How to Select Columns in Editors (Atom,Notepad++, Kate, VIM, Sublime, Textpad,etc) and IDEs (NetBeans, IntelliJ IDEA, Eclipse, Visual Studio, etc) [closed]

Answer 1

jEdit:

With the keyboard: press Alt-\ (Opt-\ in Mac OS X) to toggle between rectangular and normal selection mode; then use Shift plus arrow keys to extend selection. You can switch back to regular selection mode with another Alt-\ (Opt-\ in Mac OS X), if desired.

With the mouse: Either use Alt-\ (Opt-\ in Mac OS X) as above to toggle rectangular selection mode, then drag as usual; or Ctrl-drag (Cmd-drag in Mac OS X). You can switch back to regular selection mode with another Alt-\ (Opt-\ in Mac OS X), if desired.

Actually, you can even make a non-rectangular selection the normal way and then hit Alt-\ (Opt-\ in Mac OS X) to convert it into a rectangular one.

Answer 2

Eclipse used to need a column mode plugin to be able to select a rectangular selection.

Since Eclipse 3.5, you just need to type Alt+Shift+A: see its News and Noteworthy section. (On OS X it's Option-Command-A.)

Or activate the 'Editor Presentation' action set ( Window > Customize Perspective menu) to get a tool bar button for toggling the block selection mode.

AmbroseChapel adds in the comments:

This is a toggle.

Columnar selection is a mode you enter and leave: in other words, Eclipse switches into a mode where all mouse selections have to be columnar and you stay in that mode until you switch back (by using the same command again).
It's not like other editors where columnar selections are enabled only while certain keys are down.

Answer 3

• Notepad++, Visual Studio, and some others: Alt + drag.
• vim: Ctrl + v or (bizarrely enough) Quad-click-drag. In windows: Ctrl + Q (since Ctrl + V is the standard for paste)

Answer 4

In Kate toggle Ctrl + shift + B .

Answer 5

In Flash Builder (v 4.5 and up), and Aptana Studio (at least v 2.0.5) there is a toolbar button to toggle block select. It is between the 'mark occurrences' and 'show whitespace characters' buttons. There is also a Alt + Shift + A shortcut. Not surprisingly, this is basically the same as for Eclipse, but I'm including here for completeness.

Answer 6

In MCEdit toggle Shift+F3 (ie F13) or F9->Edit ->Mark columns.

P.S. In this case, MCEdit is an editor written for the Midnight Commander.