Files and tabs
Opening files
- File > Open… (Ctrl+O) opens one or more files; select several in the dialog to open them all.
- File > Open Recent lists the last 12 files you had open. Clear Recent Files at the bottom empties the list.
- Drag files from your file manager onto the window.
- Pass them on the command line:
ettin-edit notes.txt todo.md(see the command line). - On Windows, right-click a file and choose Edit with Ettin Edit, if you turned that on when installing.
- In the folder workspace, click a file.
A file opened while the only tab is an untouched new one replaces that tab, so you don't collect empty tabs.
Ettin Edit works out each file's encoding and line endings and its language as it opens it, and keeps them when you save. Very large files are fine: a 50 MB log opens in about a second, and word wrap keeps up when you resize the window.
One window or several
By default there is one Ettin Edit window. Opening a file from your file
manager or a terminal while Ettin Edit is running sends it to the open window
instead of starting a second copy. To get separate windows, turn off
Settings > Single Window, or start Ettin Edit with --multi-instance.
New files
File > New (Ctrl+N) or the + at the end of the tabs opens an empty tab named new 1, new 2 and so on. Its line ending, encoding and language come from Preferences > New Documents.
Saving
| Command | Shortcut | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| File > Save | Ctrl+S | Saves the current tab. A new tab asks for a name. |
| File > Save As… | Ctrl+Alt+S | Saves under a new name; the tab then shows that file. |
| File > Save All | Ctrl+Shift+S | Saves every tab with changes. |
The file keeps its encoding, line endings and byte-order mark. If the text holds a character the file's encoding can't store, Ettin Edit refuses to save and tells you which character it is, rather than quietly losing it. Pick another encoding from the Encoding menu and save again.
XML files can be checked for mistakes every time they're saved; see XML Tools.
Tabs
- Click a tab to switch to it, or use Ctrl+Tab / Ctrl+Shift+Tab (also Ctrl+PageDown / Ctrl+PageUp) for the next and previous tab.
- Drag a tab to move it along the tab bar.
- Close a tab with its ×, a middle-click, or Ctrl+W. File > Close All (Ctrl+Shift+W) and File > Close Others close the rest.
- Pin Tab (right-click a tab) keeps a tab at the front with a pin on it. Close All and Close Others leave pinned tabs open, and the × on a pinned tab unpins it instead of closing it.
- Closing a tab with unsaved changes asks whether to save them.
The tab's right-click menu
| Command | What it does |
|---|---|
| Close, Close Others | Close this tab, or every other one |
| Pin Tab / Unpin Tab | See above |
| Move to Other View, Clone to Other View | See split view |
| Reload from Disk | Read the file again, replacing what's in the tab (Undo brings your version back) |
| Rename… | Rename the file on disk; the tab follows it |
| Move to Trash… | Move the file to the Recycle Bin or trash and close the tab |
| Open Containing Folder | Show the file in your file manager, selected where possible |
| Open Terminal Here | Open a terminal in the file's folder |
| Copy Full Path, Copy File Name | Copy them to the clipboard |
The file commands are also in the File menu, for the current tab. Open
Terminal Here uses Windows Terminal or cmd on Windows; on Linux it tries
$TERMINAL, then common terminals such as Konsole and GNOME Terminal.
You won't lose your work
Ettin Edit backs up unsaved changes every few seconds, including tabs that were never saved. If Ettin Edit, your computer or the power goes away, your tabs and their changes are back next time you start it.
When you quit, Ettin Edit remembers the open tabs, unsaved changes included, without asking, and reopens everything next time: each tab's caret, encoding, line ending, language, pin, read-only state and the split view. If you'd rather be asked to save each file when quitting, turn off Settings > Remember Unsaved Changes on Exit. To start with no tabs from last time, turn off Reopen the files that were open last time in Preferences.
When another program changes the file
If a file you have open is changed by another program, a bar appears above the text:
- Reload reads the new version. If you had unsaved changes, Undo brings them back.
- Keep My Version leaves your text alone; saving will overwrite the other program's changes.
If the file is deleted or moved, the bar offers Keep Open, which keeps the text in the tab so you can save it again, or Close.
To reload changed files without being asked, turn on Settings > Reload Files Changed on Disk Automatically. It only reloads files that have no unsaved changes in Ettin Edit.
Read-only tabs
Edit > Read-Only stops a tab from being changed by accident. The status bar shows Read-only; click it, or choose the command again, to allow editing.
Summary
View > Summary… shows the file's full path, when it was created and changed, its encoding, and how many characters, words and lines it has, plus its size on disk and the same counts for the selection.