Sublime Text 4 (Build 4126)

[heelix]

There is only a handful of software (outside of games) that I'll shell out my own personal funds for. This is one of them. This is one of the few text editors that can handle stupid large files nicely. It 'remembers' what you have open, even if you don't save - so if the IT department does that random patch, you don't lose anything. Syntax highlighting and tool plugins, so it can make for a reasonable light weight code editor. The experience on Linux, OSX, and Windows is the same. The ability to do vertical column selection and insertion makes it crazy easy to make quick and dirty scripts with copy/paste data from other sources.

[baskethead]

Yep, me too. I bought ST2, got the free upgrade to ST3, and recently paid for ST4. I install it across my Windows and Mac computers and it’s still great. It’s my go to text editor for years now.

[PascLeRasc]

Throwing this out here since you mentioned it - does anyone else get tons of hangups and temporary frozen windows using Sublime with unsaved files? I’ve always had this on a bunch of different Macs and some Linux machines. I don’t like working around by saving either, sometimes I just want a scratchpad.

[wodenokoto]

> The experience on Linux, OSX, and Windows is the same

You and I have very different definitions of “same”.

If the keyboard shortcuts where just “use ctr instead of command” I’d probably agree with you, but the shortcuts are changed dramatically between the 3 systems.

For example, replace uses F on Mac, but H on windows.

[pjmlp]

Same here, even if I seldom use it. Otherwise all these nice editors will just die, and their authors also have bills to pay.

[kwanbix]

UltraEdit is very much what you describe. But the column mode is much better IMHO.

[IshKebab]

Except for handling extremely large files, VSCode does all of that.

[whalesalad]

I still daily drive Sublime. I haven’t found an editor with less latency. It’s so fast and so consistent. VS Code feels like Eclipse in comparison.

[tehbeard]

Daily driving to do what type of work exactly?

I've been using VS Code for years now, and while it is measurably slower (I still use sublime to handle ad-hoc grepping log files as code just won't handle that, and scrollable, highlighting and multicursor is MUCH better than smacking bash pipes together), the batteries included "It just works" approach of code means I don't really see a reason to head back.

Maybe it's changed since the sublime 2/3 days, but the packages ecosystem always felt a bit unpolished and anemic.

[dahfizz]

Vim with my plugins in the terminal is noticeably faster than vanilla sublime for me. Sublime feels like Vim does over a good SSH connection. Its definitely good, but whatever magic terminal emulators use is definitely faster.

[ben-schaaf]

Developer at Sublime HQ here, pleasant surprise to see this stable build reach the front page :)

If you have any questions related to ST or otherwise feel free to ask.

[jokoon]

Please fix the issue on code folding being based on indentation and not syntax. People regularly write on this issue and it's still not fixed.

That's the only thing that stands between me and buying ST.

[masterof0]

Any plan to add support for Remote Development, similar to what VS Code and Jetbrains Gateway offer?

[thiht]

Any plan on developing a database tool? I think it would be a great complement to Sublime Text and Sublime Merge.

I believe Sublime HQ could really bring something in this space, because there are some good existing ones but none are great. Sublime DB could be great :)

[indentit]

Have you had any thoughts about how to improve the indentation engine ST uses to handle the common "switch"/"case" statement style? As I understand, it would mainly require a way to unindent 2 levels at once when typing the closing brace (or just getting it to match the open brace line/position) and for the first `case` to not unindent, just the later ones (which to be fair, may already be possible with some creative meta scoping and tmPreferences fun, though perhaps just not easy to maintain).

e.g.

switch (something) {

    case one:

        return;

    case two:

        foo();

        break;

}

[indentit]

Pretty sure you're the best thing to happen to ST since Will joined the team :)

What's your test suite like? Whenever something is regressed in a dev build, do you try to cover it with tests? Or are the UI side of things not tested in an automated fashion?

What are the plans for matching VSCode's useful features, like the one whereby all syntaxes can inject themselves into Markdown fenced code blocks etc?

It'd be great to see some better SQL syntax highlighting support - I saw a community effort on the Packages repo aiming to address this. Will there be a way to switch "active" sql dialect? Or configure it per project?

[silicon2401]

I'm a huge fan. I've used sublime pretty much since the beginning of my career (switched over after emacs wrecked my hands a few months in). I've switched over to Intellij for java dev because its built in handling of things like going to definitions (cmd+click on my machine) and being able to swipe back to previous locations in the code, as if I were in a browser. Are these features supported in sublime, and if not, are there plans to add them? These navigation features alone would have me back over to sublime, today.

[ilrwbwrkhv]

The lsp typescript package is substantially slower when finding completions than vs code typescript. Even though they are running the same typescript server I imagine. Any ideas why?

[j_crick]

In v4 right now the definitions from packages do not expand automatically, and for ruby/rails, if you type “def” and press Tab, it will select whatever Sublime thinks matches better the pattern def*, and to make function wrapper macro work, I have to just type “d”, then press Tab, it will highlight “def”, then I press Tab again, and only then the macro expands.

In v3 I can type “def”, hit Tab and it works right away.

Are you considering adding the option to change auto-compete behavior to what was in version 3?

[shaicoleman]

Sublime is one of my favorite software - Great UX, super fast, stable and bug free.

Thanks for listening and fixing the issue I've requested (handling files renames/deletes outside Sublime).

The only thing I'd like improved would be syntax-aware code folding, and folding support for Markdown files.

[indentit]

What would you say ST's main weakness is right now, and (how) do SublimeHQ plan to address it?

[sgtnasty]

My question is, how did you make it run exactly the same on all platforms (Windows, macOS, and Linux). No other cross-platform software works as seamless like this.

[melony]

Any plans for native WSL integration similar to VS Code?

[taifun]

I'd love to know when we can move the sidebar to the right side :)

[toastercat]

Add me to the list of folks who choose Sublime over VSCode as their main editor. It is much faster and less bogged down by the inherent bloat of VSCode. I find that I prefer CLI utilities over VSCode extensions anyway, so everything works out in the end.

Also Sublime-LSP is awesome.

[jpe90]

I recently saw there was a new Clojure plugin for Sublime Text called Sublime Clojure by Tonsky: https://github.com/tonsky/sublime-clojure

In his documentation he mentions that he made the plugin in part because he did not want Paredit mandated by a plugin. I was curious to see what kind of structural editing he used instead, so I tuned into one of his streams. Turns out he just writes raw lisp in sublime text, and he's fast as hell at it too.

Since then I've been trying out using Sublime for Clojure development and falling back on Intellij when I need anything more than basic inline/REBL debugging, and I'm very happy with it so far.

[pketh]

everyone's mentioning the speed (as they should), but I also prefer sublimeText for the GUI (or lack thereof). After a decade of using it, the keyboard shortcuts are also hardwired into my soul.

I also started using sublime Merge recently and I think I may feel the same way about it

[umvi]

> After a decade of using it, the keyboard shortcuts are also hardwired into my soul

That used to be my reason for not using VSCode, but then I started using this: https://marketplace.visualstudio.com/items?itemName=ms-vscod...

[kvark]

I have a feeling that the recent move to OpenGL rendering for Sublime was a mistake. I know, we did with Firefox and WebRender as well. And yet, when compiling a heavy project on a modern machine, I can scroll fine in Firefox, but Sublime chugs, becoming unusable. For Sublime, it should be assumed that some code is compiling all the time!

[galfarragem]

That's exactly why I still use Sublime3 on my 10 year old, Win7 laptop. Sublime3 works like a charm. If I didn't mind a "slow" tool, I would use VScode instead.

[ben-schaaf]

OpenGL rendering is only enabled by default on macOS. Perhaps you don't have it enabled?

[kyrra]

What did it use prior to opengl? Is there a blog o anything that talks about that move?

[etothet]

I still use Sublime for when I want to visually edit each line of large text files. I find the performance to be superior to alternatives, but it’s been a while since I’ve done a comparison.

[squeaky-clean]

Sublime is still the best by far if you need to edit a gigabyte large json file or something massive like that.

[kyrra]

I tried sublime this year now that it has an LSP (language server), along with the Go plugin. Maybe it would take more getting used to, but VSCode has done such a great job for coding in. Sublime's project view just wasn't as good either.

I really still like sublime for editing text or log files on my dev system, but not for development.

https://github.com/sublimelsp/LSP

[henning]

I recently tried Sublime again. It feels much snappier and more responsive than VS Code. Very enjoyable to use.

[panta82]

I agree.

I know new engine is supposed to speed up rendering, but on my linux boxes, everything feels slightly slower than before.

Not a big deal for an IDE or IDE light, but for what I use sublime for (quick text editing), it's a disappointing change.

[Daunk]

I love Sublime, but I've always felt like the whole "package" system is a bit of a mess. There's no consistent anywhere either, working with one build system is usually not the same as in the next one. I feel like VS Code does this part a lot better, which is why I use Sublime as a general text browser and VS Code where I do all my serious remote coding.

[dlojudice]

maybe out of nostalgia, I always have Sublime installed on my computer. nowadays if i need a draft for a copy/paste or need to annotate something fast I use Sublime, which is always running. it became something like my advanced notepad

[ChrisMarshallNY]

My general-purpose text editor (and has been, since last century) is BBEdit, but Sublime is also excellent (It handles extra-large text files better, so I use it for them). I use BBEdit because of "muscle memory." TextMate was also a big one, but I never got into it.

VSCode is excellent, but I don't think that I do enough of the kind of coding that VSCode is optimized for, to make it worth it.

[DesiLurker]

I use sublime 3 on my linux dev box all the time & even have paid for it. there is one extremely annoying bug that keeps me periodically switching to other editors out of frustration. It happens when you have multiple desktop panes/workspaces and you are working in say pane 1 but there is a sublime window open in pane 3. now when I say sublime open a file in pane 1 I am suddenly transported to pane 3 and and the file is opened there. this is super frustrating because I lose all my mental context and focus that I now have to reacquire. if anybody from sublime is reading this please fix this ASAP.

