Talk:TextPad

Hmm .. I created this as it was linked from a wikipedia tip-of-the-day, but have to admit it does read like an advert. Please improve! TB 10:44, 28 Apr 2004 (UTC)

It's not that bad...G1ggy 07:07, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

A message for David Gerard

Two days ago you reverted four edits I made to the Emacs, XEmacs, vim and TextPad pages (all in the editors category). Your explanation was that I was "spamming". You then proceeded to ban my IP for two days.

What I posted was a link to a page on my website where I have a listing of most known code editors for Windows of all types. Open source, commercial, shareware, etc. I only edited the "Related links" section; except in the case of this TextPad article, which I actually filled out with (what I think) was relevant information and removed the stub notice. What exactly about that edit offended you again?

Now, "spamming" entails some sort of gain. I'd like you to explain just what exactly I'm gaining by posting that link. Perhaps you'd be so kind as to point out the ads or pop-ups on my web site. Maybe you found some sort of advertising for an editor product there?

Did you even bother to visit the link? Do you know what it contains? I posted it because I think it is a useful resource for Windows developers. You do realize that developers read these pages? Could it be that a listing of almost 400 code editing-related tools might be on topic for these editor articles? Or are you offended by the fact that most of them are intended for Windows developers? Or maybe you're just uncomfortable because of my relationship with Microsoft?

Given that you've essentially abused your all-mighty "editor powers" I'd like you to explain your rationale for removing my edits (and banning me) or stop trying to play god.

[response copied from User talk:David Gerard]

You put a lot of links to your personal site on lots of barely-relevant articles, and you don't think this is spamming? - David Gerard 22:16, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Spamming need not imply financial gain, direct or indirect. - Fennec (はさばくのきつね) 22:22, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

"Barely relevant"?? Are you kidding me? What if it is my "personal site"? Jeez. OK then restore my edit to the TextPad page (minus the link) and leave my link on the Text editor topic. Would that be "barely relevent" enough for you?

Putting links to one's own site at all is looked at askance, in accordance with the principles outlined at Wikipedia:Auto-biography; it's really not the done thing at all.

If your site is really of encyclopaedic levels of relevance, someone else will put it on the articles. If they don't, you may have to cope with the fact that it isn't. If you put a link to your own site, it'll likely get blanked as vanity-posting at best and spamming at worst. Wikipedia is not dMoz. - David Gerard 22:43, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Wikipedia is not a web directory, yet most pages have a "Relevant links" section with outside links - check. "Spamming" is whatever Wikipedia decides it happens to be, like "Fennec" so helpfully pointed out - check. A link is relevant and on topic only if someone other than the owner of the link posts it, otherwise it's "vanity" although I fail to see what I'm gaining here - check. That makes a lot of sense, and I understand everything now. Boy, was I wrong. Thanks for your time. I especially enjoyed you nuking everything I wrote for the TextPad article, which was so obvously invalidated by the one link. Oh, and I'll try to remember the term "encyclopaedic levels of relevance". That's a winner.

Nothing whines like a spammer - David Gerard 00:11, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)

ROFL. Nothing like a bored technorati "telling it like it is". Thanks ever so much.

There is no one so arrogant, and for so little reason, as a Wikipedia moderator. - 12.38.2.160 (talk) 14:45, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Not shareware?

"Full-featured trial versions of TextPad and WildEdit are available for evaluation, but neither program is shareware."

