14 DAY TRIAL // Of all the applications that get released every day, few amaze me as much as the ones that build on top of TextEdit. For the simple text viewing and editing program that it is, TextEdit does such a decent job that you don't really need anything else unless you really work with text, and even then you don't really need a lot more. As such it is not surprising that there are many applications offered as an alternative, but the thing that boggles the mind is how these applications actually manage to end up being worse than TextEdit, despite sharing so much in common with it. A good example is NovoEdit.
What it does NovoEdit is a text editing application that builds upon TextEdit aiming to offer a better solution. It builds on the core technologies in OS X thus managing a very similar layout and interface to the point that it is indistinguishable from the original in many ways. Despite being so similar, NovoEdit heads in a slightly different direction, adding new features such as a customizable toolbar and line numbers, but also losing features in the same process.
Working with it Working in NovoEdit is incredibly similar to working in TextEdit and quite simple. Both programs have the same menus and submenus with only a few notable differences, they both use the same keyboard shortcuts and their windows even look identical except for the few extras that NovoEdit brings to the table. The two programs are in fact so similar that for the large part you would be hard pressed to tell the difference without stopping and looking.
However, despite the similarities, there are big differences between the two programs. The first of these is the formats they accept. While TextEdit is open to all kinds of new things and will open most of the common file formats, including plain text, rich text and even Office documents, NovoEdit only works with its own file format called NRTD. This is huge because the moment you start using this program you won't actually be able to open anything with it. Only the documents that you create from this point on will work.
Another big difference is the way NovoEdit handles lines. While TextEdit lets you wrap the text to the window and even transform the text to plain text, NovoEdit does no such thing. This is especially absurd when combined with the line numbering functionality.
When it comes to the actual text, there isn't much to say, NovoEdit does everything that TextEdit does in exactly the same way, everything is identical, down to the menus and palettes.
Improvements? The idea behind these programs that are essentially improved TextEdit clones is that they are better than the original? at least in theory. In practice, the improvements that NovoEdit are lacking, to say the least.
The toolbar and the line numbering are the two features that stand out of what NovoEdit offers. The toolbar sounds good and looks good, the only catch is that it simply does not work good. Buttons become inactive for no reason at all, then become usable again of their own accord, while some buttons such as the 'Find' one I have never been able to use. There is no logic to be found here, buttons can become unusable because of actions such as typing text into a document, resizing the window or changing the toolbar. Similarly they can be reactivated by just about anything.
The line numbering features shares a similar fate. The ability to quickly see the line numbers and jump to a certain line is invaluable, especially for people writing codes. Unfortunately, NovoEdit's implementation is nothing more than a bad joke. Not only can you not jump to a certain line of your choosing, but the lines themselves are determined by the width of the window. Lines created by the text wrapping are considered actual lines, rendering this method of structuring a document useless.
Bugs bugs Some people might feel that I am being too hard on this program considering that it is a beta and that it is not exactly ready for primetime. Normally I would agree, however, considering that the improvements offered by this program are cosmetic more than anything and that they don't even work right, I was expecting the program to be able to deliver at least the most basic of functionality. Basic functionality seems to be a tough nut to crack.
One of the most horrendous bugs in this application is the way the window, any window, will act up and not display the contents properly. When pasting large brocks of text, and by large I mean anything that won't fit into the current size of the window, the program will often decide that what you see is what you get. I'm not referring to the design paradigm of some visually orientated editors, but to the fact that the application will decide that the content of the document is what can be seen in the window. You won't get scroll bars and in the cases when you do get them, they won't actually scroll all the way down. To get around this bug you can try resizing the window, but this will only go so far, since you can't really make the window bigger than the screen. Should you actually manage to get all the text visible in the window, resizing it again will inevitable result in loss of text after a certain point.
The Good The toolbar that NovoEdit offers is quite practical, and the line numbering feature would be great for coders, if both worked right.
The Bad The sheer number of bugs and inability to do even the most basic things is astounding.
The Truth Programming is not the easiest thing in the world, that is a given. However, a program that is essentially a perfect clone of TextEdit that manages to actually be worse than the original is a rare thing. Arguably this application is still in beta, but looking around at other beta application, it is not even ready for the alpha state.
Here are some screenshots, click to enlarge:
