Mac Apps

[vincent]

I recently got a Mac like a month ago (I was a long time PC user). I was wondering what you guys thought of certain web dev apps.

Coda – I know a lot of people use Coda and everyone loves it, so this would probably be the one I buy. I like the Books section.
Espresso – I’ve been reading about this, some people say it’s better, and of course some don’t.

CSSEdit – What is the point of buying this if you have Coda or Espresso?
TextMate – What is the point of buying this if you have Coda or Espresso?

Which full app do you prefer (Coda or Espresso)? Why compared to the alternative? I hear a lot of good talk about CSSEdit and TextMate, but I don’t really get why someone would also have these. Is TextMate an alternative to Coda or Espresso?

Thanks!

EDIT: I currently have Dreamweaver. I’m not going to rag on Dreamweaver or anything, I just want to explore Mac Apps since that’s the main reason I got a Mac :D It seemed like the Mac App community was like the Firefox community, there are tons of add-ons/extensions for everything and forums for everything. Dreamweaver has a ton of things I never use. I like the fact that if you find a bug, it doesn’t take a year to get fixed (not that it’s Adobe’s fault, it’s just they have a lot on their plate). Mac Apps seem like small businesses. Small businesses always have better support :)

[Matt]

I use Espresso now. Also, I use VirtualBox + Windows XP for testing in a Windows environment. That or I just reboot, but w/e.

[vincent]

Yeah, I’ve been thinking about a Windows solution. I have a POS Toshiba laptop that I use now… I like the idea of running Windows on my Mac though. Can’t your stuff get contaminated or something by viruses though? Since, even though Macs aren’t susceptible to Windows viruses, they can still carry them.

I might see if Espresso has a trial or something.

EDIT: Well, I downloaded the trial of Espresso and got like 3 errors in the first 5 minutes :( It looks really nice and I like the right side with the structure and stuff… but damn. I used the New Tag or whatever button at the top and attempted to change the "tag" highlighted text and I got an error, then sent an error report. Then, I tried to delete the tag text and got a giant error that froze me up for a minute until I finally force quit :(

[Matt]

"vincent" wrote:

Yeah, I’ve been thinking about a Windows solution. I have a POS Toshiba laptop that I use now… I like the idea of running Windows on my Mac though. Can’t your stuff get contaminated or something by viruses though? Since, even though Macs aren’t susceptible to Windows viruses, they can still carry them.

I might see if Espresso has a trial or something.

EDIT: Well, I downloaded the trial of Espresso and got like 3 errors in the first 5 minutes :( It looks really nice and I like the right side with the structure and stuff… but damn. I used the New Tag or whatever button at the top and attempted to change the "tag" highlighted text and I got an error, then sent an error report. Then, I tried to delete the tag text and got a giant error that froze me up for a minute until I finally force quit :(

Viruses can’t spread from its Virtual Disk or Virtual Partition (how BootCamp works). As for Espresso, bad luck there mate. I’ve personally never had any problems, but TextMate and Coda come incredibly close to Espresso anyhow, so I don’t see a big deal in it.

[vincent]

Is TextMate an alternative to Coda or Espresso, or is it just for text editing?

[Matt]

"vincent" wrote:

Is TextMate an alternative to Coda or Espresso, or is it just for text editing?

I guess alternative. It’s just a standard text editor with code-completion (like closing brackets) and syntax-highlighting.

[subq]

"vincent" wrote:

CSSEdit – What is the point of buying this if you have Coda or Espresso?
TextMate – What is the point of buying this if you have Coda or Espresso?

Which full app do you prefer (Coda or Espresso)? Why compared to the alternative? I hear a lot of good talk about CSSEdit and TextMate, but I don’t really get why someone would also have these. Is TextMate an alternative to Coda or Espresso?

Coda and Espresso are similar, Coda has a built in CSS editor though.

Textmate is completely different as it is a full fledged text editor, I use it for just simple text tasks and programming tasks, not just web dev.

I would classify Coda and Espresso as an IDE with a note that Espresso isn’t complete IMO since CSSEdit is its better half. :)

CSSEdit does one thing, CSS

So to summarize, owning Textmate in addition to any of the others is completely acceptable and not necessarily a duplication of function.

I will add that I wish macrabbit would get its act together because I think a complete IDE with Espresso/CSSEdit integration would be nice. I would still own Textmate though.

[Author]

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