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56

answers:

2

I have textmate, but honestly the only thing I can do with it is simply edit a file.

The handy little file browser is aslo useful. (how can I show/hide that file browser anyhow!)

But I have no other knowledge/tricks up my sleeve, care to help me out?

+2  A: 

If you look under the Bundles menu in TextMate there is a Python-specific sub-menu that exposes a bunch of helpful things like syntax checking, script debugging, insertion of oft used code blocks, manual look ups and so on. Most of them are bound to keyboard shortcuts (or can be bound if they are not).

Also, under the Bundles are sort of general-to-code or general-to-text-editing tasks in sub-menus.

You can set up templates for new file creation that let you start new files with all the little bits and pieces you like to see in new files (copyright notice, author, SCC tags, etc.) See the File -> New From Template -> Edit Templates... menu option to do that. It ships with 4 Python templates already.

Finally, that browser is called the Project Drawer. View -> Show Project Drawer to get it to show up. It'll only be available when the window you're viewing is a project window, not a single document window.

Ian C.
A: 

So the killer "app" of TextMate is the bundle community. These are collections of commands, snippets etc that third parties have created.

Say you're using Mako as your template language. Google "TextMate Mako" and you'll find this article on a Mako bundle for TextMate. Google around for some of the other tools you use: I don't think there's one for Pylons specifically (nor Turbogears).. but hey, you could always start one...

And there's bound to be a TextMate bundle for some of the other Python tools you use (use the PEP8 checker? There's a bundle for that, for instance...)

RyanWilcox