Significant Upgrade Provides Major Interface Overhaul, Now With Ruby,
SQL and YAML Language Support and Much, Much More
BEDFORD, Mass. – Sept. 7, 2006 – Bare Bones Software today announced
the release and immediate availability of BBEdit 8.5, a significant
upgrade to the award-winning HTML and text editor for the Macintosh.
With more than 160 new features and improvements, BBEdit 8.5
represents a major interface overhaul for this time-tested and widely
respected product. The changes are designed to streamline navigation
and ease discovery of BBEdit’s powerful feature set.
“BBEdit is a mature and deeply capable product,” explained Rich
Siegel, founder and CEO of Bare Bones Software, Inc. “As such, we
have to constantly consider the question of how to maintain and
enhance its feature set, choosing only well-conceived, attractively
presented features which serve the goal of increasing our customers’
productivity. For BBEdit 8.5, we’ve taken a huge leap forward in
interface polish and usability, increasing the potential for our
customers to be more productive than ever.”
BBEdit 8.5 introduces code folding, which aids comprehension of
complex files by allowing the customer to collapse ranges of text.
Predefined ranges are generated on a language-sensitive basis, and
the user can also fold any arbitrary range of text.
The traditional Glossary feature, which provides for storage and easy
insertion of frequently used chunks of text, has been superseded by
an enhanced Clippings system. A new Clippings menu provides quick
access to text clippings, as well as the means to create new
clippings and search for existing ones. Clippings can also make use
of intelligent placeholders, and even invoke AppleScript or Unix
scripts.
Extensive improvements to the layout and usability of text-editing
views include a revised and simplified tool bar, and enhancements to
the navigation bar to speed navigation of the current document. An
expanded status bar displays document properties at a glance, and
allows quick access for adjustments.
BBEdit 8.5 features new integrated support for Ruby, SQL, and YAML.
Supported SQL variants include MySQL, PostgreSQL, PL/SQL and
Transact-SQL. This upgrade also features improved language support
for object-oriented JavaScript. Plus, customers can now adjust
editing and display options on a per-language basis, providing
maximum control in the pursuit of improved productivity.
BBEdit’s Preferences window, the nerve center for controlling and
customizing BBEdit’s behaviors, has been extensively revised and
simplified. A new Menus preference panel provides unified control
over BBEdit’s menu structure, including adjustment of keyboard
equivalents and the ability to show and hide individual menu commands
and even entire menus. Also new in BBEdit 8.5 is an innovative search
function for the preferences, which allows customers to quickly
zero-in on a desired preferences control.
“Our customers appreciate the extensive flexibility afforded by
BBEdit’s preferences,” Siegel explained. “For BBEdit 8.5, we
revisited many decisions that were made when the technological
constraints were very different, reviewed every preference,
rearranged, overhauled, buffed and polished, and we’re very pleased
at how easily customers can now manage and customize the myriad
capabilities of BBEdit.”
The powerful Find Differences feature now highlights specific
character differences within a changed line, for faster and more
accurate review of changes. An improved FTP/SFTP browser is now more
discoverable, and in BBEdit 8.5 immediately becomes available when
choosing “Open from FTP/SFTP Server.” The revised Disk Browser window
now presents a hierarchical file listing, and provides the ability to
apply BBEdit’s powerful file filters to reduce the size of the list,
if desired. BBEdit 8.5 also seamlessly opens and saves
gzip-compressed (.gz) text files.
BBEdit’s innovative Text Factories now feature HTML Format,
Translate, and Tidy actions for easier automation of repetitive web
site maintenance and development tasks. A new Auto-save option, with
an adjustable save interval, helps safeguard work in the event of a
power outage or system failure.
BBEdit 8.5 now incorporates version 5.0 of the Perl-Compatible
Regular Expression library (PCRE). The upgraded version of PCRE
features extended Unicode properties, named subexpressions for
greater readability, and additional regular-expression enhancements.
Detailed information on all of the changes and improvements
implemented in BBEdit 8.5 can be found at:
(http://www.barebones.com/support/bbedit/current_notes.shtml)
For more information on BBEdit, or to download a fully functional
demo version, visit the company’s web site:
(http://www.barebones.com/products/bbedit/index.shtml)
Pricing and Availability
————————
BBEdit 8.5 is available at a suggested retail price of US$125.
Registered owners of BBEdit 8 can upgrade for US$30; registered
owners of BBEdit 7 and older can upgrade for US$40. Anyone who
purchased BBEdit on or after January 1, 2006 is eligible to receive a
free upgrade. Customers who purchased directly from Bare Bones
Software will be notified automatically via email. Upgrades are
available directly from Bare Bones Software by visiting:
(http://www.barebones.com/store/)
BBEdit 8.5 may be purchased directly from Bare Bones Software, the
retail and online Apple Stores, and numerous major Macintosh software
resellers. For a partial listing of domestic and international
resellers, visit:
(http://www.barebones.com/store/resellers.shtml)
Educational discounts and site license pricing, for both new
purchases and upgrades, are also available. For details please visit
the company’s web site at (http://www.barebones.com/store/), send
email to (sales@barebones.com), or call (781) 687-0700.
About Bare Bones Software, Inc.
——————————-
Bare Bones Software, Inc. develops leading-edge power tools for the
Macintosh. The company’s passion for creating deeply functional
software with a clean, effective interface has earned it devotion
from Mac users worldwide. The company’s award-winning products
include BBEdit, a professional HTML and text editor, Mailsmith, an
extra-strength email client, and TextWrangler, a high-performance
plain text editor. The company’s expanding product family also
includes Yojimbo, an effortless information organizer, and Super Get
Info, a file and folder info utility. Bare Bones Software has been
crafting fine Mac software since 1993 and operates as a
privately-held corporation based in Bedford, MA. For more
information, visit (http://www.barebones.com/) or send email to
(sales@barebones.com).
TextWrangler, Yojimbo, Super Get Info and the Bare Bones Software
logo are trademarks of, and BBEdit, Mailsmith and “It doesn’t suck”
are registered trademarks of Bare Bones Software, Inc. Copyright (c)
2006, all rights reserved. All other trademarks or registered
trademarks are the property of their respective owners.