Text with a twist
July 31, 2010 7:33 AM Subscribe
I want to find software to handle either plain text or RTF text, with a twist.
Instead of storing the text items within its database, this software displays the text from discrete files located on the hard drive. If a file is edited, the editing would be saved in the discrete files.
I know I have seen this somewhere, but I cannot relocate it. It was, as I recall, built on a tree interface.
Windows or Mac, as I swing both ways.
Instead of storing the text items within its database, this software displays the text from discrete files located on the hard drive. If a file is edited, the editing would be saved in the discrete files.
I know I have seen this somewhere, but I cannot relocate it. It was, as I recall, built on a tree interface.
Windows or Mac, as I swing both ways.
I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for but Diri provides a very simple web interface for editing discrete bits of text in a tree structure which is mapped to a directory tree with text files.
posted by enn at 7:45 AM on July 31, 2010
posted by enn at 7:45 AM on July 31, 2010
PMWiki is a wiki with hierarchy of sites and it stores its data it operating system flat files.
posted by mmascolino at 7:54 AM on July 31, 2010
posted by mmascolino at 7:54 AM on July 31, 2010
You really need to clarify what you're after, because it sounds like you're looking for basically every editor ever written.
posted by jjb at 8:21 AM on July 31, 2010
posted by jjb at 8:21 AM on July 31, 2010
Response by poster: Clarifying: a file under Treepad might have three "nodes". If you save it as "one.tpl", that is where the text is found.
With this software, each item or "node" is saved as a separate text file. That way, the text files can also be used outside that software's environment. The software is just a container to pretty up the display of the text files.
posted by yclipse at 9:02 AM on July 31, 2010
With this software, each item or "node" is saved as a separate text file. That way, the text files can also be used outside that software's environment. The software is just a container to pretty up the display of the text files.
posted by yclipse at 9:02 AM on July 31, 2010
Maybe the Emacs mode, Org, will do what you're looking for.
posted by topynate at 9:50 AM on July 31, 2010
posted by topynate at 9:50 AM on July 31, 2010
What kind of text is it you want to edit and display? Treepad looks like some kind of PIM thing? Is that what you want?
posted by RustyBrooks at 9:51 AM on July 31, 2010
posted by RustyBrooks at 9:51 AM on July 31, 2010
Best answer: I think what you are looking for is the (Previously mentioned on the Blue) Mac application Notational Velocity.
Just make sure you set your preferences to use text files instead of a database.
posted by 47triple2 at 11:06 AM on July 31, 2010
Just make sure you set your preferences to use text files instead of a database.
posted by 47triple2 at 11:06 AM on July 31, 2010
Sounds like you need a version control, or revision control package. If you Google those terms, there seem to be a lot of packages out there.
posted by Susurration at 4:17 PM on July 31, 2010
posted by Susurration at 4:17 PM on July 31, 2010
Just FYI, KeepNote comes close, by storing its text as separate HTML files in folders even though its GUI presents an overall hierarchical tree view. It does let you do rich text kinds of things (fonts, bullets, images, etc.) but implements those things as HTML instead of "rtf". It is written in Python and available for Windows, Mac and Linux.
posted by forthright at 9:25 PM on July 31, 2010
posted by forthright at 9:25 PM on July 31, 2010
Response by poster: Submitting a just-found answer to my own question: DevonThink, a Mac product, also does this.
posted by yclipse at 7:20 PM on August 10, 2010
posted by yclipse at 7:20 PM on August 10, 2010
This thread is closed to new comments.
Just about every text editor ever works from files on the disk. You make a change, it's saved to the disk.
You would need to look very hard for a desktop text editor that uses a database.
Perhaps the tree thing is just the file browser?
posted by Netzapper at 7:44 AM on July 31, 2010