing more on controls, accessibility and flexibility, rather than visuals. A good editor is only that one which manages to successfully build what you ask for. This is exactly what WinVi is also trying to prove, ditching today’s modern interface choice, for a few more functionality bonuses.

You notice one advantage right after the download process is complete. In other words, the application isn’t bundled inside an installer, and you can simply run it even from an USB Flash drive, and other computers as well. Your computer stays clean, and registries are not affected.

Managing to ignore the simple design, you’re left with a simple, blank canvas, and a small set of tools in the upper part of the window. As such, accommodation is as easy as can get, once you start pressing a few buttons.

The application aims to let you edit and write down code, even for Linux or iOS based system. However, this needs to be changed from the settings menu, where you also get to pick character encoding. Moreover, you can assign custom hotkeys to some commands, or create macros to make it easier to handle complex operations.

File support is a bit mysterious, since it’s not specified anywhere. Sure enough you can open plain TXT files, but since it’s dedicated to coding, a little more insight would have helped a lot. As for saving, you need to manually write down the desired format, otherwise the program only creates a simple file.

Bottom line is that WinVi is nothing more than an enhanced version of Windows’ basic text editor that’s been around for more than a decade. Although it comes with a bit more features than Notepad, such as line numbering and macro support, the general impression leaves more to be desired, even for simple coding tasks.