BabelPad (Unicode Text Editor for Windows)



Overview

BabelPad is a Unicode text editor for Windows that supports the proper rendering of most complex scripts, and allows you to assign different fonts to different scripts in order to facilitate multi-script text editing.

BabelPad is free and fully functional, with no disabled features or time restrictions.

Please note that BabelPad is provided "as is", with no warranty as to its fitness or suitablility for use as a Unicode text editor or for any other purpose.

If you have any comments, queries, bug reports or feature requests, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Read the BabelStone Blog to keep informed about new versions of BabelPad and BabelMap.


A new version of BabelPad supporting Unicode 5.1 will be available by the end of April.



Whilst BabelPad is free, if you do use it for commercial purposes, please consider making a small donation (£10.00 or equivalent suggested) by means of PayPal to help support its continued development :



Summary of Features

User Interface



File Features



Edit Features



Text Conversion



Rendering Features



Input Methods



Tools and Utilities



Download

BabelPad Version 1.10.2 (Unicode 5.0.0) [2008-03-18]


NB A new version of BabelPad supporting Unicode 5.1 will be released by the end of April.


User Notes

Windows XP Build



Windows 95/98/ME Build

The build of BabelPad for Windows 95/98/ME is not as feature-complete as the build for Windows NT4/2000/XP. The following limitations will be experienced when running the Windows 95/98/ME build of BabelPad (note that some problems only manifest themselves when actually running on Windows 95, 98 or ME) :



BabelPad Limitations



BabelPad Tips



Uniscribe Issues

BabelPad uses Microsoft's Unicode Script processor, Uniscribe (filename usp10.dll), to format and render Unicode text. The more recent a version of Uniscribe you have installed on the computer the better support you will have for complex scripts such as Indic and south-east Asian scripts, Tibetan and Mongolian. The version of Uniscribe that BabelPad is using is indicated in the About BabelPad... dialogue box.

Uniscribe should come pre-installed on Windows 2000 and Windows XP, and should also have been installed if you are running Internet Explorer Version 5 or above on other Windows operating systems. However Uniscribe may not be available on some PCs running Windows 95, 98, ME or NT 4.0 that do not have Internet Explorer 5 or above. If when you attempt to run BabelPad, a dialog box entitled "Unable to Locate DLL" with the message "The dynamic link library USP10.dll could not be found in the specified path" appears, this means that Uniscribe is not installed on your PC.

Uniscribe is constantly being updated to support new scripts and to add new functionality to existing script support, so it is important that you have the latest possible version of Uniscribe installed on your PC. Even if you do not use complex scripts, you will only get advanced features for Latin script such as ligatures with a recent version of Uniscribe (to see this try entering <s ZWJ t> with Code2000). You may run BabelPad with a particular version of Uniscribe by simply placing a copy of the Uniscribe file (usp10.dll) in the same directory that BabelPad.exe is located. Note that the latest beta version of Uniscribe is available to members of the Microsoft VOLT Users Community.

Some versions of Uniscribe may have bugs that may cause BabelPad to crash. Those that I know of are outlined below :



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