There is a feature that is currently in jEdit that I have yet to see in netbeans, and that is the block edit feature.
This is the ability to select a block of text and manipulate it. Normally you can select by rows, but the ability to
select in columns is something that cannot currently be done in net beans. And it is a feature that once you get used to
it, is hard to live without because of the convenience it brings. As I said jEdit has the best implementation of this
that I have ever seen. In fact I would say that they have the perfect implementation of it. Because you can also do
things like select a column (not a block), and start typing, and what ever you typing will be placed in all the rows of
the column you have selected. You can also cut, copy and paste blocks of text. And in jEdit the activated column select
instead of row select, it is just holding down the control key while using the mouse to select the area you want to work
on. But for a better understanding of how it works I think that you should download jEdit and have a look at it for
yourself. I think it would be a big plus feature for netbeans and it would finally allow me to move away from using
jedit as my ide. As a side I think that you should also look at the way that jEdit allows you to represent non-printing
characters, by using a dot instead of a block of color like netbeans does (which I think looks very ugly). And seeing as
I use HAML a lot and tracking down bugs with how many spaces something is indented, having nonprinting characters look
nice on screen is important to me. I think you should allow the user to select the character and color of character that
will be used for this. I.e White space, end of line, tabs, etc.