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What is the closest thing to Windows notepad on the Mac?

I'm using Leopard.

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I've been looking for this exact same thing for a long time, but no one seems to know any tool like this. I don't need multi-file editing, rich text, HTML or code editing, colors or anything at all. I just want a plain Notepad-like app that will open any file without fuss and show it in any font I choose. There seems to be no such thing. – aalaap Aug 28 '11 at 7:27
There's always vi – Brian R. Bondy Aug 28 '11 at 16:54
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4 Answers

up vote 13 down vote accepted

TextEdit. You can make it use Plain Text (Format > Make Plain Text) if you're looking for non-RTF text editing.

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TextEdit is even better—it's like Notepad and WordPad combined into one program. – htw Jul 25 '09 at 0:21
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Being better than Notepad is a pretty low bar. ;-P – deceze Jul 25 '09 at 0:24
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One thing I miss is being able to open ANY file inside windows notepad. Like I could take a .gif file if I wanted and see the first 2 chars of that GIF file if I opened it in notepad. In TextEdit it tells me that the file is not a supported type. – Brian R. Bondy Jul 25 '09 at 1:10
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I guess I can use commands like more or less to see this but being able to edit it with a GUI is desirable for me for some reason. – Brian R. Bondy Jul 25 '09 at 1:13
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To open most files, just add the extension .txt to them. Also, if you need to work closer to the nuts and bolts, you'll want to: 1) Set "TextEdit > Preferences > New Document > Format" to "Plain text" and 2) Set "TextEdit > Preferences > Open and Save > When Opening a File:" to "Ignore rich text commands in HTML files" – username Jul 25 '09 at 1:42
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up vote 3 down vote

If you want simple text editing, use TextEdit.

For code editing, one of the best choices is TextMate.

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up vote 3 down vote

As already stated, TextEdit is the notepad of OS X (although a more powerful notepad that is). For more advanced stuff, TextMate (already recommended) is very nice. A nice free and famous alternative is Bare Bones's TextWrangler.

You can do pretty much with either.

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up vote 0 down vote

FYI - you can default TextEdit to plain text when it opens:

  • Goto preferences
  • Under Format, click on "Plain Text"

http://support.apple.com/kb/TA20406

Can't believe it took me this long to figure that out

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