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Linux Notepad++ Windows 7

Add “Open with Notepad++” to the Context Menu for All Files in Windows 7

Having the context menu option, “Open with Notepad++” (my favorite FREE Windows text editor) is invaluable, making it easy to quickly and easily open files with just a (right) mouse click or two.

This registry hack is nothing new, it’s been around forever… think of this as a refresher course. Also note that you can use this same technique to substitute any other application that you’d like by adjusting the path in the registry to point to the different editor or to add other “open with” Context Menu options.

Registry Hack
Open regedit.exe and navigate to the following key:

HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT*shell

  • Right-click on “shell” and choose to create a new key, calling it “Open with Notepad++”. 
  • Create a new key below that one called “command”.
  • Double-click on the (Default) value in the right-hand pane and enter in the following:

C:Program Files (x86)Notepad++notepad++.exe %1

NOTE: your path may be different.

The change should take effect immediately.  Now you can right-click on any file and you’ll see the new “Open With Notepad++” menu entry.

Download Registry Hack
Just copy the following and save it to a file with a .reg extension.  Double-click the file and import to your registry.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT*shellOpen With Notepad++]

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT*shellOpen With Notepad++command]
@=”C:\Program Files (x86)\Notepad++\notepad++.exe %1″

NOTE: This will work on previous Windows versions as well – Vista, Windows 2008, Windows 2003, etc.

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FREE Freeware Notepad Replacement Notepad++ notepad++ examples Open Source SourceForge

5 Great Notepad++ Features

Notepad++ is probably the best text editor for Windows – and it’s FREE. It has a huge range of features for working with text files, scripts, HTML files, etc.  Here are some pointers on just a few of those features.

1. Set Language to match your code
One very nice feature of Notepad++ is the ability to color pieces of code. This is very useful when writing C, SQL, HTML or other types of files, allowing you to easily visually distinguish between functions, reserved words, comments, text, and other types of symbols and expressions in your code.

Notepad++ will automatically detect your code based upon the language selected. You can specify the language yourself or Notepad++ will set it based on the file extension.

HTML as text before specifying language.

HTML code after specifying language.

2. Bulk find & replace
If you want to replace a certain entry in your file(s), Notepad++ is the ticket. Not only can it instantly search through all entries in a file, it can search all open files or even all files in a directory (including sub-directories), including, matching only certain file types.

3. Search and replace using regular expressions
When it comes to finding what you want, Notepad++ is not limited to mere words. You can also use powerful regular expression to match dynamic entries. For example, the below search will find (and replace) all tags in the source of HTML files, regardless of the actual image size specified:

Of course, some knowledge of regular expressions is required to use this feature. Not surprisingly, these regular expressions will also serve you well if you dabble in the Linux command line with sed or awk commands.

4. Tidy HTML code

If you’re writing web articles, there’s a fair chance your code will include a bit of unnecessary breaks, misaligned tags and so forth. Notepad++ can Tidy your HTML code.
For example, here is some unformatted text:

Which we want to format with HTML:

5. Save all open files
While this may not sound too exciting, imagine you have several open files – Notepad++ behaves like Firefox in this regard and opens documents in tabs – each one changed after you ran a bulk find & replace earlier. Saving them one by one can be tedious. Notepad++ saves you the hassle. You can save all open files at once.

Similarly, you can close them all at once.

Conclusion

Notepad++ is an extremely powerful and useful tool. We only scratched the surface on its features. With Notepad++ you can use macros or function completion, compare documents, export files to other formats, and a whole lot more.

Notepad++ also has many useful plugins and it comes in a portable version.

More on Notepad++

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Notepad++ notepad++ examples SourceForge

The Power of Regular Expression: use in notepad++

Check out this SlideShare Presentation:

The Power of Regular Expression: use in notepad++

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Administration BareTail Encryption FREE FTP Grep Linux Notepad++ SSH Utility Windows

