Bespin is an experimental in-browser text/source-editor created by Mozilla Labs. Using any modern web browser (that means no IE, obviously), you can edit your projects from any computer, or with the added flexibility of the web - such as online collaboration, decentralisation, and extensibility. Read more for Kroc's review.
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Member since:
2005-07-08
I agree with the problems of using a text editor that is inside the browser, but some of the problems can be easily overcome with minor tweaks.
Many shortcuts already used:
I am sure the webpage can override some of the shortcuts used by the browser. For eg: Gmail overrides the '/' with its mail search instead of Firefox's browser search.
Memory usage:
This will be a real problem and I don't see a way around it.
Screen real-estate:
Full-screen mode in the browser will get rid all the browser elements and leave you will a full-screen Bespin.
Stability (TextMate never crashes)
TextMate never crashes ANYMORE.... I am sure we can overcome the stability problem in time.
I had always wanted an online code editor with syntax highlighting and some rudimentary form of project management. The most important feature that I am looking forward to is their collaboration feature which is planned for their future release.
If all else fails and you really want to run it from your desktop instead of a browser there is always Mozilla labs' prism http://labs.mozilla.com/projects/prism/
Edited 2009-02-13 23:46 UTC
Member since:2007-09-22
I really like the idea of Bespin, I've had similair thoughts and even started creating a login-screen for it, but never found a good starting point for the editor (and time).
Any issues people have with this, as the parent poster already mentioned, are mostly solved by the other Mozillla project Prism.
It solves most of the issues keyboard-shortcuts, browser-stability, access to local files, etc.
They are all options that can be enabled/disabled in Prism on a per application/website basis.
The only problems I see is, that they are not ready yet. ;-) Bespin is Alpha en Prism is beta if I'm not mistaken.
I think this is what our customers have already had for years (a webbased CMS), but this time for webdevelopers (and they don't use IE, so that solves that problem if anyone should complain about that).
Member since:
2005-07-01
Is the following what you meant?
browser -url="http://editor.example.com/?localfile=%22myfile.txt%22"
Obviously then the browser needs to ask for permission for the website's JavaScript to read the contents of the file.
Much the same sort of thing should work with opening email links in webmail but, as you say, it hasn't happened much. Goodness only knows why. Enough extension writers manage to get it working.
Member since:
2007-10-26
Member since:2005-07-08
I created an accnt this morning and I was able to login just fine. I created a new login just now to check and I am not able to login as well, I see the same error that you are seeing. It could be a temporary thing.. they might be working on it. I've sent an email to their google groups to notify them, lets see if it gets fixed soon.
Member since:
2006-02-28
Member since:2005-11-10
Member since:2006-02-28
I guess these particular things don't sound like problems, because they 'just work' for me. True, an in-browser editor *will* have problems. Browsers are slowly evolving to better support web apps, but they still have a long way to go.
Of course, there's always Java Web Start, but it doesn't get any love.
Member since:
2005-07-06
I think that's one of the (many) reasons why contact forms have largely superseded mailto: links. Of course, that doesn't fix the problem if you get a mailto link inside an EMail message.
That's what SSH and command-line text editors are for
Member since:2007-09-22
Member since:2009-02-14
I love command line ... (work on linux every day and so...)
and ...
I can use Photoshop fluently ... (with virtualbox)
my non-static "web apps" are xhtml strict compliant,
i work with agencies every day, and i care about semantic, and because you noticed English is not my native language ( Frenchy ;-) ), i can assure you that with a brain, a lot is possible...
Member since:
2005-07-12
Utterly impractical... Interesting solely as an exploration of what is possible.
Though the ugly colors that seem to have been intentionally chosen to make cleartype look bad is kind of strange.
Also find it odd there's zero support for Opera... but of course it's a HTML 5 demo - Go gecko implementing new crap when they still have decade old CSS2 and HTML4 errors listed in bugzilla!
Member since:
2007-05-12