I've been using BBEdit since v4.0. One thing that sticks out for me was, way back in System 7 days, I opened up a huge (for the time) CSV text file to do some s

I've been using BBEdit since v4.0. One thing that sticks out for me was, way back in System 7 days, I opened up a huge (for the time) CSV text file to do some search/replace. I don't remember the size, but it was larger than available RAM on the machine, so maybe 20MB. It opened, and I was able to work on it. Recently I had to open a 1GB text file in BBEdit to also do a search/replace. (Not something I could use the command line easily for, because I had to make executive decisions as to keep or replace what I found.) Worked flawlessly. The application is ridiculously solid. Like emacs, it's very customizable. I have several wonko scripts written in PHP that I can use to munge data, but you can also use Applescript, or Perl, or whatever. Code snippets are great. But the real appeal is, again, similar to emacs: once you get into the workflow and set your editor up the way you like, including keyboard shortcuts, layout, etc., you can become insanely productive. It becomes a personalized environment to such an extent that the thought of moving out is terrifying. (Years ago, Bare Bones had a mail client called Mailsmith. It BBEdit-ized your mail client. I loved it, but email moved on and they didn't keep it up. I still miss it.)