32 FREE Windows Administration Utilities

  1. BareTail. A free real-time log file monitoring tool.
  2. CamStudio. Free screen recording software.
  3. CDBurnerXP. Burns CD-ROMs, DVDs, audio CDs, and ISO images.
  4. Comodo Firewall Pro. Is a firewall and antivirus application.
  5. DriveImage XML. Is a program for imaging and backing up partitions and logical drives.
  6. FileZilla. GUI FTP client.
  7. GParted LiveCD. Manages partitions on systems.
  8. InfraRecorder. Burns ISO images and creates data and audio CDs and DVDs.
  9. Lansweeper. Is a network inventory tool that performs hardware scanning, software scanning, and Active Directory (AD) reporting.
  10. LocatePC. Emails you whenever any private or public IP address in your system changes – great for tracking a stolen computer.
  11. MyDefrag (formerly JkDefrag). Defragments and optimizes disks.
  12. Nessus (formerly NeWT). Network/computer vulnerability scanner.
  13. Ngrep. Is a packet sniffer based on finding matching text strings.
  14. Notepad++. Is a text and code editor (more info).
  15. NTFS Undelete. Recovers deleted files that are no longer in the recycle bin.
  16. Open Computers and Software Inventory (OCS Inventory NG). Provides detailed inventory data for an entire network of computers as well as deploys packages.
  17. OpenSSH. Creates secure, encrypted shell sessions.
  18. PageDefrag. Determines how fragmented your paging files and registry hives are, and defragments them.
  19. Paint.NET. Free image and photo editing software for Windows.
  20. PING (Partimage Is Not Ghost) — Backup and Restore Disk Partitions.
  21. PRTG Traffic Grapher. Is a powerful network monitor.
  22. System Information for Windows (SIW). Gathers detailed information about a computer’s system properties, settings, and displays.
  23. TestDisk. Recovers damaged partitions, makes non-bootable disks bootable again, and repairs damaged boot sectors.
  24. TrueCrypt.  Free open-source disk encryption software for Windows 7/Vista/XP, Mac OS X, and Linux.
  25. WinDirStat. Determines how space is being utilized across disks and visually represents the results in multiple ways.
  26. WinPE (Windows Preinstallation Environment). Lets you make a Windows command-line boot recovery DVD.
  27. WinDump. WinDump is the Windows version of tcpdump, the command line network analyzer for UNIX / Linux.
  28. Winfingerprint. Is a network scanner.
  29. Wink. Builds screencast recordings.
  30. WireShark (formerly Ethereal). Network protocol analyzer.
  31. XML Notepad. Is a specialized XML editor.
  32. ZoomIt. Magnifies portions of a screen and lets you draw on and annotate the screen.
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Freeware FTP Linux Notepad Replacement Notepad++ Utility Windows

Notepad++ – source code editor for Windows (FreeWare)

Notepad++ is a source code editor for Windows. It is distributed as free software. The project is hosted on SourceForge.net, from where it has been downloaded over sixteen million times.[1]

This project, based on the Scintilla editor component, is written in C++ with only Win32 API calls using only the STL in order to increase performance and reduce program size. The aim of Notepad++ is to reduce overall power consumption by using efficient binaries that require less CPU power.[2]

Notepad++ is available only for the Microsoft Windows operating system. However, users can still get Notepad++ to work on other platforms like Linux and Mac OS X, using software such as Wine.

Programming languages
Notepad++ supports syntax highlighting and syntax folding for 48 programming, scripting, and markup languages.[2] It attempts to automatically detect the language that a given file uses, using a modifiable list of file extension bindings. Users may also manually set the current language, overriding the extension’s default language. The program also supports autocompletion for a subset of the API of some programming languages.

Users can also define their own language (for syntax highlighting) and its respective API (for autocompletion) by using the built-in User Language Define System.[2] Users may configure the syntax highlighting’s font styles per element, per language, and the resulting formatted script may be printed in full-color (WYSIWYG). Additionally, Notepad++ displays indent guidelines when source code is indented with tab characters, and highlights closing braces, brackets and tags.

Some of its features include:

  • Auto-completion (language and file)
  • Bookmarks
  • Syntax highlighting (and brace and indent highlighting)
  • Drag-and-drop
  • File status auto-detection
  • Regular expression find and replace
  • Split screen editing (“View/Clone”) and synchronized scrolling
  • Zooming
  • Spell checker (requires Aspell)
  • Tabbed document interface
  • FTP Browser (plug-in included in standard installation)
  • Support for various file formats including unicode.
  • Find and replace text or text strings of text over multiple documents simultaneously.

Although Scintilla does not support multiline regular expression search and replace, Notepad++ does contain support for plugins which help mitigate this fact.

Notepad++ home page
Notepad++ download

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Notepad++ notepad++ examples Windows

Notepad++ : start using a real text editor

Notepad++ : start using a real text editor
Have you ever used Notepad? It’s very simple, which is good. However, it lacks the power and features of more advanced text editors.
Notepad++ is a free and very powerful text editor. Here are some Notepad++ features:

  • Syntax Highlighting and Syntax Folding
  • Print text in color
  • User Defined Syntax Highlighting
  • Auto-completion
  • Edit several documents at the same time
  • Synchronized scrolling between two documents
  • Regular Expression Search/Replace
  • Full Drag ‘N’ Drop support
  • Zoom in and zoom out
  • Place bookmarks in the text
  • Macro recording and playback

For more details, check out the Notepad++ homepage.

