What can I use as a Notepad++ alternative in Linux (ubuntu)?

Question

I got addicted to notepad++ on windows and I've recently moved to Ubuntu. I'm missing a tool as such.

Answer 1

Doesn't the bundled editor GEdit offer much the same functionality? If you need a richer functionality, use a “true” Linux editor such as GVim or Emacs.

To harness the full power of GEdit, have a look at this blog posting entitled Pimp my Gedit. Notepad++ is no match to this.

Answer 2

You may like vim, with the plugins you want.

See:

http://www.vim.org/
http://www.vim.org/tips/index.php

http://www.vim.org/scripts/index.php
http://www.vim.org/scripts/script.php?script_id=1658

Answer 3

I would personally recommend VIM or GVIM. Its features are unmatched as far as I am concerned. Code folding and syntax highlighting are key features that are in both applications.

Answer 4

Emacs and Vi are you best options, the power of those will dwarf anything that notepad++ can do...The learning curve is steep.

Gedit is pretty good with a few add-ons.

Answer 5

gedit has long been a staple of my X installations. GVim is handy as well, but with Gedit and vi, I have just about everything I want.

Answer 6

If you are using KDE, give kate a try.

Answer 7

you can use kate editor

Answer 8

Welcome to the dark side :)

From the top of my head, I would suggest gVim, the "graphical" version of Vim. It's an extremely competent editor, but it takes some time to get used to it. I had to check the tutorial to understand all the shortcuts etc. It has syntax highlighting for most languages.

But i don't know of any good WYSIWYG editor. However, you could of course try to run Notepad++ through Wine. That might work :)

Answer 9

GEdit is indeed more powerful than it may appear at first; in particular, the plugin system allows it to gain pretty much all the functionality you would find in something like Windows' Notepad++.

There are plenty of sites that give you tips on "tricking out" your gEdit, such as this one, or this one or this one for a more-or-less comprehensive listing. Googling around will find you many more.

Hope this helps! :)

Answer 10

You could try gvim or xemacs, they'll probably take longer to get used to than np++ but either should be able to do everything you need. If this isn't good enough, you could also always just run np++ in Wine :)

Answer 11

If you are looking for the same editing component, use SciTE. SciTE and Notepad++ both use Scintilla behind the scenes.

Answer 12

Notepad++ works well with WINE. Installation instructions can be found at http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/nppLinux.php. This link is no longer valid.

Answer 13

I second vim/gvim. However, if you're looking to ease the transition to vim, you can use cream, which is kind of like vim w/ insert modes as default (there's probably more to it than that, though...)

http://cream.sourceforge.net/

Answer 14

Gedit if you're using Gnome, or KWrite if you're using KDE, or Mousepad if you're using XFCE (although I don't know if it has syntax highlighting).

Notepad++ will run under Wine.

Answer 15

Kate and Nedit were always favourites where I worked.

Answer 16

I like vim (use it even on Windows) but if you want to avoid the steep learning curve and use something more "Windowsish", try NEdit: http://www.nedit.org/

Answer 17

Cream [http://cream.sourceforge.net] will give you the power of Vim with the convenience of a graphical interface.

Answer 18

Notepad++ works fantastically in Ubuntu under wine. If you absolutely can't do without it, you can still have it.

I personally have been using Medit because it's lightweight, although it doesn't have some of the best featured of notepad++. Specifically, the split screen view is something I miss almost every single day.

Answer 19

I vote for Geany, it is in Ubuntu repositories.

Answer 20

With WINE 1.0 you can emulate Notepad++

Answer 21

Give Editra a try. It is open source and written in Python (runs on most platforms). The code is pretty stable. The project is being actively developed. Editra was recently featured on lifehacker.

Full Disclosure: my friend and colleague started the project

Answer 22

I highly recommend SciTE:

http://scintilla.sourceforge.net/SciTEDownload.html

It is fast, light, highly configurable, and cross-platform. I've tried GEdit, Kate, NEdit, vim, etc., but SciTE gets my vote.

