Some Lagniappe for You
By Tiny Ruisch
la·gniappe (lnyp, ln-yp)
n. Chiefly Southern Louisiana & Mississippi
1. A small gift presented by a store owner to a customer with the customer’s purchase.
2. An extra or unexpected gift or benefit. Also called regionally boot.
Notepad has been been Microsoft’s default text editor since before there was Windows. It hasn’t changed much over the years. Although the program does an effective job of editing text, there are hundreds of alternatives.
My default note editor is LopeEdit, a powerful programmer’s editor and a replacement of Windows Notepad. It has tabs to select between open files, supports syntax highlighting of multiple programing languages and incorporates a built in hexadecimal editor.
For most people, the programmers attributes are likely to be overkill. The other features of LopeEdit make it worth the download. It comes with a built-in file browser, allowing you to locate and open the files you need. A versatile tabbed interface means you are able to open multiple documents simultaneously. There is an excellent search, find and replace tool. You can send the results of your search to a separate tab. This means there is no need to scroll all the way through a lengthy document to find all your hits because they are all neatly presented in a single list.
There are many other features including detailed statistics on the current document (lines, words, characters, etc.) A File > Send To menu which which sends your document via email.
Finally, there is a customizable tool bar with many more functions and options than you will probably ever use. LopeEdit come in both a free and paid version. The Pro version mostly adds functions that are useful for programmers. A portable version is also available. You can download LopeEdit here. Give it a try. I think you’ll like it.
If you like the program, just tell everyone that you’ve got a SWLAPCUG extra, a bonus perk, a small gift, a present from the club: a little lagniappe.