Asp Forum - Ruby text editor for beginner

Shawn Wa...

1/18/2007 2:38:00 PM

I'm looking for a simple text editor for Ruby to work under WinXP SP2.

Must have:

- syntax colouring (of course)
- an incorporated window that shows your code working, even when your
code requires gets input
- option to turn background to black and adjust colours accordingly
(would be nice to have a "convert to black" button, or even better,
default black background).

Could have:
- folder navigation and "projects"
- ability to open more than one Ruby file with tabs
- autocompletion of code

I've tried Scite but couldn't get the incorporated code working window
working when your code required input. I was directed to a fix which I
tried but the fix did not fix it. There's was no option to turn the
background to black anyway, so I abandoned it.

I tried FreeRIDE. Had the option to turn the background to black, but no
black background convert button. Had multifile open tabs. Had folder
navigation and projects capabilities. Had a code working window, but I
couldn't get this one working either. Went to their website and there
was mention of problems in windows - supposed to work fine in Linux
though. I liked FreeRIDE but one of my top 3 requirements was broke so
I've put it aside.

Looked at vim and emacs through some nice screencasts. A little too
complicated for my purpose at this early stage of my Ruby career. I can
see myself ending up using either of these eventually though.

Found Arachno and Ruby in Steel, but alas I don't own Visual Basic and
won't be buying it just to run Ruby code.

What's left? Any simple text editor for Ruby that meets my 3 must have
requirements?

--
Posted via http://www.ruby-....

31 Answers

Reid Thompson

1/18/2007 2:45:00 PM

Shawn Wa... wrote:
> I'm looking for a simple text editor for Ruby to work under WinXP SP2.
>
> Must have:
>
> - syntax colouring (of course)
> - an incorporated window that shows your code working, even when your
> code requires gets input
> - option to turn background to black and adjust colours accordingly
> (would be nice to have a "convert to black" button, or even better,
> default black background).
>
> Could have:
> - folder navigation and "projects"
> - ability to open more than one Ruby file with tabs
> - autocompletion of code
>
> I've tried Scite but couldn't get the incorporated code working window
> working when your code required input. I was directed to a fix which I
> tried but the fix did not fix it. There's was no option to turn the
> background to black anyway, so I abandoned it.
>
> I tried FreeRIDE. Had the option to turn the background to black, but no
> black background convert button. Had multifile open tabs. Had folder
> navigation and projects capabilities. Had a code working window, but I
> couldn't get this one working either. Went to their website and there
> was mention of problems in windows - supposed to work fine in Linux
> though. I liked FreeRIDE but one of my top 3 requirements was broke so
> I've put it aside.
>
> Looked at vim and emacs through some nice screencasts. A little too
> complicated for my purpose at this early stage of my Ruby career. I can
> see myself ending up using either of these eventually though.
>
> Found Arachno and Ruby in Steel, but alas I don't own Visual Basic and
> won't be buying it just to run Ruby code.
>
> What's left? Any simple text editor for Ruby that meets my 3 must have
> requirements?
>
>
see http://homepage2.nifty.com/sakazuki/rde_en/...

Mat Schaffer

1/18/2007 2:48:00 PM

On Jan 18, 2007, at 9:38 AM, Shawn Wa... wrote:
> I'm looking for a simple text editor for Ruby to work under WinXP SP2.
>
> Must have:
>
> - syntax colouring (of course)
> - an incorporated window that shows your code working, even when your
> code requires gets input
> - option to turn background to black and adjust colours accordingly
> (would be nice to have a "convert to black" button, or even better,
> default black background).
>
> Could have:
> - folder navigation and "projects"
> - ability to open more than one Ruby file with tabs
> - autocompletion of code
>
> What's left? Any simple text editor for Ruby that meets my 3 must have
> requirements?

While not a text editor, I'd recommend eclipse. It's default scheme
is blank on white, but you can configure it. If you download
RadRails, it'll come with everything you need to do Ruby projects as
well. It lacks auto completion, but has everything else you're
looking for. It even handles subversion and unit testing, which
you'll probably get into once your projects grow a little larger.
-Mat

Shawn Wa...

