BBEdit 10.5.6 and TextWrangler 4.5.4

While nary a new feature has been added to BBEdit 10.5.6, Bare Bones Software stuffed this version of its flagship text editor full to the gills with well over 90 fixes. One notable change sees BBEdit no longer requiring items in the Stationery application support folder to have the Finder “Stationery Pad” option turned on in order for them to appear in BBEdit’s Stationery menu or palette. As per usual, the release notes are breezy and sound like they’ve been written by an actual person. Here are just a few of our favorite nuggets from this update:

Application startup performance has been significantly improved. Anyone who has complained that BBEdit is slow to launch is going to have to find something else to complain about.

In a Markdown document, a list which is immediately preceded by a horizontal rule —- or a headline is now recognized as such. The documentation says to put blank lines before and after “block elements” (like lists and horizontal rules), but the implementations all support this format. #likeUnscramblingAnEgg

Hex Dump just got made wicked fast. You’re welcome.

Bare Bones has also updated TextWrangler to version 4.5.4, with the free text editor receiving most of the same fixes and refinements accorded to BBEdit. Note that as of this writing, neither Mac App Store editions of BBEdit or TextWrangler have been updated to the most recent releases. ($49.99 for BBEdit, 12.9 MB, release notes; free for TextWrangler, 9.8 MB, release notes)