[Dma54rhs]

Interesting enough this big or feature is on Windows as well. For some reason Sublime always opens / switches to first desktop no matter what. Really drives me insane.

[zzyzxd]

I live in command line most of the time, but Sublime Text is always my default editor to open any text files in a GUI file manager on any operating system.

When it notified me about the version 4 license change, I was ready to make the purchase. However, it has been a while since then and, besides the "LICENSE UPGRADE REQUIRED" text on the top right corner, I still can't notice any restriction. The current installation still has my license purchased for v2 applied. I just upgraded to build 4126 today and it worked fine. Am I misunderstanding the licensing terms or is this a bug?

[shaicoleman]

There are no restrictions, and you're free to evaluate the software for however long you need.

You're expected to purchase a license if you continue to use the software.

They're just asking nicely instead of crippling their software after an arbitrary time limit.

[kgarten]

Really Like Sublime Text for cross platform work (especially when I need to edit code under windows). Yet, really love Nova https://nova.app/ for mac, super polished.

Though for day to day, i switched to nvim and neovide (rust frontend). Given that, I guess I spent too much money on text editors ...

[pier25]

I used ST 2 and 3 for almost a decade. A couple of months ago I switched to VSCode.

Yes it's slower and clunkier but the extensions ecosystem is worth it. And also features like intellisense, unused vars, automatic updates of imports on file renames, and a long etc of QOL features ST doesn't have interest or capacity in implementing.

[TheFreim]

It's been years since I used sublime text, has anything changed that users have found noteworthy since ~2016?

[gonzus]

I personally favor it because I find it abhorrent to load a bloated electron application to do... text editing, but I also wanted to have some of the niceties of a more modern editor. This is why I am giving it a try (and, so far, liking it).

[strzibny]

I have a license because I have a thing for speed and feel of Sublime. There is nothing like it.

I write my Ruby and Elixir code with it, even if I know I get better experience with other tools.

I wrote my book Deployment from Scratch with Sublime as well.

I sometimes evaluate other editors but so far always returned :).

[ilrwbwrkhv]

I wished sublime text worked well with the typescript ecosystem. For example automatically importing the right file when using a symbol.

[amrox]

Is there any kind of remote development support (ssh, docker) in Sublime? That’s the killer feature that keeps me on VS Code.

[mulcahey]

sublime has had ssh development for many years

[piafraus]

Someone who tried ST3 and sure, it feels a bit better than Notepad++. But it's not $100 worth of better

[tuananh]

this build always freeze on startup for me (pop os 21.10, wayland)

build 4119 works fine though

[ben-schaaf]

I suggest submitting a bug report, under the menu: Help > Report a Bug

[naltun]

Even though I haven't met a Sublime user in a few years, it still must be popular since it's at v4. Last time I checked, Sublime was still proprietary, which is the reason I had skipped using it. I've heard Sublime has some useful features, though. If it's in their interest, I hope they decide liberate / open their source code.

E: misspelling

[hn_throwaway_69]

It's a paid product with a team who need to earn a living wage. It's not like VS Code where the team is bankrolled by a big organisation making its money on other proprietary products.

In light of the above, it makes sense for it to be proprietary and closed source.

Were it open source, people could fork it and distribute it freely, with no remuneration going back to the developers. I doubt the developers could offer any other incentive such as support to make up the shortfall.

"Source available" licences where the user is prohibited from providing the software to others doesn't meet the FSF's definition of freedom, so even that wouldn't please everyone.

[jmull]

As a software developer I prefer to pay for my text editor.

As one of the people supporting it’s continuing existence, I think there will be more focus on what I need. For open source projects, the focus will be (and should be) on what the people putting in the time and money need.

There’s considerable overhead (in terms of optimizing workflows) to switching editors too, so just because an editor is good for today doesn’t mean it will be good tomorrow. Not that proprietary editors can’t change in a way negative for me. I just figure it’s less likely and, over time, will happen less often.

Of course, I could have the perfect editor by doing my own, but it’s orders of magnitudes less effort to pay someone $x. (Personally, I think sublime should go to a subscription model. Pay per release encourages feature bloat, which I do not want in a text editor.)

[dralley]

I use Sublime as my primary editor.

It's just so much faster than every other GUI editor, even VSCode which is "tolerable". I can open multi-gigabyte XML files without bringing my computer to its knees. The extension ecosystem is pretty weak compared to VSCode but it does what I need. And something is just better about the way Sublime renders text. It's easier on the eyes. And the multi-line / multi-cursor editing flow is better.

I still pull out other editors if I need some advanced refactoring or debugging feature but if I can avoid it, I do.

[e-dant]

As of writing there is no disclosure of any particular license on their website for sublime text.

I must have overlooked this. While most of my programming is over ssh with vim, I’ve very much enjoyed Sublime on my own systems. Minimalism and unobtrusiveness has been very appealing to me. Free software is more important, though, so perhaps it’s back to vim, then.

I wish that the Xi editor was maintained more efficiently than it is.

Are you aware of good IDE’s besides vim and emacs? What do you use? I love vim but sometimes I just want something “friendlier” for a change.