Column mode

I would love this too -- huge time saver for code editing. It's so common in Mac editors (even TextEdit:), that I'm hoping it's not too hard to implement. OPTION+Select usually activates it.

Just checked out the editor and is amazing, but I think this is a crucial feature, as it says it's planned, do you have a date for it?

I'd like to purchase the editor when the feature is available, as I've been using BBedit for years but I'm tired of it,  it's getting slower every time.

For work I also use a windows machine, and I haven't found a true alternative to Notepad++ on the mac, and your software seems at last the answer to my problems, keep up the good work

No, sorry, I don't have a date. I submitted version 1.1 two days ago which adds tabs among other things. I'm going to concentrate on the iOS version now for a while and plan to add column mode after that.

Hi, any update on this thing? Is that possible to enter "the column mode" in the textastic? Thank you in advance.

Not yet, sorry.

Is there any news on this?

Hi, great software! Has the column mode been implemented? It is so useful for large tables of data! Thank you!

Re-visited Textastic in late 2023 because I'm back on a Mac (after some time with Windows), and I need a somewhat minimalist plain-text editor. The possibility to select a column is the only feature missing for me, and I need it very regularly (had it with Notepad++ on Windows). TextEdit has it, but printing from TextEdit is really bad (while printing works the way I need it from Textastic). Any chance that you'll update Textastic, and that feature might find it's way into it? (I started with Textastic many years ago on the iPad, later on macOS – or at least I think it was this way. ;-))

Hello there!

I was looking for a text/code editor for the iPad and Textastic showed up! I already new its name for so long but never tried it so, here I am. Bought it immediately because I need a good way for edit some files on the go.

I also bought it for macOS but… I'm using BBEdit, TextEdit also does this, the ability to select a column of text. I noticed the last update for Textastic on macOS was 2y ago and for iPadOS just 3w. That leads me to the question if this is abandoned… I just spent 10€ and noticed that later… Also, while looking for the column feature stumbled upon this thread! Mmmm
On macOS TextEdit and BBEdit, as well as some others, we just need to press ⌥ and ⇧ to select a column of text and it would be nice to have a way of doing it in the iPadOS version too.

Am I that late to party and is everybody already gone?

Thanks in advance and Merry Christmas

I'm currently working on an update of Textastic for macOS. I hope to release it within the next few weeks.

Great news! I use Textastic and TextEdit in parallel when I need column selection (this works far better than I thought it would), but native in Textastic would be great, as it has become my go-to plain text editor (or for poking into all sorts of files). Ah, I just saw that you are actively working on iPad version – I should upgrade!