Answer 23

There is another thread about it here, but jEdit is a Java-based editor which is in the Ubuntu repositories.

If you're used to Notepad++ it will probably have a slightly easier learning curve for you than Vim or Emacs, and I find it has more (useful) features than gEdit - and it has loads of plugins.

www.jedit.org, if you want the actual website :)

Answer 24

Geany is pretty similar to Notepad++. Supports syntax highlighting for several languages, auto-indent, tabs, etc. While plenty of the other editors listed here are excellent, geany seems the most similar to notepad++

Answer 25

I like gEdit and I followed most of the tips that I found here to make it a pretty good lightweight IDE.

Answer 26

There are lots of plugins that you can add to the "base" editors of the main linux frontends Gedit (for Gnome), KWrite (for KDE) or MousePad (for XFCE), but if you want something more equipped from the beginning try Geany (for Gnome or XFCE) or Kate (for KDE).

Answer 27

I found MadEdit quite an ok replacement, though mind you, it's on my university's computers, so I have no idea where to get it from.

Answer 28

Emacs has great support for all kinds of different editing modes and is still quite usable even for new users. It also allows for massive customization once you realize it's the best thing that ever happened to you.

Answer 29

Can someone tell me if there's any editor that has tag match capability? For example: my title

when you position the cursor anywhere within the opening brackets, Notepad++ will highlight the opening and closing tag's bracket (> in the closing tag), so everything in between will be highlighted, it's very useful when you need to edit HTML/CSS pages, is there anything similar for Linux/Ubuntu? I just switched to Ubuntu 9.04 and tried a few editors (Bluefish, Gedit, Geany, etc.), but none of them do what Notepad++ does with closing tag, maybe it's there and I couldn't figure out how to configure it. \

If there's such editor out there, please let me know which one and how to configure it.

Thanks for your comment/suggestion Michael

Answer 30

Hello guys,

after a long time of searching the best Notepad++ alternative in Linux, I find that Notepad++ is the best alternative for Notepad++ in Linux. :-)

Here is the solution,

1. Install Wine from Ubuntu software Center, I used Wine 1.1.31;
2. Download Notepad++Portablelink text;
3. Go to your Notepad++ download folder, right click on the *.exe file and chose Open with Wine.....
4. Chose your language, chose your C:\Program Files\Notepad++Portable and click Install; 5 Go to Aplication Ubuntu menu, in Aplications/Wine/Browse c:/Drive or paste the following ~/.wine/dosdevices/c:/Program Files/Notepad++Portable in your File explorer
5. Right click on Notepad++Portable.exe and chose Open with Wine.....

That's it,

Roland

Answer 31

you should really learn VIM... vi is in every linux and unix build ... therefore no matter what machine you get on, you will be able to do very powerful editing. emacs would be the other choice to learn... the other programs are nice but you will all thank us once you get passed the learning curve and your production will FLY... even if you use gvim/cream on windows it is WELL worth it. I have to use windows at work and people come by and see me running vim and are like WTF is that! meanwhile they use shitty dreamweaver lmao

Answer 32

I would vote UP the first couple if stack overflow would let me.

Notepad++ under wine is OK but why? syntax highlighting is broken and some other things in it are broken like pop up boxes that take an integer. so it is pointless. Great app in windows though.

Kate is fantastic alternative. The fonts are very smoothed (antialiased), it's reasonably snappy and has a lot of great features that are useful in notepad++ like being able to see all characters, change line endings, syntax highlighting, line numbers, code folding i believe, etc.

I would not recommend gvim or emacs. It's 30 years into the future for them, folks, we don't need to hamhand our keyboard with tekkenlike combos because of the advent of the mouse and simple cut paste, home, end keys and a modest number of combos. Plus, it's a total pain in the butt to get emacs fonts to NOT give everyone a severe tension headache after looking at the horrible fonts for 5 minutes. Yes i know there's a way to fix this, but it's unclear, badly documented and unless you are some ubergeek you are just goign to waste hourse of your life getting emacs to work half=as well as ultraedit, which is now native to linux but unfrotunately not free.

best, chris