This release has a lot of new features, but is also likely to be very buggy, and the documentation has not been updated for any of the new goodies yet. Also, a number of plugins (including mine) are broken by this release. Take care and have fun.

I would like to release jEdit 4.0pre2 two weeks from now, along with an updated set of plugins at the same time. There will then be a pre3 release at the start of December, right before I move back to New Zealand, where I will buy a new computer and switch to Java 1.3 as my primary JDK. 4.0pre4 will follow soon after, and this release will finally drop 1.1 compatibility.

Like nearly every software project, jEdit is built from its source code using what is called a "make" or "makefile" system. These terms come from the original "make" utility that was created for use on the UNIX operating system; there are now a variety of makefile utilities available for all operating systems. Besides the source code and related resources, a makefile system has two main elements. The first is a "makefile", a plain text file that specifies the steps necessary to build the application, such as the invocation of a compiler, an object code linker or an archiving program. The makefile also describes the dependencies among the final product, intermediate files and the underlying source code. This file will be written in a special format designed to satisfy the requirements of the second major element, the "make" utility.