Why has this been written? How about indicating how the licence for these programs differs from shareware? -- Smjg 02:17, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

It was written because it is factual. "It's available from the web site on a try before you buy basis" An unregistered Textpad continues to display that it is an evaluation copy in "Help About". A registered copy displays the license code. Evaluation term is 30 days. The EULA includes the following sentence, "Evaluation Version Software Products may include software code intended to disable their functionality after the expiration of the Evaluation Term". DFH 16:48, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

The actual word shareware is not used by Helios in the Textpad website. It would therefore be more correct to state that it is not advertised as shareware. DFH 16:52, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Edit war

124.168.17.252 (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · filter log · WHOIS · RDNS · RBLs · http · block user · block log) has five times edited this article with this statement:

Appears to be abandoned. No development since June 2004. No unicode support. No developers presence on TextPad forum. No roadmap published. [1]

The user has since been blocked for WP:3RR violation. As I write, he/she/it has about 13 hours of block left. Three of us have reverted this statement treating it as vandalism. The original statement was:

The next version released will be version 5. Many enhancements are expected as there has been a significant development period. Textpad forums

(<ref> tags removed)

User:A D Monroe III stated in the edit summary, quite sensibly, "Reference cited contridicts this edit". While some of the posts on that thread are from people saying it seems to have been abandoned, much of the thread is to the effect that Helios has confirmed that TextPad is still under development. Moreover, nobody but Helios can confirm that there's been no development of TextPad since a given date, so the antagonist's statement is practically nothing but speculation. And at least one member of Helios staff has posted on the forum a few times in the last few months [2] [3] [4] [5] [6].

While I'm at it, using a reference list for these citations seems to be overkill, as there is no real content in the citations besides the URL. The citation would be better done as an inline external link IMO.

So there, I've begun to discuss the issue. If nobody minds or gets there first, I'll clean it up once more. Maybe with something that improves a bit over the current effort. -- Smjg 23:51, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Unicode support

Extract from the Textpad help file: (pasted here under 'fair use')

How to Work with Unicode Files

Overview:
TextPad automatically detects 16-bit Unicode and UTF-8 encoded characters, when opening files. Unicode characters may be in "little endian" (Intel) or "big endian" (RISC) order, and the order is preserved when a file is saved.

Internally, these files are converted to single or double byte characters (DBCS), using the locale corresponding to the font script selected for the document class. For example, if the screen font for the Text document class is MS Mincho, with the script set to Japanese, Unicode characters in *.TXT files will be converted to the corresponding DBCS characters in code page 932.

WARNING: This means that it is only possible to edit, without data loss, files containing characters from the implied code page. Other characters will be converted into a system default character (normally "?"), if you confirm that is what you want to do.

Conversion:
Conversion between various file formats and encodings can be made using the Save As command on the File menu. The options for encoding are ANSI, DOS, Unicode, Unicode (big endian) and UTF-8.

The Find in Files and Compare Files commands automatically convert files to the internal format, so they can operate independently of character encoding and end of line characters. For example, a file containing UTF-8 characters can be compared to another containing Unicode characters. The code page used depends on the font specified for the "Search Results" and "Command Results" document classes.

So why did someone add the sentence "Current version is not Unicode compatible."? DFH 18:17, 1 February 2007 (UTC)

For detailed explanation of no Unicode support search TextPad forum. For example see: [7] [8] Warrimoo 01:21, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Re: Edit war - a bit of clarification

Guys, my five times editing was not an attempt to vandalise the page, you observed the facts, but you concluded incorrectly. All my edits were closely spaced in time. This was my first ever attempt to use Wikipedia. As TextPad is not exactly the mainstream topic I made fair assumption that it is unlikely for someone to react almost immediately to my entry and remove/revert it. I observed my entries disappearing, and assumed that they were not accepted by the system for whatever technical reason. Yes, now I know that there is history page and discussion page. First time user clumsiness is not necessary a vandal in action...

I strongly disagree with the statements that "nobody but Helios can confirm that there's been no development of TextPad since a given date, so the antagonist's statement is practically nothing but speculation" -- while such statement is logically correct, at the same time it is practically useless. How do you decide that a software is abandoned -- by waiting for a developer to say it is, or by checking that some of the expected deliverables are released from time to time (betas, roadmap, new version details, maintenance of the existing version, etc)? It is highly speculative to see total lack of any deliverables for two and a half years, and yet to trust vague developer statement (vague meaning here: no dates, no details).

