Free, Open Source, TextPad Replacement!

I have been searching for a replacement for TextPad for a LONGTIME now, and I think I have finally found it. It is the Scintilla based SciTE. My criteria was a little tough. I wanted a free, preferrably open source, multi-platform (Linux, Windows, & Mac), light weight text editor to replace Notepad that comes with Windows that could highlight code in a lot of languages. I also wanted something that was highly customizable and scriptable. ScitTE meets all of those I think. It natively comes as source code that needs to be compiled. However, I downloaded a pre-compiled Windows executable wrapped in an installer from the download page (the one "contributed by Bruce Dodson.") Another nice feature is that it can be run from a single executable file if need be. I have been using it for a couple of days now, and I haven't run across anything that it can't do that I was used to doing in TextPad. It's learning curve is a little steeper than TextPad, but it is well documented. It's options are contolled by four different options files. This may seem a little daunting, but it is really a clever way to have a hierarchy of options in more complex situations. From a cursory glance it seems to be a very intelligent approach. I wasted no time in setting several preferences in the "User Options File". One nice thing about this is that it is easy to port your preferances from machine to machine. The only thing I have found to be hard was associating my file types to SciTE in Windows. This is the only thing that seemed to do the trick: Go to Start Menu -> Control Panel -> Folder Options -> File Types (tab), highlight or add your extension. You may or may not have an "Advanced" button on the lower right side of the box, if you don't have one, click the "Restore" button. Then you should have an "Advanced" button. Click it. Under "Actions" click "edit". In the box labeled "Application to perform action:" paste (or whatever your path to SciTE.exe is in double quotes followed by the "%1" again in double quotes): "C:\Program Files\Scintilla Text Editor\SciTE.exe" "%1" (include all of the double quotes in the above string) That should do it. It is the only solution I could get to work. I have been loving SciTE for the last couple of days, and best of all it is free!