1/18/2007 3:08:00 PM

Can you both confirm (ie used yourself) that RDE and Eclipse can execute
Ruby code from within the program if on WinXP SP2? FreeRIDE and Scite
claimed they could and they both couldn't, or I couldn't get them
working anyway.

They look good to me. The first one I try that has my top 3 I'm using.

--
Posted via http://www.ruby-....

Drew Olson

1/18/2007 3:13:00 PM

Shawn W_ wrote:
> Can you both confirm (ie used yourself) that RDE and Eclipse can execute
> Ruby code from within the program if on WinXP SP2? FreeRIDE and Scite
> claimed they could and they both couldn't, or I couldn't get them
> working anyway.
>
> They look good to me. The first one I try that has my top 3 I'm using.

Eclipse with RDT can indeed execute code as long as you point it at the
interpreter. However, there is a weird syncing issue with I/O display
that you have to fix. It's one line of code and explained on the RDT
website.

--
Posted via http://www.ruby-....

Reid Thompson

1/18/2007 3:25:00 PM

Reid Thompson

1/18/2007 3:36:00 PM

Reid Thompson wrote:
> Shawn W_ wrote:
>> Can you both confirm (ie used yourself) that RDE and Eclipse can
>> execute Ruby code from within the program if on WinXP SP2? FreeRIDE
>> and Scite claimed they could and they both couldn't, or I couldn't
>> get them working anyway.
>>
>> They look good to me. The first one I try that has my top 3 I'm using.
>>
>>
>>
> RDE does
>
Eclipse is nice. It is LARGE. It offers the option of multiple
languages and infinite configuration. It is a JAVA application. All of
these are great if you want/need them. If you don't they can be a PITA.

RDT is nice. It is small. Not sure if it does langs other than ruby.
I'm pretty much 99% VIM. I've used and will prob continue to use RDE
and Eclipse for various purposes at various times ( at various times I
want/need various capabilities ). If you're currently just interested
in RUBY and want a small, quick IDE, I suggest giving RDE a run.

Screenshots of both ides are at their respective sites.

M. Edward (Ed) Borasky

1/18/2007 4:13:00 PM

Reid Thompson wrote:
> Reid Thompson wrote:
>> Shawn W_ wrote:
>>> Can you both confirm (ie used yourself) that RDE and Eclipse can
>>> execute Ruby code from within the program if on WinXP SP2? FreeRIDE
>>> and Scite claimed they could and they both couldn't, or I couldn't
>>> get them working anyway.
>>>
>>> They look good to me. The first one I try that has my top 3 I'm using.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>> RDE does
>>
> Eclipse is nice. It is LARGE. It offers the option of multiple
> languages and infinite configuration. It is a JAVA application. All
> of these are great if you want/need them. If you don't they can be a
> PITA.
>
> RDT is nice. It is small. Not sure if it does langs other than
> ruby. I'm pretty much 99% VIM. I've used and will prob continue to
> use RDE and Eclipse for various purposes at various times ( at various
> times I want/need various capabilities ). If you're currently just
> interested in RUBY and want a small, quick IDE, I suggest giving RDE a
> run.
> Screenshots of both ides are at their respective sites.
>
>
I'm pretty impressed with KDevelop on the Linux platform. I don't know
any reason why it couldn't be made to work on a Mac, but I don't know
about Windows. A couple of years ago I saw a (ghastly slow and unusable)
port of KDE to Cygwin, so I suppose it's *possible* to run KDevelop
under Cygwin.

--
M. Edward (Ed) Borasky, FBG, AB, PTA, PGS, MS, MNLP, NST, ACMC(P)
http://borasky-research.blo...

If God had meant for carrots to be eaten cooked, He would have given rabbits fire.

Suraj Kurapati

1/19/2007 4:39:00 AM

Shawn W_ wrote:
> Looked at vim and emacs through some nice screencasts. A little too
> complicated for my purpose at this early stage of my Ruby career. I can
> see myself ending up using either of these eventually though.

Have a look at VimMate before going to Vim. It's just a wrapper around
Vim that provides a nice console and file management GUI. Plain, simple,
works for me ;)

> What's left? Any simple text editor for Ruby that meets my 3 must have
> requirements?