A question needs to be asked: in software development lack of anything verifiable for 'how many years?' is sufficient for users to say: this software appears to be abandoned? Is the answer really: never, unless it is announced by the developer? So the consumers should not question, but trust what they are told? cheers, Warrimoo 01:21, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the clarification. Just to clarify my point further, part of the problem is that you seemed to be taking no notice at the time of the "You have new messages" link that appears at the top of every Wikipedia page to alert you that somebody is trying to talk to you. -- Smjg 13:06, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Correct. Note however that depending on how one works with Wikipedia the "...new message" link may not be visible at all, unless one re-reads full screen from the top. It is not a pop up message, or a floating message which follows your actions. Unless one is aware of the mechanism and familiar with the environment, one would not necessary look for it. This is amplified by the fact that many other sites use various style of static and dynamic panels informing about 'personal' and 'important' messages, typically useless or dangerous. Warrimoo 22:11, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Contradiction

193.129.65.37 (talk · contribs) has added the following:

"Version 5 was released on 3rd March 2007, which supports utf-8 and utf-16"

Aside from the fact that it could be improved grammatically, the fact that this has been mentioned implies that TextPad has finally become Unicode conformant. However, other statements:

• "The current version of TextPad is not Unicode compatible [9], even though it offers UTF-8 and UTF-16 as encodings in which files can be loaded and saved."
• "Helios have stated on the TextPad forums [10] that the next version of TextPad is under development; this is expected to be version 5."

have remained in place. I'd think that the editor had merely failed to finish what he/she/it started, except that on looking on the TextPad website, I can see no evidence of the change that has been noted. -- Smjg 02:36, 9 March 2007 (UTC)

TextPad 5.0

The release notes for version 5 [11] are not that impressive. Lists only eight enhancements and addresses only four reported issues. The download page also states, "TextPad 5.0 is only available in English at first release. Other language editions will be released as they are completed." DFH 16:28, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

The only mention in release notes relating to Unicode is the sentence "The Unicode/UTF-8 byte order mark setting was taken from the default file extension's document class,Warrimoo 14:27, 7 April 2007 (UTC) rather than the Save As document class." DFH 19:08, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

I have therefore removed ", which supports utf-8 and utf-16" as I found nothing to substantiate the statement. I think this now removes the last apparent contradiction in the article. DFH 19:15, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Is the TextPad 5.0 section even necessary? I think the release information could be included in the introduction at the top of the page and the Vista compability could be written after the section discussing how TextPad 4.7.3 was the last to work on Windows 95, 98 and ME. DarkJedi613 20:15, 29 March 2007 (UTC)

I have removed the section detailing last two versions, rationale being: (1) entries for similar editors (PSPad, jEdit, Notepad+, Notepad2) do not have such details, (2) entry at the top of the page: "First released in 1992, this software is currently in its fifth major version." appears to be sufficient. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Warrimoo (talk • contribs) 14:24, 7 April 2007 (UTC).

Windows ME & earlier

The installation notes for TextPad 5 state that it "is supported on Windows 2000 (SP4), Server 2003, and the 32-bit and 64-bit editions of XP and Vista." I just verified empirically that TextPad 5 will not install in Windows ME. DFH 19:23, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

Seeking Advice / Criticisms

Could someone with more Wikipedia experience kindly express his/her opinion on the following:

I have been using TextPad forum for about a year. During this period TextPad Admin deleted my posts many times, deleted full threads in which I participated, banned my user names three times, and finally last months blocked two IP ranges I was posting from (work & home). Reading the TextPad forum one finds that this is common Admin practice triggered by: critical remarks about TextPad, references to another text editors implementing certain functionality better (for example Unicode support), and posts asking: what text editor are you using? what are the alternatives if I need this or that functionality? This appears to me to be vandalism, rude behavior not in the Internet spirit, and displaying arrogant attitude: 'I own this place, I can do whatever I like, if you do not agree, go away'.

