Sublime Forum

**bschaaf** · February 21, 2022, 9:29pm

There is no Sublime Text for Android, so there’s nothing to port to the iPhone. See Sublime Text app for iPhone! on why a mobile app won’t happen.

**Jackeroo** · February 21, 2022, 10:02pm

It’s difficult getting through to some people, isn’t it?

**redge** · February 22, 2022, 4:50am

Hi @Jackeroo,

Took me a minute to realise that you were talking about people interested in using a version of Sublime Text on a mobile device rather than the developers of the product.

I’m in the process of deciding whether to purchase Sublime Text, and this thread led to reading the August 2021 post below from @bschaaf, who has also made a point of saying that he doesn’t own an Apple device (not a surprise, given what this post says):

Everything I’ve said in the iPhone thread still holds today. Sublime Text is not a usable interface for a mobile phone whatsoever. I have it running on my PinePhone and it’s an awful experience without a bigger screen and a keyboard/mouse plugged in. Tiny screens with only touch input simply require a different UI to desktops/laptops.

For tablets it’s a bit of a different story. For the iPad specifically the Apple Tax, App Store restrictions and general iOS limitations make it an incredibly unappealing platform to develop for.

Not only does that not get through to me, I’m left with the impression, quite apart from the issue of code editing on mobile devices, that the owners of Sublime Text aren’t interested in my business.* Indeed, I think that Mr. Schaaf and I are living on different planets. That impression gets reinforced when a company says that it has millions of users for a for-profit product, but only two staff, in their spare time, to support users, and has no presence on social media.

I figured that there would be basic training videos on YouTube, but I was wrong. Indeed, on YouTube VS Code is everywhere, but Sublime Text barely exists.** That’s cool if you don’t care about your market share, and figure that training purchasers ain’t your problem. Let other users do the training. Sure enough, the company recommends training documentation that cost it nothing because it was made by volunteers. It also recommends a video series that would bring the cost of a Sublime Text purchase to US$180.

Let me tell you what’s getting through to me: why VS Code has rapidly developed a dominant position in this market, and why the people behind VS Code probably don’t take Sublime Text seriously as a competitor.

*Panic wrote a detailed blog post about why it discontinued its mobile device code editor. Worth reading.

** Terence Martin, who has the only YouTube channel that regularly talks about Sublime Text, has 3,250 subscribers.

**bschaaf** · February 22, 2022, 5:03am

I’d sincerely love to know where we’ve said to have millions of users - afaik we don’t have any stats on our end for users, only for purchases. Closest I’ve gotten are packagecontrol stats, but those users aren’t unique. There’s also a huge difference between a user and a customer.

In any case when it comes to an iOS app the crude answer is that yes there isn’t any interest in that business for the reasons outlined in other comments.

For reference we have 6 staff including the owner/founder, two of which are dedicated towards Sublime Text. Technical support is something I’ve decided to take on and I do some of it in my free time because I enjoy helping people.

**clci** · February 22, 2022, 6:17am

I think you should also consider that VS Code is backed by a huge company with virtually unlimited bank accounts. It’s really helpful to gain a domiant position.

I’d like to add my case to your statistics of what Sublime Text users want: I’m not in the slightest interested in using ST either on Android nor IOS.

**redge** · February 22, 2022, 1:58pm

@cici,

Microsoft’s backing of VS Code does not explain why the Sublime Text company is asking me for US$100, why ST4 is accompanied by a whopping 25% price increase over ST3, why company support consists of the part-time efforts of one person and why company marketing and user training is non-existent. I’m left with the impression that Sublime Text is a hobby business run by, and for, people whose world consists of Linux phones and the belief that Apple’s business practices make iOS “an incredibly unappealing platform to develop for.”

I’m also testing Sublime Merge and GitKraken. The latter, which appears to be a pretty small company, is making a serious effort to market its product to me and makes training resources, including for YouTube, on an on-going basis. Git Tower, another competitor, recently made a detailed video about Git for the non-profit freeCodeCamp. In the four months since, that video has had almost 600,000 views; to put it mildly, rather good exposure for Tower.

Sublime Text? It has no presence on YouTube, let alone makes instructional videos. Instead, its resources page suggests a video series that costs US$80. How hard are these videos to make? It requires a basic screen capture app, a microphone and a company that is prepared to spend some of its manpower resources on acquiring and supporting users of the product.

I’m having lot of trouble understanding what Sublime Text is about as a business and why I should give it US$100, or US$170 with Merge.

**bschaaf** · February 22, 2022, 2:01pm

I’m having lot of trouble understanding what Sublime Text is about as a business

Sublime HQ is primarily focused on making good tools, befitting our values for software development. That means doing things the “right way” even if it takes longer. I believe we’ve thus far primarily relied upon word of mouth for advertising, leaving our products to speak for themselves.

We don’t do instructional stuff beyond documenting our applications because for one it’s not in our wheelhouse and secondly we generally try to keep everything somewhat discoverable inside the application. Specifically in terms of an introduction to git I believe we decided against doing anything along those lines because there’s already plenty of high-quality git introductory tutorials and Sublime Merge is targeted at power-users who already know git.

**redge** · February 22, 2022, 2:59pm

Thanks @bschaaf,

Your post confirms my impression of what Sublime is about as a business. Interesting that Sublime marketing by word of mouth doesn’t include use of social media, except for a Twitter account that hasn’t been used for seven months.

I don’t see myself as a Sublime client as a matter of principle. I’m looking for a text editor and git client, not an alleged Hermès scarf for people in the know.

