Script Editors, IDEs & Validators

There is nothing wrong with a simple editor like EDIT or Notepad.
In fact many of the older pages on this site were created with OS/2's "E" (OS/2's Notepad equivalent) and, later, File Commander's built-in text editor.
But sometimes an editor with built-in support for one or more scripting languages can help speed up our code writing.
And some editors have evolved to full-blown multi-language IDEs.

What to look for in editors?
That depends entirely on what you are going to use it for.

Do you want to use it for a single scripting or programming language only?
If so, try the editors and IDEs specializing in that language.
And look for built-in debuggers, compilers/packagers, and if your language of choice is object aware, object browsers.

Some editors don't have their own debugger, but do support external debuggers.
The same goes for compilers/packagers.

To me, an important feature in specialized editors is the capability to run the script within the editor itself and view the script's output in a window.
Most editors with this option also support at least external debuggers. These are, in fact, IDEs.

In case you want a "universal" editor, you may find some with syntax highlighting and word lists for all the languages you'll be using, but features like debugging and compilation will be a "challenge" at least. The best you can hope for is support for external debuggers.

You may also want to look at snippets/code libraries, and regular expressions based search and replace options.
And customizable tools, which means you can add your own (external) tools to the editor's menu.

Download the trial versions, and test, test, test and test.

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