My question is: would it be appropriate to enter a comment (warning?) regarding the above in the TextPad Wikipedia entry? Are there any precedences how Wikipedia handled similar situations before? Any advice?

Thank you for reading, Derek. Warrimoo 14:53, 7 April 2007 (UTC)

I read the Textpad forum from time to time and I am well aware of the problems you mention, (post deletes, IP bans, removal of threads that do not praise them and so on). But the fact is that, it is their forum and they can do what they want with it.

Having said that, I agree that maybe we should have a warning section of some sort about Textpad as a whole, their business practices are somewhat strange, their forum ethics raise some serious questions about them, and whatever anybody says, Textpad 5.x is nothing more than a beta and a very, very buggy beta at that.FFMG

Although, if we considered what some other software vendors had done, Textpad's behaviour is pretty tame. I've had good experiences with them; I'm a trainer, use their product in programming classes and they were very helpful to me. peterl 10:24, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

I agree with you to an extent, (but I don't think it is as tame as you think), but maybe a warning should added nonetheless.

After all it is a shareware and people should be made aware that:

* There is hardly any support, (threads are never really answered by anyone 'official').

* Threads are deleted, (giving the impression that all is well).

* The forum tactics as a whole give a false impression that the product is supported and somewhat stable.

* The current product is very buggy, (why they jumped from 4.x to 5.x is a mystery to all).

* The new product was not tested, (security issues, stability issues and so on).

* There is no road map and the last released was 3 years ago.

If we are going to have an entry about Textpad in wikipidia we should talk about the bad points as well as the good points of the product. This is seen in other products, (Microsoft, Mozilla).

The problem of support for Textpad and lack of updates are major ones that users should be made aware of. FFMG

I agree most other softwares have a criticism seciton - I'm going to go ahead and make it. It will probably require a large amount of cleaning up, but I'll try to keep it as unbiased as possible. Also I could use some help finding some sources if anyone knows of some. DarkJedi613 20:29, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Your entry looks good I think.

Should we add something about their forum ethics? It is very hard to find a reference that will verify any statements made. Maybe the OP has a link to that effect? All I could find was post on their forum but I am sure Helios has removed, (or will remove), any posts that they don't like.

I know they remove any posts that criticize their products, but I cannot point to a reliable source for it. FFMG 05:48, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

I've made some changes to the criticism section:

I've removed "It is unknown whether future updates to TextPad will be produced, " because we don't know the future. The only info we have is their (admittidly dubious and possible unreliable) statement. But we can't report on the future (yet).

The statement "Although Helios Software Solutions offers support with TextPad it is requested that you do not contact them directly (using their website) unless there is a licensing or purchasing question." is not correct; their website requests that you exhaust all other avenues first, including FAQ and forums.

Also, the footnote [3] is not correct; does someone have the right link?

If someone has a good link or two about Helios's forum behaviour, then that should really go in. peterl 07:45, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

The reason I linked footnote [3] was that it showed the release notes of 5.0.2, right below it are 5.0.0. I was trying to show that 5.0.2 just fixed a whole bunch of things that 5.0.0 had broken as support that it should not have been released when it did. I'm not sure what else could 'prove' that.

The problem with trying to find something with them deleting forum posts is that they're deleted, we can't prove anything. If you could perhaps find threads that were locked for seemingly no reason, etc. that would work probably. But deleted threads don't help as a source. DarkJedi613 13:43, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

All we had to do was wait for a post to be deleted, I have a link to a topic that was deleted, it was about this very wikipidia entry, 'Textpad entry in Wikipedia', (I was not the original author).

