If you want to understand the difference between text editors and word processors, read on. When you do this in the context of this book’s exercises, we want you to use a so-called text editor, not a word processor.įor a quick lookup of common free and open source text editors for Windows, macOS and Linux, see the table at the end of this appendix.

Although there are several ways to create a file with text in it, most of us will use a software application in which we type or copy/paste the text. On several occasions in this text you will encounter exercises which require you to create files containing some textual content perhaps a PHP program, some XML, some JSON, etc. txt, click Save As, enter the name, check the If no extension is provided, use “.txt” box and click Save.Appendix A: When Editing Code Files, Use a Text Editor Not(!) a Word Processor This will allow you to save your document as a. From this drop-down menu, select Unicode (UTF-8). Now, you need to check the Add “.txt” extension to plain text files box and then click the box next to “ Saving files:”. In the dialog box that appears, go to the Open and Save tab. However, you’re going to need to do some tweaking in order to do this.įirst, go to Preferences, under TextEdit in the uppermost toolbar. Like when using Notepad on PC, you can save your documents with the. This is why it’s important that you backup your file and think carefully before confirming that you want to switch to the plain text mode. Of course, even if your plain text was in rich text mode before you switched to plain mode, you won’t get your original text back this way. Navigate to Format, select Make Rich Text, or press Shift+Command+T on your keyboard. You can always switch back to rich text mode by following the exact same pattern of commands. The font and size, however, can still be changed from the Format menu. Your text font will also be converted to Menlo, size 11. Now your text is in plain text mode, meaning that both the formatting toolbar and the ruler are removed, as well as the formatting, colors, and pictures/images.

Plain text editor for windows