How about jEdit with:

* RubyPlugin

http://ruby...

* EditorScheme plugin (use dark color schemes: dessert, dark brine,
etc.)

see example: http://www.eadz.co.nz/blog/article/ruby-rails-...

* SuperAbbrevs plugin (just like the famous TextMate you see in Rails
screen casts):

http://www.ifakedit.com/log/2006/02/19/jedit-tutorial-a-how-to-on-abbreviations-superabbrevs-in-html-ruby-on-rails...

http://synthesis.sbecker.net/articles/2006/03/20/jedit-snippets-for-rub...

With these awesome plugins, I feel jEdit is the equivalent of TextMate
that's made for the rest of us. ;)

--
Posted via http://www.ruby-....

Hendrik Volkmer

1/19/2007 9:15:00 AM

Mat Schaffer schrieb:
> While not a text editor, I'd recommend eclipse. It's default scheme
> is blank on white, but you can configure it. If you download
> RadRails, it'll come with everything you need to do Ruby projects as
> well.
There's a nice TextMate-style theme for RadRails if you like the colors:
http://drnicwilliams.com/2006/08/08/textmate-theme-for...
> It lacks auto completion, but has everything else you're looking for.
What do you mean by "auto completion"? Defining templates and using
Ctrl+Space works fine. So you could type
de<Ctrl+Space>method_name

and end up with

def method_name
<cursor goes here>
end

Completion for variable names etc. is supposed to work, too but somehow
it hasn't worked for me so far (maybe I'll need to upgrade to a newer
version...).
> It even handles subversion and unit testing, which you'll probably get
> into once your projects grow a little larger.
I second that. The subversion integration is quite good and it's nice to
see the green unit test bar and the Ctrl+F11 shortcut makes it easy to
repeatedly run tests.

Hendrik

Shawn Wa...

1/20/2007 2:36:00 AM

I've tried RDE but once again run code window doesn't work. This is the
program that is breaking all the editors:

-----------------------------------
puts 'LEAP YEAR CALCULATOR'
puts 'Enter the start year'
startyear = gets.chomp.to_i
puts ' '
puts 'Enter the end year'
endyear = gets.chomp.to_i
puts ' '
puts 'The leap years between the years you have entered are:'

while startyear <= endyear
if startyear%4 == 0 and startyear%100 != 0 or startyear%400 == 0
#using modulus method %, which returns the remainder when the first
number is divided by the second
#using the == sign (is this equal), which is different from the = sign
(which is an assigning one to the other)
puts startyear
end
startyear = startyear + 1
end
-----------------------------------

This short program requires you to enter two years and then it outputs
all the leapyears between them. After hitting F5 in RDE for the above
code I get:

1985
2006
LEAP YEAR CALCULATOR
Enter the start year

Enter the end year

The leap years between the years you have entered are:
1988
1992
1996
2000
2004

The dates are entered before the puts statements? The prompt in the code
working pane immediately after hitting F5 is [EOF], not LEAP YEAR
CALCULATOR Enter the start year? Dunno what [EOF] means?

It's more than likely I'm doing something wrong here but straight out of
the box RDE does not execute gets and puts correctly, or at least not in
the right order.

Can anyone test the above code and tell me it works in their Ruby editor
as it would from the dos prompt with c:\ruby program.rb?

RDE looks similar to FreeRIDE. Has all the same stuff and the same
shortfalls. Both programs do not allow you to change all the panes to a
black background, not just the code edit window. If this is the case it
defeats the purpose of having a black background because a half white
half black screen is more annoying than an all white screen. The purpose
of a black screen is to ease the glare on the eyes. RDE does not have an
"convert to black background" button, but neither has any editor I've
come across so far.

I'm more than happy to be corrected on any of these points - I am a
newbie. In fact I want to be corrected becuase if I'm wrong I've found
my editor.

--
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comp.lang.ruby

Ruby text editor for beginner

Shawn Wa...

Reid Thompson

Mat Schaffer

Shawn Wa...

Drew Olson

Reid Thompson

Reid Thompson

M. Edward (Ed) Borasky

Suraj Kurapati

Hendrik Volkmer

Shawn Wa...

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