I have a screen shot of the deleted entry, but apart from that I am not sure what else will be good enough 'proof'. FFMG 10:54, 12 April 2007 (UTC)

I am the author of the TextPad forum post which was deleted within hours. This time I also kept a copy of my post, and a copy of the forum listing when it was still showing my post. My previous three user names were: 'derek324', 'derek325' and 'mrus' -- all banned, and many previous posts were deleted. Yesterday I posted as a new user name 'grzybek' using proxy connection. IPs I am using are dynamically allocated by my ISP (large Australian provider iiNet), and Helios decided to block full class of iiNet IPs (at the moment I am connected to 124.168.2.240). Collateral would be significant, specially that another class of IPs from my workplace was also blocked by Helios a few months ago. Warrimoo 01:23, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Sounds like proof enough to me. Could we link the screen shot? peterl 01:32, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Here it is: deleted forum post Warrimoo 12:10, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Here it is as well, [12], same thread as the one that was deleted by Helios. I don't get why they deleted it an banned the user, it wasn't such a terrible post.

I haven't tried, but I wouldn't be surprised if Helios banned all the participants of this discussion. FFMG 08:52, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Can we add these links to the main TextPad entry? peterl 21:59, 17 April 2007 (UTC)

I think a more experienced editor must tell us if they can be added, (I doubt it). The wording would have to be chosen carefully as well so that it is clear that we are referring to deleted threads.

Maybe Textpad should also be invited to edit this article as well, (because this criticism section is 2nd in Google search term for 'textpad'[13]).

Helios always was (and still is) free to join this discussion. Wikipedia does not ban users, deletes discussions or blocks IP ranges only because a view expressed by one individual is found to be inconvenient by another invidual, who happens to have admin priviliges. Textpad forum does admin does. Warrimoo 13:31, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Is lack of Unicode support a criticism?

Is the lack of Unicode support a criticism? There must be dozens of editors out there that don't have full Unicode support. Has Helios said Textpad has Unicode support? (Don't misunderstand me; I know Unicode support would be useful or essential to many of you.) Seems to me it falls in the surprising-its-not-there category, rather than a criticism. peterl 01:45, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Indeed, it is in the "surprising-its-not-there" category - and this surprise is a criticism. 'I would be surprised to see Unicode support there' wouldn't be a criticism. I believe that full Unicode support is to be expected if a text editor is described by its developers as offering "power and functionality to satisfy the most demanding text editing requirements" TextPad Web. See also Wikipedia Unicode entry. Warrimoo 13:04, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

There is also a bit of history with Unicode and Textpad, users have been asking for it over and over again for more than 3 years, yet a change in version number, (4->5), does not even acknowledge the lack of Unicode support.

There was even an assumption that the reason for the delay between version was because of the Unicode issue.

Helios knew that there was a strong demand for it, they chose to ignore this request, and that's a big criticism in the Textpad ranks.FFMG 15:37, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

Who said anything about full Unicode support? It's basic Unicode conformance that's missing first things first. Just read the linked-to forum thread. -- Smjg 00:54, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Sorry who are you replying to?

Unicode is missing and it is a big criticism with the Textpad users, (I don't see what difference full or basic makes).

Telling us to follow the link is not the point, the point is that Unicode is not supported, and that is a criticism. FFMG 10:03, 14 April 2007 (UTC)

Clip Library saved where?

Good discussion in this article about the clip library. But when I edit it, where is this saved at? I use TextPad on multiple machines, and would like to have the same clips in both places.

Wikipedia is not a 'how to'. This would be better addressed to the Textpad formus. But to answer your question, in 5.0 they are in C:\Documents and Settings\username\Application Data\Helios\TextPad\5.0 peterl (talk) 22:02, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Advisory: TextPad Criticism section

This message is a notice to the WP contributors who have added or substantially contributed to the "Criticism" section of this article. Although I sympathize with the concerns specified in this section of the article, and although a lot of these concerns probably have merit, you can bet this section of the article is not going to survive serious scrutiny if it gets reviewed by an experienced WP editor or a competent WP administrator.

Personally, I believe the critique is not in bad-faith, and I believe that whoever put it there was not being mean-spirited or trying to make this company look bad. My personal opinion, however, doesn't really mean squat. WP policy has the last word.

