Open Source

Learning to use vi is so easy, I've done it dozens of times.

It is...eccentric, and not designed for a modern keyboard. But knowing vi can make or break your ability to fix an unfamiliar system. Knowing the very, very basics has been crucial to me a few times. (esc :wq = quit and save, esc :q! = quit without saving, esc esc esc = stop doing whatever I turned on by accident, esc i = stop beeping at me and let me type already you stupid program, esc d d = delete the line)

Also, the pico editor is a bit old, wedded to the pine mailing program, and has some problems as a general-purpose editor(its insistence on linewrapping everything, a horrible thing to do to a script or configfile). nano is the modern equivalent if you can get it, the pico interface plus a little more. You'll find it more places than you find pico these days.

VI is what I have been using since last 3-4 years. Simultaneously I was using UltraEdit which I liked most.
Since past few days, I have moved to new project where there is no licensed version of UltraEdit. So I was looking for it's replacement. Then I found Notepad++ which is pretty good too. Syntax highlighting, column mode selection etc....are there.

Nedit is a wonderful editor. I have been using it for more than 12 years.

vim )

I use IV and emacs on my linux boxes and Notepad++ on windoze.

SDC

vim / notepad++

I have diffrent fav's per task/env...

cli-simple/quick edit: nano
cli-long edit: vim

For GUI i'd selected gedit just until yesterday, but today i favor: Sublime Text.
To me it feels like its got the best of: MS .Net, gedit, geany, codeblock and of course emacs.
Only drawback is, its only a free (but yet still...) unlimited evaluation copy.