The Black Toolkit

Programming languages are the means of making a computer understand your input through dozens of command lines that form an interface you can use. There are multiple languages that use different expressions and forms, but with the help of utilities like The Black Toolkit you can gather most of them and assemble in a final form.

Your workspace is pretty intuitive, with most space dedicated to writing down code, a side panel that represents a file browser to quickly find files in your computer, and clever tab support that lets you keep multiple projects open at the same time. What's more, there's even a portable version in case you want to use it on the go.

Unfortunately, spending a little time to get to know the application makes you realize it's not all fun and games. On the one hand, importing files can be a little difficult due to the rather poorly designed file explorer and no support for drag and drop. Luckily, an integrated search engine lets you find custom formats in a specific folder, with an option to also look in subdirectories.

On the other hand, you can import a decent amount of file formats, ranging from INI, TXT, XML, to CPP, JSP, H, ASP, PHP and more. By default, the syntax highlighter helps you identify scripts, strings, keywords and attributes, but colors used are the same for all languages, and options to change them also apply as a global attribute.

For enhanced accessibility options, the application gives you the possibility to create quick access points for Java, C / C++ and Pascal in case they are installed on your computer. Moreover, you can start a project from scratch, with options to generate several specialized files or commands.

You can save your work under a custom format or try to take it out for a spin. Sadly, the compiler doesn't always indicate errors, nor lines where they occur. This is a great disadvantage because you need to pay extra attention when writing the code, which is a difficult task already.

To sum it up, you can't call The Black Toolkit a professional approach on IDEs, leaving a lot more to be desired. Sure, the overall design is pretty intuitive and you can import a decent amount of files to edit, but the lack of IntelliSense or at least a better compiler tip the scales against its favor.