I'd like to suggest if you want this section to be able to survive and "have legs", you are going to need to make it sound much less like an editorial and a rant, give it some balance, and support it with some citations and references, and also consider renaming the section header.

You might also want to read: Template:Criticism-section, Wikipedia:Criticism and WP:NPOV (see the section on "Article structure").

If you would like specific suggestions on how to improve this section, you can ask me, or ask at the Wikipedia help desk Wikipedia:Help desk. This is just a friendly suggestion to help you prevent your contributions from being tossed out. dr.ef.tymac 14:49, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

About the Criticism section

In my humble opinion, the criticism section is becoming a bug reporting/rant space. I think we should try be more neutral and objective to keep an encyclopedic tone. Pmaroncelli (talk) 02:20, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

I disagree. It's all about major shortcomings, not individual bug reports. TextPad is misleading in that it can read files with UTF-8 BOMs but it doesn't actually display characters outside of the ANSI range. So what use is reading a file if it mangles the characters it doesn't understand? --Walter Görlitz (talk) 02:28, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

I see your point. Nevertheless, in my opinion, the criticism section in its present form is more a bunch of personal considerations rather than a neutral encyclopedic entry. Pmaroncelli (talk) 14:39, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

Do you have a suggestion to improve it? The way it currently stands, other than the last (which is essentially an elaboration of the one before it), they're all cited. How do you remove the "personal considerations" and list all of the criticisms effectively? As for neutrality, the criticisms are presented in a neutral way. To eliminate them entirely would create an unbalanced article. --Walter Görlitz (talk) 14:58, 9 November 2010 (UTC)

It isn't a bunch of personal considerations. Some of it may lack good, recent references, but for a start the fact that TextPad doesn't support Unicode is regularly ranted about on the forum.

And as for the latest addition, what on earth are "character sets spanning more than one character set", and how can a plain text file have such a thing? -- Smjg (talk) 19:15, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

I think it's meant to read "documents that span" or "files that span". --Walter Görlitz (talk) 19:30, 3 January 2011 (UTC)

But a plain text file, by its nature, cannot span more than one character set. Unless you consider such things as the letters and figures pages of Baudot code to constitute separate character sets, but what encodings used on PCs have such a thing? -- Smjg (talk) 12:00, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

I think the original editor was alluding to Unicode again. --Walter Görlitz (talk) 16:03, 8 January 2011 (UTC)

Looking at it now, and indeed the original version of that paragraph, I can only make out that the person who wrote it didn't know what he/she was talking about, and it's really just a duplicate of the preceding paragraph. I'll delete it. -- Smjg (talk) 13:02, 9 January 2011 (UTC)

Look, I too gave up on Textpad because of the regrettable lack of Unicode support, but if I post on a forum to complain about it that doesn't make me a reliable source. The section needs to be properly sourced or removed. --kingboyk (talk) 12:01, 7 August 2011 (UTC)

I have added an out-of-date tag to the Criticism section since most of the citations are from 2007 and 2008 with the majority of the space taken up on version 4 and 5. Since they've released version 7, the section needs to be updated, removed, or better balanced.
SBaker43 (talk) 01:29, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I'll remove it since none of what has been criticized has been fixed yet. Walter Görlitz (talk) 01:54, 17 April 2013 (UTC)

I agree with Pmaroncelli, SBaker43 and kingboyk. The criticism section is increasing out of date since the release of TextPad 8 that supports unicode. The criticism also seems to me to be somewhat out of proportion for an encyclopedia entry. Other editors such as NotePad surely have at least as many limitations but have no similar Criticism section in their Wikipedia entries. I propose to update and drastically shorten the section. GKSmyth (talk) 23:29, 8 February 2016 (UTC)

 Done • Sbmeirow • Talk • 03:07, 9 February 2016 (UTC)

I have removed the comment about the lack of a "real-time spell checker" for "editorial purposes", because no citation has been provided even after many years and because an as-you-type spell checker is something more associated with word processors rather than with text editors. GKSmyth (talk) 00:51, 10 February 2016 (UTC)

Further reading section

I just added these references to a Further reading section and would like to know why they were immediately deleted.

