Cursor Caret should show at the end of \n newline instead of on next line

[robertcollier4]

The cursor caret kind of shows itself at the next line when you make a selection. See the attached screenshot where you think that the selection is from Line 589 to 598 but instead you are looking at it visually wrong. You therefore sometimes push a up key and reduce the selection by 1 line and then end up selecting less than you should be.

It would be better if the cursor caret would show itself after the newline (at the end of a char place) instead of before at a char place. This would be after a \n and not at the beginning of the next line.

This is perhaps best visually seen. It is a visual difficulty to selecting what you want and making the wrong selection sometimes (in number of lines and selecting sections together like shown in the screenshot).

[jfcherng]

This would be after a \n and not at the beginning of the next line.

Isn’t after \n == the beginning of the next line?

\n is not visually see-able in ST… but we need a way to know a \n is selected or not.

[robertcollier4]

What I propose is that the selection appears at the end of the little " " empty space that shows that a \n is selected there. The " " selection indicator is already there to indicate newline selected.

Note this is only in the case of selection - otherwise the caret shows up normally as is in non-selection display.
(In selection there isnt really a caret position anyways - it is just telling you on which side of the selection your region.a and region.b is)

Like the following mockup diagram:

[jfcherng]

So in the above screenshot, what’s selected in line 597 assuming that ST is implemented in your expectation? A space or a \n? I can’t distinguish them.

By the way, is there a editor behaving like that? Feel counter-intuitive to me.

[robertcollier4]

On line 597 \n is selected. This is how SublimeText currently shows the selection of a newline.

[jfcherng]

Yes. But in your expectation, it could be either a space or a \n and both situations look like quite the same (blank things are selected and the cursors are in the same place for both situation).

I would have a hard time distinguishing these two while the cursor position tells a clear story.
: space is selected
: \n is selected

[robertcollier4]

First mockup GUI is how I propose (second image is how it currently is).

This would be the introduction of a “special” selection caret.
NOTE: the caret only changes for selection state!