TextEdit preferences to set to use it for coding

Text Edit Menu with Preference option selectedStart the TextEdit application:

  • Finder > Applications > TextEdit

In the TextEdit menu (next to the Apple menu) select:

  • Preferences.

Text Edit's New Document Preferences Settings Make the following changes in Preferences:

In the New Document section:

  1. Select:
    • Plain text

  2. Disable:
    • Smart quotes
    • Smart dashes
    • Smart links

TextEdit's Open and Save Preferences SettingsIn the Open and Save section:

  1. Enable:
    Display HTML files as HTML code instead of formatted text

  2. Disable:
    Add ".txt" extension to plain text files
    Note that by doing this you will need to manually add a .html (or .css, .js, etc.) file extension when saving a file.

TextEdit's Edit menu's Substitution settings In the Edit menu:

  1. Disable (if not already disabled):
    • Smart Quotes
    • Smart Dashes
    • Smart Links

There are no other changes required.