Scripted is a lightweight and nimble general purpose code editor that aims to make a developer’s life easier. The editor has been implemented in pure JavaScript, CSS and HTML. VMWare’s focus has been to provide a better, more organized and easily manageable coding experience when using JavaScript.

The editor itself is based in the browser. It will run locally on your machine (with a Node.js instance performing editor operations). As a result, it becomes mandatory that you have the latest version of Node.js installed on your device in order to run Scripted.

Recommended Reading: Top 10 Free Source Code Editors – Reviewed

Scripted’s Major Features

Can’t wait to see what Scripted has to offer? Well, here is a list of offerings:

1. Extremely fast and light-weight.
2. Comes with syntax highlighting (for HTML, CSS and JavaScript).
3. Errors and warnings for basic cases such as module resolutions.
4. Content assist (again, for HTML, CSS and JavaScript).
5. Smart hovers (hover over a JS identifier and see the inferred type signature).
6. Smart navigation (Press 8 over an identifier, and you will be navigated to its declaration).
7. Properly integrated JSbeautify.
8. Apart from the main editor, you can also open a second editor in the side panel.
9. Key bindings can invoke external commands.

There are a lot more features but you’d probably have more fun finding them out on your own.

Reasons Behind Scripted

So, why on earth did VMWare bother creating this editor in the first place? VMWare cites a couple of reasons. According to them, many users prefer lightweight code editors over full-fledged Integrated Development Environments (IDEs). IDEs come with their own added level of awesomeness, in the form of content assist and error indication, which many lightweight editors fail to match up with.

So what is a developer to do? Opt for the lightweight alternative and compromise on features, or go for the feature-rich alternative, and compromise on speed instead? Neither! Create a new lightweight editor, rich in a decent number of features!

Furthermore, in simple terms, cloud-based solutions that run entirely in the browser itself are the way to go, and Scripted doesn’t lag behind on this front either. And the fact that it relies on your own system means that you do not even need a working Internet connection all the time.

Under The Hood

According to VMWare, the editor technology comes from Eclipse Orion. I personally feel that this is a smart pick for an editor. Orion provides a wonderful coding experience, and VMWare couldn’t possibly have done better with any other editor.

Beyond that, as mentioned above, the server level things are dealt with by Node.js.

Links:

1. Scripted on Github
2. Scripted Wiki

Conclusion

So, where does Scripted go from here? VMWare is working on a plugin system as well as better integration with Google Chrome Dev Tools. Furthermore, there are plans for adding enhanced functionality to the side panel, among other things.

What do you think of this new code editor from the stable of VMWare? Will you be giving it a shot? Feel free to share your thoughts with us in the comments below!