Installing WinEdt

WinEdt 7 runs on Windows XP, Vista, 7 and 8 (32-bit or 64-bit). It has been extensively tested under different platforms and has proven stable and reasonably fast. If you have an older version of Windows you should consider a non-unicode WinEdt 6 or even an older WinEdt 5.5.

WinEdt's overall appearance depends on your Windows and selected themes, and on the way you want to customize WinEdt's own colors and background schemes.

WinEdt setup and default settings have been carefully prepared to make installation and integration with MiKTeX or TeX Live automatic. It is recommended that you install WinEdt and your TeX System as a power user (administrator) in order to allow the programs and their installers to properly update your Windows Registry and/ or PATH, thus making automatic integration with WinEdt possible.

Download and execute the setup file winedt70.exe. The Installer Wizard will guide you through the installation. For most users the default options in the Wizard should be used. However, if you are creating a portable installation you should disable User Profile Creation: this way WinEdt will create a Local folder inside its install folder and this folder will contain all your custom settings.

During the installation you can also decide if you want this version of WinEdt associated with TeX files (and friends). The associations can also be made, removed, or repaired (on a selective basis) from WinEdt's Configuration Wizard. However, on Windows with UAC-enabled this requires starting WinEdt with elevated privileges (which are already in effect during the installation).

After the installation is completed it is recommended that you let the Installer start WinEdt for the first time. On first opening, WinEdt presents you with its Configuration Wizard where you can perform some further - and important- additional tasks, most notably, filetype associations. If you decide to postpone this for later you may have to start WinEdt with elevated privileges; on UAC-enabled Windows this is done by right-clicking on the icon used to start WinEdt and choosing Run as Administrator from the popup menu or by pressing the button Start WinEdt as Administrator button in the Configuration Wizard interface. With User Profile Creation enabled WinEdt can be run by restricted users since it stores application data in user-specific folder with write access. However, without elevated privileges WinEdt may not be able to create filetype associations which require write access to Windows Registry.

After these preliminaries, start the Preferences Dialog (from the Options Menu). In particular, you should make you choices pertaining to your preferred Wrapping, Unicode, and Backup strategy:

Help in the Dialog explains how...

    Important: The default settings use Soft Wrapping and UTF-8 format for TeX Documents. If these are not not your preferences you should make the changes before you start working on your documents (this can save you a lot of problems and confusion)!

Upgrading

From version 5.x -- not really: WinEdt 7 installs parallel to WinEdt 5 or 6 (you can continue to use an older version and possibly uninstall WinEdt 7 should you prefer the old version). You should not attempt to install WinEdt 7 over the existing WinEdt 5.x or 6 on your system! You cannot import old settings from WinEdt 5: the new version will have to be customized from scratch! Configuration (*.ini) files from WinEdt 6 can be loaded into WinEdt 7 after minor modifications (with a few exceptions that affect Unicode and Language functionality). The "What's New?" section in Help explains changes to keywords and configuration files syntax from version 6. This document should be consulted before attempting to import your WinEdt 6 settings into the new version!

Important: You should not be upgrading to WinEdt 7, if

  • you are busily working on a project with a deadline approaching (install it later when you have more time).
  • you want everything exactly as it is in your current version (if it ain't broke don't fix it!).
  • your current custom settings are more important than any of the new features.
  • your computer might not be up to running the latest version (eg. legacy Windows).
  • you prefer a simple light-weight editor (unicode functionality comes at a cost!).
  • you expect personal assistance with restoring your old settings (whatever they may be)...
    •

If you don't fall in any of the above categories read the rest of the instructions and proceed accordingly...

Registration: WinEdt 7 series uses the same registration data as WinEdt 6 -- you will have to enter the same registration data in WinEdt 7. If you are currently using WinEdt 5 you can take advantage of the trial period and see if you want to use this version or you prefer the older WinEdt 5.x series. Should you opt for WinEdt 7 and already have a license for WinEdt 5, you will need to purchase an upgrade license from www.winedt.com (see the Tables at the Registration page: upgrade rates are at the bottom). Exceptions will be made (upon request) to users that have purchased a license or an upgrade within the last year and to users that make contributions to winedt.org, or help with WinEdt project in some other way... This is your chance to get involved!

Note: At this stage many components (including old dictionaries) on winedt.org will not automatically install into WinEdt 7 unless they have been updated and they state that they are WinEdt 7-compatible. This applies to all components that involve changes to the Menu and/or Toolbar... Advanced users can, of course, install such components manually and make them WinEdt 7-compatible by rewriting the relevant scripts (.ini or .edt files) in the new format.

WinEdt 7 uses dictionaries (word lists) in unicode format: they can be downloaded from winedt.org. Properly converted English dictionaries are already included in the default settings.

Upgrading from a previous build of WinEdt 7

Upgrading WinEdt 7 series is easy!

You don't have to uninstall the previous build of WinEdt 7 in order to upgrade to the latest version. In fact you should not uninstall it if you want to preserve custom settings in your Application Data or Local folder.

Here are the steps that you should perform for smooth upgrading:

  • Install the new version (over the old one).
  • Restart WinEdt; your old settings are used and your last project is loaded...
  • Execute Options -> Maintenance -> Upgrade Personal Configuration menu command (to merge your personal settings with the new defaults).

The "What's New?" section in WinEdt's Manual explains what has been changed or fixed for the latest build... Check it out!

Reading the fairly short introduction to the Configuration Manual in the Help is essential if you want to learn how to customize WinEdt 7 beyond the common settings that can be changed through the Preferences Dialog (new in WinEdt 7)... The manual also contains important instructions on Maintenance and Upgrading procedures (including how to import your custom settings to another computer). Read it now (if you haven't done it yet)!

The Options Interface allows you to mark those components that have been modified. This can come in handy if you want to compare your settings with defaults. The Cleanup command will remove unnecessary local ini and edt scripts (if they are identical to the default ones).

Troubleshooting

WinEdt is by default configured to run as a front-end for MiKTeX or TeX Live. However, it is quite straightforward to configure WinEdt for a different TeX System, or even define a completely different set of accessories. By default, Options -> Configurations Menu already contains a few alternative configurations!

WinEdt does its best to automatically detect your TeX System and Accessories (such as PDF Viewer). However, should automatic detection fail it is easy to manually configure WinEdt to find your TeX System or any problematic accessory: in the Options Menu, start the Execution Modes Interface. Disabling Auto-detect and entering the location of your TeX Root folder is pretty much all that has to be done (no need to modify any macro scripts):

This interface can also be used to diagnose your system, fine-tune the execution of console applications (such as TeX), define alterative executables (such as biber of gsview32), and more... Help in the Execution Modes Interface explains the details!

Uninstalling

If you use the Uninstall Command (eg. from Windows Control Panel) to uninstall WinEdt. The folder where you installed WinEdt and WinEdt's Application Data folder (if you created a User Profile) will be removed (as they should!). