We have moved to a new Sailfish OS Forum. Please start new discussions there.
11

what app for text/plain?

asked 2015-06-11 00:21:51 +0300

Bokkie gravatar image

updated 2015-06-11 09:07:28 +0300

heubergen gravatar image

When I select a text file in File Browser and tap it, it opens If I however drag and choose "open", I get an error that "xdg-open" has found no preferred application.

My question: What application opens it with a tap? I can edit /usr/share/applications/mimeinfo.cache to add the mimetype, but would not know what application to use...

edit retag flag offensive close delete

Comments

3

I created a fork of TinyEdit to make it a little nicer (mono-space font, auto-save...) so I use that. I should post it on openrepos. I always intended to implement undo / redo. Maybe someone else can figure out how to do it. :)

drcouzelis ( 2015-06-11 14:57:10 +0300 )edit

Great! Have you a github repo?

heubergen ( 2015-06-11 18:51:08 +0300 )edit

Please see my "answer". :)

drcouzelis ( 2015-06-12 01:33:35 +0300 )edit
1

TinyEdit is the best there is out there @drcouzelis I am grateful for the app, and wanted to let you know that in person, my default text handling app on my jolla, should fix whatever the author of the thread complained about

DameCENO ( 2016-05-11 14:24:14 +0300 )edit

7 Answers

Sort by » oldest newest most voted
12

answered 2015-06-12 01:30:56 +0300

drcouzelis gravatar image

updated 2015-06-12 01:33:13 +0300

Here is "FinPad", a simple fork of TinyEdit that I made. I included all of the source code and an RPM release for convenience. Changes include:

  • Mono space font
  • Auto save after every change in text
  • If no filename is selected, the text is automatically saved to "~/Documents/finpad-TIMESTAMP.txt".
  • Other minor "cleanups".

The last killer feature I would love to have is undo / redo. That would make it just perfect.

https://github.com/drcouzelis/finpad

Set it as your default text editor with these instructions (with "finpad.desktop" instead).

Please fork it and make it awesome! :D

edit flag offensive delete publish link more

Comments

rpm package available?

objectifnul ( 2015-09-16 10:54:46 +0300 )edit
1

Yes. Go to the GitHub page and select the "Releases" tab.

drcouzelis ( 2015-09-17 13:37:39 +0300 )edit

Got it, thanks. Only reachable in desktop version, not in mobile site.

objectifnul ( 2015-09-17 16:13:15 +0300 )edit

Thanks for FinPad!

How about these enhancements:

  • open dialog: history of opened files
  • make a backup when saving a file (tilde file ~)
  • remember cursor position of previously opened files
Rolfa ( 2016-04-04 17:55:47 +0300 )edit

You're welcome. :) Thank you for the suggestions. I'm sorry, I won't be adding new features. Hopefully another developer will take the open source code for FinPad (which is based on the open source code for TinyEdit) and make it nicer.

Actually, I will happily give the entire project to anyone who is interested in updating it. :)

drcouzelis ( 2016-04-04 18:10:42 +0300 )edit
4

answered 2015-06-11 00:44:52 +0300

objectifnul gravatar image

On my device, the default app for .txt files is "Documents" from Jolla store. Sadly, it doesn't open text files. So I use TinyEdit, also from Jolla store. Quite basic editor, but more or less working. Didn't find out how to make it default for txt files, so I have to open them manually from the pulley menu ("open" command). We miss an advanced native text editor anyway.

edit flag offensive delete publish link more

Comments

Use mimer available on openrepos, it gives an option to set default apps for various filetypes

DameCENO ( 2016-05-12 17:44:21 +0300 )edit
3

answered 2015-06-11 02:13:23 +0300

Self-Perfection gravatar image

I suggest to stick with filemanagers embedded functions. File Browser can display contents of .txt files, and Filetug even has embedded text editor. Why would you need something else?

edit flag offensive delete publish link more

Comments

You are right. However this is not really satisfying. FlleTug and TinyEdit are very basic editors with poor features (no search), poor ergonomics, poor system integration. FileBrowser has no editing capabilities and displays only truncated content. So, for the time being I'm still editing text files with my laptop. IMHO this is a regression in comparison with what my old E90 Communicator offered.

objectifnul ( 2015-06-11 09:57:13 +0300 )edit

And for complex text editing we have vim...Can android text editor be a solution for you?

Self-Perfection ( 2015-06-11 11:17:35 +0300 )edit
2
  1. Obviously, no (regarding Android text editor), as (i) Aliendalvik can't access many areas of my file tree, (ii) I'm not running Android most of the time, for various reasons not to be detailed here.

  2. Vim is a powerful tool indeed. However, command line interface is clearly not what can be expected for an everyday tool running on a GUI device. A GUI for Vim might be the solution we are waiting for (same for other available CLI apps). The tool is there, building a graphic interface is maybe not a big job for a good developer, which I am definitely not).

objectifnul ( 2015-06-11 11:56:30 +0300 )edit
2

answered 2018-05-30 12:49:10 +0300

olf gravatar image

updated 2018-05-30 13:06:45 +0300

The information provided here WRT editors with a GUI is partially outdated:

  • The simple editor TinyEdit and its fork FinPad (just a single commit) are unmaintained for years (at least since 2015), but still work well.
  • The filemanagers FileCase (single pane) and FileTug (dual pane) provide built-in, simple editors (basically on the same level of TinyEdit / FinPad). Their development ceased in 2016, but both still work well.
  • There has been a Maemo.org development regatta for GUI editors (ending early 2017), which resulted in Editor. and tIDE / tIDE-editor (Jolla Store). They have a slightly different focus, but are both much more advanced than TinyEdit. Editor. still receives new features every now and then.
  • Some existing editors have been ported to SailfishOS, e.g. JOE and Nice Editor (ne), but these were "one shot" actions (no maintenance or updates).

Whatever you ultimately choose, assign the MIME type "Text-plain" with Mimer (or manually) to your primary choice.

I personally settled with FileCase for viewing files and changing a few characters, Editor. for creating / editing regular text files as user nemo and the classic vi / vim for system administration tasks (e.g. editing configuration files as root).

P.S.: Trying to use editors for Android is very frustrating, as the good ones provide much more and much more polished functionality than any SailfishOS-native editor, but one ends up writing files to /tmp and copying them back to their original location (usually one, where Android apps cannot write to) too often.

edit flag offensive delete publish link more
1

answered 2016-05-11 11:19:36 +0300

Rolfa gravatar image

Nice Editor (short: ne) works great, although cli only.

I think this is the most complete and useful text editor currently available for Sailfish OS (features Undo, Search, Syntax Highlighting etc.)

https://openrepos.net/content/vevgeniev/nice-editor

edit flag offensive delete publish link more
0

answered 2016-05-11 17:59:44 +0300

pawel gravatar image

tiny edit .

edit flag offensive delete publish link more
0

answered 2016-05-12 01:35:58 +0300

Schturman gravatar image

Most of the time I use FileTug file manager for editing files... But when I on Jolla Tablet connected to my Jolla phone and want to edit some files on the phone, I use DroidEdit Pro app (via SFTP). Very nice editor for text, scripts etc...

edit flag offensive delete publish link more
Login/Signup to Answer

Question tools

Follow
6 followers

Stats

Asked: 2015-06-11 00:21:51 +0300

Seen: 1,805 times

Last updated: May 30 '18