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Notepad++ notepad++ examples Regular Expression Windows

Notepad++: A guide to using regular expressions and extended search mode

The information in this post will benefit anyone looking to understand how to use Notepad++ extended search mode and regular expressions.

Notepad++ is an excellent text editor and replacement to Microsoft’s notepad.exe.

Since the release of version 4.9, the Notepad++ Find and Replace commands have been updated. It now has a new Extended search mode that allows you to search for tabs(t), newline(rn), and a character by its value (o, x, b, d, t, n, r and \). Unfortunately, the Notepad++ documentation is lacking in its description of these new capabilities. These slides by Anjesh Tuladhar on regular expressions in Notepad++ is very useful.

One of the major disadvantages of using regular expressions in Notepad++ was that it did not handle the newline character well — especially in Replace. Now, we can use Extended search mode to make up for this shortcoming. Together, Extended and Regular Expression search modes give you the power to search, replace and reorder your text in ways that were not previously possible in Notepad++.

In the Find (Ctrl+F) and Replace (Ctrl+H) dialogs, the three available search modes are specified in the bottom left corner. Select your desired search mode.

Example 1: For this example let’s remove all lines that begin with a certain character, for example the exclamation point.

Open the Search & Replace dialog box (Ctrl+H) and select the Regular Expression search mode.

  • Find what: [!].*
  • Replace with: (leave this blank)

Press Replace All. All the error messages are gone.

Explanation:

  • [!] finds the exclamation character.
  • .* selects the rest of the line.

Example 2: Remove all blank lines.

Switch to Extended search mode in the Replace dialog.

  • Find what: rnrn
  • Replace with: (leave this blank)

Press Replace All and all the blank lines will be removed.

Explanation:

  • rn is a newline character (in Windows).
  • rnrn finds two newline characters (what you get from pressing Enter twice).

Example 3: Put each Item on a new line.

Switch to Regular Expression search mode.

  • Find what: (+.*)(Item)
  • Replace with: 1rn2

Press Replace All. “Item”s have been placed on new lines.

Explanation:

  • + finds the + character.
  • .* selects the text after the + up until the word “Item”.
  • Item finds the string “Item”.
  • () allow us to access whatever is inside the parentheses. The first set of parentheses may be accessed with 1 and the second set with 2.
  • 1rn2 will take + and whatever text comes after it, will then add a new line, and place the string “Item” on the new line.

Example 4: Delete duplicate or redundant information.

Remove all newline characters using Extended search mode, replacing them with a unique string of text that we will use as a signpost for redundant data later in RegEx. Choose a string of text that does not appear in your file — I have chosen RegEx_Example.

Switch to Extended search mode in the Replace dialog.

  • Find what: rn
  • Replace with: RegEx_Example

Press Replace All. All the newline characters are gone. Your entire file is now one very long line of text.

Using our RegEx_Example signpost keyword, let’s separate the different values.

Stay in Extended search mode.

  • Find what: ,
  • Replace with: ,RegEx_Example

Press Replace All. Now, RegEx_Example appears after every comma.

Example 5: Put the remaining Items on new lines.

Switch to Regular Expression search mode.

  • Find what: RegEx_Example(Item)
  • Replace with: rn1

Press Replace All. All “Item”s should now be on new lines.

Example 6: Get rid of duplicate entries.

  • Find what: RegEx_Example ([^A-Za-z]*)RegEx_Example [^A-Za-z]*,RegEx_Example
  • Replace with: 1,

Press Replace All and all duplicate entries will be removed.

Explanation:

  • A-Z finds all letters of the alphabet in upper case.
  • a-z finds all lower case letters.
  • A-Za-z will find all alphabetic characters.
  • [^…] is the inverse. So, if we put these three together: [^A-Za-z] finds any character except an alphabetic character.
  • Notice that only one of the [^A-Za-z] is in parentheses (). This is recalled by 1 in the Replace with field. The characters outside of the parentheses are discarded.

Example 7: Let’s get rid of all those RegEx_Examples.

  • Find what: RegEx_Example
  • Replace with: (leave blank)

Press Replace All. The RegEx_Examples are gone.

Example 8: Separate each entry’s data from the next.

  • Find what: (***)
  • Replace with: rnrn1rnrn

Press Replace All. The final product is a beautiful, comma-delimited file that is ready to be imported into Excel for further analysis.

Notepad++ rocks!

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notepad++ documentation

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Notepad++ notepad++ examples Regular Expression Windows

Remove Blank Lines in a Document With Notepad++ With Extended Search Mode

Switch to Extended search mode in the Replace dialog.

Find what: rnrn

Replace with: (leave this blank)

Press Replace All. All the blank lines are gone.

* rn is a newline character (in Windows).

* rnrn finds two newline characters (what you get from pressing Enter twice).