Change the default editor for files opened in the terminal? (e.g. set it to TextEdit/Coda/Textmate)

user_153097 0
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Is there a way to make files opened for editing in the terminal open in Textedit instead?

For example, where a command might open a file for editing (like git commit), instead of opening that file in vim or emacs, it would open in Textedit (or perhaps another text editing application of your choosing, such as Coda or Sublime).

And as a bonus question, is there any way to specifically configure git to automatically open the file created after running git commit in an editor from the applications directory?

macos text-editor terminal
8 Answers

For anyone coming here in 2018:

  • go to iTerm -> Preferences -> Profiles -> Advanced -> Semantic History
  • from the dropdown, choose Open with Editor and from the right dropdown choose your editor of choice
user_18361430

If you want the editor to work with git operations, setting the $EDITOR environment variable may not be enough, at least not in the case of Sublime - e.g. if you want to rebase, it will just say that the rebase was successful, but you won't have a chance to edit the file in any way, git will just close it straight away:

git rebase -i HEAD~
Successfully rebased and updated refs/heads/master.

If you want Sublime to work correctly with git, you should configure it using:

git config --global core.editor "sublime -n -w"

I came here looking for this and found the solution in this gist on github.

user_89278220

make Sublime Text 3 your default text editor: (Restart required)

defaults write com.apple.LaunchServices LSHandlers -array-add "{LSHandlerContentType=public.plain-text;LSHandlerRoleAll=com.sublimetext.3;}"

make sublime then your default git text editor git config --global core.editor "subl -W"

user_47709020
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