
#ATOM PLAIN TEXT EDITOR CODE#
Linters are standalone tools that check source code files for syntax errors and coding style errors. They typically follow the naming convention of “language-”. If you are missing this for your favorite language, see if someone already created a package for that, which is normally the case, even for quite exotic languages. Programming Language PackagesĪtom ships with a number of supported language definitions by default, which enables Atom to auto-complete and highlight code for these programming languages.
#ATOM PLAIN TEXT EDITOR INSTALL#
You can install packages either via the Settings menu or via the command line package manager called like “apm install ”. I will show you which packages I use and recommend. ExtensionsĪs mentioned above, the most interesting thing about Atom is its extension ecosystem.

On the right side, there is the a miniature view of the code, nice for scrolling with an overview, provided by the minimap package. In the main view, you can see one tab with a Python file opened, and nicely colored the syntactic structure of the code. On the left, you can see the project directory in a tree view. Here is a shot of my personal setup, using Atom Material UI and Atom Material Numix Syntax. There is really a lot of things to explore, just head over to for packages or to for syntax color schemes and user interface themes. The real strength of Atom is its ecosystem of extensions. Git support (highlight code changes etc.).package manager for functional extensions and themes.Internally, it is built on web technologies, such as Javacript, which makes it significantly slower compared to some other code editors like Sublime Text (also popular, but neither free nor open source), but you wont probably notice the difference unless you open up some really huge data files (like CSV or GeoJSON), which is a bad idea anyway.

It is available for all major platforms such as Windows, Mac and Linux. I also wrote my thesis on that, in LaTeX, with syntax checks and highlighting, and automatic recompilation. Long story short, here is my love story with the Atom editor, starting with this fun video:Ītom is a text editor initiated by GitHub, made for writing in plain text, especially code, but not only.

There are plenty alternatives out there, but if your doing coding for a living, or even just write some scripts for your thesis, I recommend giving it a try. But to make it clear right away, I don’t want to push you to using Atom explicitly, I just want to show why this is my editor of choice. But once you have discovered the productivity boosts and little helpers that you can find in modern code editors or IDEs (Integrated Development Environments), you probably wont ever look back. Of course, in the end, it is always just plain text that you are saving in your editor, and you might be able to write huge programs even in Textpad on Windows. “Well”, you might be asking, “I am using program xy for writing my code already, and I don’t see a reason to change that”. But because a proper code editor can make a huge difference, I want to introduce you to my favorite tool for the job: Atom, a free, open source, modern and extensible, cross platform editor.
#ATOM PLAIN TEXT EDITOR SOFTWARE#
And I guess I am not the only one around here who is working on software projects. There is this time of the year when the presents are unboxed and the new year hasn’t started yet, when a lot of people (including me) find some time for tinkering on personal projects.
