Now Windows’ only built-in text editor, there’s more room for Notepad to grow.

  • hperrin@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    The entire point of Notepad was that it didn’t have fancy features, it just edited text files. They got rid of Wordpad, and now they’re gonna turn Notepad into Wordpad.

    • admiralteal@kbin.social
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      7 months ago

      The entire reason notepad still exists is that it edits and saves to plain text files. I do not see how an opt-in spellcheck or autocorrect interferes with that – though honestly, I don’t see who the possible customer is for those features either. It’s a waste of time, but it doesn’t undermine the application.

      What reason, honestly, did Wordpad have to exist? Who was clamoring for an RTF editor but thought any of the free the full-featured ODF editors or online service a la Google docs were not up to the task? Seems a lot of people are salty that Wordpad was dropped, but I just don’t get who was using it. This from someone so frustrated and annoyed by pretty much all WYSIWYG doc editors that I’ve lately been doing more stuff in latex despite how irrational I know I am being.

      • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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        7 months ago

        I found it useful occasionally for a pretty niche use case. I automated generating documents with a program I wrote, then cleaned it up a bit in Wordpad before sending it on.

        That’s about as niche as you can get, but I wonder if it’s not too uncommon. RTF is easy to generate programmatically, and it’s pretty widely supported across various platforms. I have since moved on, but maybe others haven’t.

      • AnUnusualRelic@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        RTF has to be one of the most atrocious document formats. It’s such a jumbled mess, it should be buried and forgotten. You can make it clean but of course Microsoft doesn’t.

      • ares35@kbin.social
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        7 months ago

        but I just don’t get who was using it.

        way more than you realize. i’ve been supporting home users and small businesses for thirty years. i run into wordpad users frequently.

    • umbrella@lemmy.ml
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      7 months ago

      i think its tasteful to have a couple QOL features like code highlighting, tabs, spellchecking etc.

      i didnt notice this until i went back from gedit to notepad the other day

  • ares35@kbin.social
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    7 months ago

    wordpad gets kicked to the curb because microsoft thinks they can sell a few more office subscriptions if the most basic of word processors wasn’t included with windows.

    meanwhile. notepad, the basic text editor that lacks even the basic formatting features found in wordpad, gets the spellchecker users have wanted in wordpad since windows write for windows 1.0

    • po-lina-ergi@kbin.social
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      7 months ago

      I suspect it was more likely that nobody used wordpad because, well, why would you? So supporting it is more pain than it’s worth.

      I don’t think the wordpad to office pipeline represents quite the cashflow you’re implying

      • ares35@kbin.social
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        7 months ago

        wordpad has always been gimped to keep it from taking any sales away from word. if microsoft wasn’t worried about wordpad, they would have tossed a spellchecker into it back in the 1990s (when wordpad replaced write) and it would, ya know… still exist (in upcoming versions of windows).

  • Kethal@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    What is going on at Microsoft? Did anyone ask for this? How about they make search work again and not use 4 Gb just turn turn on the computer?

  • Zier@fedia.io
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    7 months ago

    You’ll never be the Kate Text Editor! MS just likes to copy others.

  • flappy@lemm.ee
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    7 months ago

    Protip: Cudatext is open source, portable, and cross-platform

    • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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      7 months ago

      That also fits for Linux, and Linux often comes with much more capable text editors. If you want an awesome text editor, Linux is your friend.

      That said, if you just want a basic text editor (which I’m guessing is 99% of people), Notepad works.

  • AutoTL;DR@lemmings.worldB
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    7 months ago

    This is the best summary I could come up with:


    Whatever else you can say about Windows 11—and whatever you think about its pushy tendencies and the Copilot feature that has been rolled out to pretty much everyone despite being labeled a “preview”—the operating system has ushered in a bit of a renaissance for decades-old built-in apps like Paint and Notepad.

    An updated version of Notepad currently rolling out to Windows Insiders in the Canary and Dev channels is adding two more modern features to the old app: spellcheck and autocorrect.

    Per usual, spellcheck in Notepad highlights misspellings with red squiggly underlines, and right-clicking the word or pressing Shift + F10 will pop up a short menu of suggested fixes.

    If you’re upgrading from the Windows 10 version of Notepad, the spellcheck and autocorrect features join the tabbed interface, redesigned Settings screen, an auto-resume feature, and a handful of other tricks that the app has learned throughout Windows 11’s development.

    Unlike Notepad, WordPad had been mostly left alone since a Windows 7-era refresh that added a user interface ribbon like the one in the (then-current) Office 2007 update.

    Updates to Notepad and other apps could roll out before then, though, in keeping with Microsoft’s “release them when they’re ready” approach to feature additions in the Windows 11 era.


    The original article contains 458 words, the summary contains 208 words. Saved 55%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!

        • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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          7 months ago

          Nothing, but laughing at your own jokes is a bit… odd.

          If I comment on my own post, it’s because I have an opinion about it that I want separated from the post to have a separate thread of discussion. This isn’t that.

          • Ephera@lemmy.ml
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            7 months ago

            It’s not their own joke, though. Microsoft is making the joke. Expressing that you find it laughable rather than taking it serious, that is an expression of an opinion.

            • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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              7 months ago

              It is an opinion, but it doesn’t drive additional discussion so it should just be put into the post body.

              I would only top comment on a post I made if I’m asking a question and want to provide my own answer for discussion’s sake.