**UltraInstinct05** · February 22, 2022, 3:01pm

Just my 10 cents

I fail to understand why are you comparing MS’s VS Code against a company that wants to price their product ? Does it mean if Microsoft were to back any software product, there should always be free competitors for that product & no one can make a similar product and charge it ? I guess similar is not even the right term since VS Code & ST share completely different philosophies. SHQ has made a product, they want to sell it & make money for a living. That’s completely natural. The one thing that really baffles me is that people wanting a product to be priced low or for free is there is something else similar which is open source.

It’s an age of inflation, they cannot keep pricing their product the same for ever. Have you come across and goods or services where people made a living by charging it the same $ for years on end ?

The thing is, it’s really ease to state that it’s easy to do something and then understand the difficulty when actually doing it. I have never edited videos but I guess the main elements of professional videos are:

Prepare some kind of written material to understand what you are going to present.
Prepare flowcharts of how you are going to present.
Setup all the necessary equipment.
Record the actual thing (& maybe fail a few times when you realize that it’s not up to par)
Edit the video (Which includes adding all the promo stuff, subtitles, video captions, additional information)
Release the video (& deal with all of the post release hiccups)
Post release & keep an eye out on the audience who ask questions.

To me that seems like the job for an entire team. So where are you going to spend the time. Developing the editor or making marketing stuff ? Sure SHQ could hire someone to do it, but that’s up to them.

**redge** · February 22, 2022, 3:22pm

@UltraInstinct05,

I was responding to a comment about Microsoft’s resources. I have no problem with Sublime charging for its products, and I have said nothing suggesting otherwise.

If there’s a claim that inflation is behind the 25% price increase, I’d love to see the explanation. That is a whopping price increase (if I understand correctly, it followed another price increase a year or two before), and was prior to pandemic-related inflation.

Unlike you, I have made screen capture videos, and indeed I’m making one now. They require either a script or an outline, but are otherwise dead simple to make. In any event, @bschaaf has stated why Sublime doesn’t make them, and the reason is unrelated to your point.

**clci** · February 22, 2022, 3:23pm

The size of Microsoft doesn’t explain anything about Sublime Text because Microsoft has nothing to do with Sublime Text.
But the size of Microsoft explains why VS Code is a feature-packed software with new great features added every day, video tutorials, Twitter presence and why Microsoft doesn’t even ask you money for it.
I’m not trying in any way to justify the business model of ST, but what I don’t get is why complaining about it.
You think ST doesn’t worth its price? Fine, just use VS Code or Vim.
You think GitKraken is great? Fine, use it. Last time I tried GitKraken it forced me to create some kind of account in order to run it so… no thanks for me.

I value different features for my code editor, and I’m happy to pay for ST, even if there are no instructional videos. The moment I’ll be happy no more, I will move to something else and stop paying for it.
And I’m not going to the VS Code forum complaining about what I don’t like about it.

**UltraInstinct05** · February 22, 2022, 3:33pm

Yes, it’s dead simple to make simple screen captures. But difficult to make professional videos explaining features of a product that has tons of features in an organized manner. Once you start pushing out videos, people have a lot of expectations (& obviously complains as to why it’s not made in a certain way). You unfortunately seem to be taking a lot for granted,

That’s why it’s stated at the very top “My 10 cents” & not as a supplement to his answer. I have been using ST for close to 2 years now and I have just put what I felt for your post after using ST for the period.

**redge** · February 22, 2022, 3:50pm

@cici,

I commented in this forum as part of actively considering the purchase of Sublime Text and Merge. As I said five posts above, the result of this discussion is that I will not be purchasing Sublime products as a matter of principle. I just don’t agree with the operating philosophy. In other words, the posts have been helpful in making my decision.

**redge** · February 22, 2022, 3:41pm

@UltraInstinct05,

Yes, well I’m interested in the matters discussed in the thread, not in getting into a debate with someone who’s never made a video about video production issues that have nothing to do with Sublime’s own stated reasons for not making them

**UltraInstinct05** · February 22, 2022, 3:44pm

Yes. & Unfortunately my points as to why it’s not easy to make them doesn’t seem to be getting across (which are independent of SHQ’s reason since it applies generally to anything you’d want to make videos for). You don’t have to be an expert to understand why somethings may not be easy at first glance.

I am ending my involvement in this thread. Have a good day

**bitsper2nd** · February 22, 2022, 3:56pm

Do you expect no response in a forum after writing bad takes? The reason you don’t consider Sublime is not because there are no educational videos about it. The real reason is because a license for Sublime Text or Sublime Merge cost money. And you don’t want to pay for that. That’s OK. Simply use another tool. Don’t try to hide that under the banner of principles.

**redge** · February 22, 2022, 4:21pm

@bitsper2nd,

Interesting. Sounds like you believe that price is the only reason why someone would use a text editor or git client other than Sublime’s, to the point where you are prepared to just make up stuff about me in your head.

By the way, except for a very limited free tier, GitKraken, the other git client that I’m considering and discussed above, is US$60 per year. Over the three year period of a Sublime Merge license, GitKraken is quite a bit more expensive.

**bitsper2nd** · February 22, 2022, 4:21pm

I didn’t make stuff up about you. Clearly the issue is about money. You don’t see Sublime Text or Sublime Merge to be worth spending money.

You also mentioned VS Code, which in fact is free and can work as a git client.

**redge** · February 22, 2022, 4:40pm

@bitsper2nd,

This was a civilised discussion that helped me make a decision. Then you decided to weigh in. I tried to handle your first post tactfully, but that’s harder to do with two in a row. Thankfully, and to the credit of Sublime and its users, yours are the only posts that I’ve seen on his forum that accuse someone of lying.

**bitsper2nd** · February 22, 2022, 4:50pm

Your mind was already made up before commenting here.

And you got the aproppriate response to your bad takes.

This is a civil discussion. Just because you don’t like the response, doesn’t mean it is not civil. Nobody accused of you lying. I clearly pointed out your real reason, which is money.