If your like me you just can’t help playing with new technologies. Since I started working with the web it has been a whirlwind ride with so much happening that it can be mind blowing. Just when you think you’ve seen it all, some new buzz pops up. The web is a truly dynamic medium that is constantly evolving and trying to keep up with all the new technologies makes it that much more interesting.

Sydney FX started with web design back in 2004 but these days I spend more time studying new web technologies like ruby on rails, flex and the new AIR from Adobe and sometimes you need costly editors to assist you in speeding up your development time.

Well now there is an IDE that is multi platform so no matter if your working on Windows, Apple, or Linux, there is a release just for you.

Now I haven’t been using Aptana for very long but I have now installed it on both my Windows and Linux platforms mainly for Rails development because there are very few good editors that meet the needs of rails programmers straight out of the box. Most mac users including myself use the Textmate however Aptana is great if you can’t spare the money for a mac or need an alternative editor when you don’t have a mac handy or don’t want a mac altogether.

I’ve seen a number of custom setups for text editors on linux which look great however you’ll need to know how to get the editor to suit your needs. If you don’t have that knowledge then check out Aptana. It’s really cool, and can be used for all the latest web technology programming like Ajax, HTML, AIR, and even iPhone.

Aptana is an open source project founded by Paul Colton who has been involved in a number of successful technologies in previous ventures. Check out more of Aptana at the official website.

As a bit of a new comer to Rails development and an avid fan of the Apple Mac I have settled on using Textmate as my editor of choice when developing for Rails.

But what about when you are developing on Microsoft’s Windows platform. Well after playing around with a few editors I found Notepad++ which has some remarkable similarity’s to Textmate for Apple.

The best part about Notepad++ is it’s free and it’s also open source, however you can give donations as it started and developed by Don Ho and a small group of developers. I didn’t spend a lot of time using Notepad++ mainly because I spend most of my time on a Mac however I did enjoy using it as a Ruby on Rails editor for Windows. The only thing I didn’t see was a project window which you could import your Rails project framework into for easy access.

Notepad++ has full code highlighting, use defined language including Ruby, zoom in and out, and alot more.

A great editor and well worth further investigation.

While I ventured into my Ruby on Rails experience, I found this great text editor called Textmate that is recommended by the Rails team for Mac users. Unfortunately there isn’t a version for Windows so you’ll have to convert to Mac if you want it.

Personally I’ve never really been a big fan of text editors for any serious work and this has mainly been because they have never had much functionality up until now. Textmate is a very cool editor having the ability to provide code structure, highlighting, code block collapsing and so much more.

You can code HTML, Applescript, Javascript, Ruby, XML and more. This is one texteditor that is full of surprises with plenty of options for even the most hardcore coding junkie.

Once you start using it you’ll find it very addictive thinking hey, I can use Textmate to code this, and I can use textmate to code that. So crunch time… how much is it? Well it only costs around AUS$70 which isn’t alot for such an extensive and well designed texteditor that is more than capable of handling all your coding duties and more. If your not sure you’ll like it, you can download the trial version for a limited time before you decide to hand over any cash.

Find out more about Textmate from www.macromates.com.