Need remote editor

February 10, 2006 11:25 PM

What's a good Windows app for remotely editing files on my hosted server? Currently my method is to hand-code HTML in Notepad then use a custom batch script to FTP it to the server, or to telnet and use pico. Obviously this is horrifically tedious. I'm ready to come out of the 1990s. What's a good, nonbloat Windows app that will help me? Something that will maintain the content locally and upload changed files is be a bonus. Frontpage is bloat and way overkill.
posted by chef_boyardee to Computers & Internet (17 answers total)

UltraEdit will do nice HTML editing, is non-bloated, and will auto-FTP for you.
posted by twiggy at 12:02 AM on February 11, 2006

Ultraedit will directly open the file via FTP (not saving a local copy on your end), which can be nice but is kinda risky.

EditPlus is a bit more lightweight (but still nice and powerful) and also has FTP support (uploading the local file instead of working directly). Personally I prefer EditPlus -- the only reason I use UltraEdit instead is because it supports function collapsing in PHP, and EditPlus doesn't. For your uses I don't think this will be an issue...
posted by neckro23 at 12:20 AM on February 11, 2006

At this point, I'll usually recommend webdrive.
Edit FTP Files like they were local with the editor of your choice.
*sigh*
posted by seanyboy at 12:37 AM on February 11, 2006

why not use rsync (there must be a windows port) and edit locally?
posted by devilsbrigade at 12:43 AM on February 11, 2006

Keep a local copy of everything and then use rsync or unison to propagate the changes. This has the following advantages:

• It's fast to make lots of little edits and see how things look, since you can test your changes locally.
• It's less error prone, since you can get the site in working order before committing it, without any periods where the live site is in the middle of being edited.
• It's quite efficient, since these programs only copy the parts of the files that have changed -- so you can sync a whole tree of files efficiently.
• It's very flexible, since you can edit the files locally using whatever tools you desire: choose any text editor, or use grep/sed for automated modifications, etc.
• As a side effect you get a perfect working backup copy of your whole site in case something happens on the server. You can also use an editor with built-in ftp editing, but opening and saving files this way can take several seconds which can be a pain if you like to make many changes when tweaking something. Also, please don't use unencrypted ftp when sftp, scp, rsync-over-ssh, and other related protocols exist. Plain old ftp puts your login name and password out there in plain text for anyone to see. UltraEdit is nice in that it supports scp with public-key auth, which means you can securely edit remote files without worrying about passwords.

posted by Rhomboid at 1:17 AM on February 11, 2006

oops, forgot that pesky </ul>
posted by Rhomboid at 1:18 AM on February 11, 2006

rsync for windows
posted by ori at 2:13 AM on February 11, 2006

Emacs download for Windows: http://math.claremontmckenna.edu/ALee/emacs/emacs.html or:
Mac: http://homepage.mac.com/zenitani/emacs-e.html
Linux/Other Unix (probably comes bundled)

Now issue the following key-strokes:

ctrl-x ctrl-f

/ftp://username:[e-mail]:/path/to/file/here.html

. Now to find out what you've just done:

ctrl-h ctrl-i ctrl-s tramp [read]

Then to do the emacs tutorial: ctrl-h t (note NOT ctrl-h ctrl-t)

No gain without pain (and you will gain).
posted by singingfish at 2:15 AM on February 11, 2006

I've had great experiences with earlier versions of Macromedia Homesite as a remote web editor. I'm not sure about the synching, but we used to just work directly on the non-local file. There is a free 30-day trial.
posted by john m at 4:19 AM on February 11, 2006

I've been using FileZilla lately. It's your typical FTP client, but you can right-click on any local file and edit it. Nothing fancy, just saves me a few steps.
posted by intermod at 8:24 AM on February 11, 2006

If your hosting provider supports SFTP (which, I hope it does) you could always use WinSCP. You can specify your own editor and when you save the file it will automatically upload it to the server for you as if you were working on a local copy.

It's free. It's secure (straight FTP sends all information, including user/password, in clear text) and it will let you choose whatever editor you want to use.
posted by purephase at 8:25 AM on February 11, 2006

Kudos to WinSCP. I use it exclusively. Fuck FTP.
posted by cellphone at 8:40 AM on February 11, 2006

FileZilla also works great with SFTP
posted by Sharcho at 9:25 AM on February 11, 2006

devilsbrigade/Rhomboid/ori:Do you have any suggestions on learning rsync, whether books, URIs or otherwise? I've heard very good things about rsync -- and I'm not uncomfortable with the occasional command line tinkering -- but I really don't know the first thing about how to use it.
posted by Handcoding at 10:37 AM on February 11, 2006

If you're find with the command line then the man page (see also: FAQ) ought to have pretty much everything you need to get going.

I'm sure there are various front ends available that give a nice GUI but I'm not familiar with any of that.
posted by Rhomboid at 8:46 PM on February 11, 2006

Remotepad (halfway down the page) works well. I'm always looking for stuff like this, so I'll have to check out the others here. Via the excellent resource tinyapps.
posted by condour75 at 9:50 PM on February 11, 2006

(and it's freeware)
posted by condour75 at 9:51 PM on February 11, 2006