*SciTE* text editor

Tailoring (i.e. Configuring)
and Usage Notes

by Blaze



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! Note !
More notes may be added,
if/when I re-visit this page.

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INTRODUCTION :

This page is meant as a collection place for notes on tailoring (and using) the SciTE text editor (Wikipedia link), on Linux.

This page is 'Notes', NOT a 'Guide'. I will probably never collect enough notes on SciTE to turn this page into a 'Guide'. There are many features of SciTE that I will never use.

In addition to these notes on SciTE, I have put together a page on installing Linux applications, like 'gscite', in a '/apps' directory, like $HOME/apps ---- instead of scattering the installation through system directories like /usr/bin, /usr/share, /usr/lib, etc.

That inatalling-apps-in-your-home-directory guide may be of interest --- especially if you are installing multiple versions of SciTE --- that is, keeping one version installed until you are satified with moving to the new version.

Why SciTE :

As I mentioned in a web page on my migration from MS Windows to Linux (on an Ubuntu Installs web page), I have used 'gedit' as an text editor on Gnome-based Ubuntu (9.10), but I am constantly frustrated by the fact that 'gedit' does not support quick mouse-only copy-and-paste.

I found that SciTE (or, more precisely, 'gscite') DOES provide that support --- and it is the only GTK-based text editor on Linux that I have found to do so.

I can simply copy-and-paste by swiping over line(s) of text with a mouse and pasting in another part of the document (copying from the current document or from another window).

Another capability of SciTE that is not in many text editors is 'block-insert-and-delete' which is especially handy for inserting or deleting entire columns of text (or blanks) at the beginning of multiple, contiguous lines of text.

Some SciTE behaviors that annoy me :

One thing that has bothered me about 'gscite' is that it does not default to a 'monospace' (fixed-width) font when I start it on a text file --- such as an HTML code file, or a shell script file, or a Tcl-Tk script file. Rather it shows the file in a variable-width font.

You can change this behavior with a SciTE 'properties' file. An image of such a 'SciTE user properties' file is shown below.

Another behavior that annoys me is that SciTE seems to replace my spaces at the start of a line by tabs, whenever it sees fit. I have not found a way to over-ride this behavior, yet. 'gedit' does not behave like this.

In fact, the 'Replace' option of 'gedit' allows you to replace tabs by a specified number of spaces, or vice versa (a fixed number of spaces by a tab). In other words, you have essentially complete control of tab and space conversions in 'gedit'.

There is probably a way of changing this behavior via a SciTE 'properties' file, but I have not taken the time to find how to do that.

Another annoying behavior:
When you start up SciTE it opens a too-small window --- about half the height of my screen instead of about 80% of the height of my screen.

    This window-size behavior can be changed via a SciTE 'properties' file --- via 'position' properties. See the link to a sample properties file below.

An alternative would be for scite to remember the height of the window from the last session, but SciTE (or 'gscite') does not seem to do that. 'gedit' is more pleasing in this regard.

TABLE OF CONTENTS :

(links to sections of this page, below)

END OF TABLE OF CONTENTS.

The 'scite' notes start below.

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Defaulting to a fixed-width font in SciTE :

< Go to Table of Contents, above. >

You can paste the following code in a '.SciTEUser.properties' file in your Home directory. This is one way to make the SciTE editor default to a fixed-width (monospace) font when it starts up on your selected text file.

There is a different way to set these SciTE font parameters --- provided on a FAQ page on the SciTE web site. But this works fine for me. 


if PLAT_GTK
	# font.base=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans,size:9
	# font.small=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans,size:8
        font.base=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:9
        font.small=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:8
	
	# font.comment=font:!Bitstream Vera Serif,size:9
	font.comment=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:9
	 
	font.code.comment.box=$(font.comment)
	font.code.comment.line=$(font.comment)
	font.code.comment.doc=$(font.comment)
	font.code.comment.nested=$(font.comment)
	
	# font.text=font:!Bitstream Charter,size:10
	font.text=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:10
		
	# font.text.comment=font:!Serif,size:9
	# font.embedded.base=font:!Serif,size:9
	# font.embedded.comment=font:!Serif,size:9
	font.text.comment=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:9
	font.embedded.base=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:9
	font.embedded.comment=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:9
	
	font.monospace=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:9
	font.vbs=font:!Bitstream Vera Sans Mono,size:9

Note that I have changed some 'Sans' font statements to 'Sans Mono', and I have changed some 'Serif' statements to 'Sans Mono'.

    I commented out the 'Sans' and 'Serif' statements rather than removing them --- to indicate the 'scite' default fonts.

For some more statments that I added to the '.SciTEUser.properties' file, see this page on installs of apps in a '$HOME/apps' directory. Go to the section on installing 'SciTE'.

And here is a link to a sample '.SciTEUser.properties' file that I was using in the 2019 to 2024+ time frame on a desktop computer with Ubuntu-MATE Linux installed.

    There are lots of information-only comments in this sample file --- along with commented 'scite' property-setting statements. Some of the information-only comments remind me of the source from which I got the sample property setting statements. And some of the commented 'scite' property-setting statements remind me of properties that it might be desirable to set.

    This link is a text file that should be immediately viewable in most desktop-computer-web-browsers, but perhaps not some mobile-device-web-browsers.

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EXTERNAL LINKS on 'SciTE' :

Bottom of this
'SciTE' text editor Notes page.

To return to a previously visited web page location, click on the Back button of your web browser, a sufficient number of times.

OR, use the History-list option of your web browser.

OR ...

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Page history:

Page was created 2011 Aug 24.

Page was changed 2011 Sep 25.

Page was changed 2018 Dec 19.
(Added css and javascript to try to handle text-size for smartphones, esp. in portrait orientation. Added a link.)

Page was changed 2024 Mar 28.
(Changed links to 'external' web pages so they startup in a separate window or tab, so that this web page remains available.
I changed some text lines for greater clarity, hopefully.)