1. Doug Lowe (2017). "Chapter 3. Working with TextPad". Java All-in-One For Dummies. Wiley. pp. 35–42. ISBN 978-1-119-24780-7.
2. Gary B. Shelly; Thomas J. Cashman; Joy L. Starks; Michael Mick (2012). "Using TextPad". Java Programming: Comprehensive Concepts and Techniques. Cengage Learning. pp. 52–60. ISBN 1-4188-5985-0.
3. "PC Magazine Finalists: 1997 ZD Shareware Awards". PC Magazine. Vol. 16, no. 16. 23 September 1997. p. 222. ISSN 0888-8507.

The current article reads like a company website page. I use TextPad and want to rewrite it to look more like the TextEdit page. My practice is to begin to find independent references and put them into a Further reading section. As I rewrite I will convert them to references to replace current references to the company website. 1 and 2 are references for TextPad features. 3 is a reference for winning an award. I have a fourth independent reference which talks about the use of clip libraries. I don't see why adding 3 references at the end of such a poor article should in any way contaminate it. StarryGrandma (talk) 19:27, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

I gave a reason when deleting. There's nothing encyclopedic about those entries. WP:FURTHER Do we really need a how to on installing TextPad or its use a Java source code editor? If you want the reference to the award, go ahead, but it's not appropriate for a further reading section. So I guess the reason why they were removed was that they should not have been there in the first place. Walter Görlitz (talk) 19:37, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

I disagree. WP:FURTHER says nothing about "encyclopedic". Instead it says: An optional bulleted list, usually alphabetized, of a reasonable number of publications that would help interested readers learn more about the article subject. I will leave them here on the talk page instead, but I disagree with your interpretation and will continue to do this when I rewrite articles. StarryGrandma (talk) 19:58, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Feel free to disagree. Everything needs to be of encyclopedic value in an encyclopedia. You could ask on the talk page at FURTHER. Regardless, we still have WP:NOTHOWTO. Walter Görlitz (talk) 20:34, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Per MOS, Further reading should not duplicate links in References. That means they are ones not being used to make the article. For these particular links, I don't see them appropriate for Further reading, for the same reasons per Walter Görlitz. --A D Monroe III (talk) 20:47, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

I am not using these references for their how-to content. I still plan to use them as independent references. The article depends too much on the company website and very brief reviews. A D Monroe III they aren't references yet. I haven't rewritten the material yet. They do describe features of TalkPad and show general notability. I started using TextPad in the 1990s after reading reviews in paper magazines of that era, but I've since recycled my old computer magazines. If you or Walter Görlitz could point me to some independent references, especially showing history of the editor, I would be very grateful. StarryGrandma (talk) 21:09, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

You're not using these links as references at all. You're suggesting that they're further reading on the subject, which they're not. They don't describe features either. I can do all of what they describe in Sublime Text, Notepad++, VIM or any other text editor. And as reference, we're describing TextPad not TalkPad. I assume that was a typo.

TextPad, like much shareware software, doesn't get written about. I don't have any sources to support the discussion of features. Walter Görlitz (talk) 22:13, 17 August 2017 (UTC)

Outdated?

This page has been marked as "outdated". I am unclear on what content is outdated - the infobox is up to date, and the other content of the article appears up to date, or at least not rendered incorrect by virtue of being old. The product itself is not outdated, as there have been 7 updates this year [14]. What "recent events or newly available information" is it missing? peterl (talk) 04:57, 5 July 2021 (UTC)

I suppose that question should be asked of @Ineuw:. The edit summary does not match what transpired in the edit. Walter Görlitz (talk) 17:04, 6 July 2021 (UTC)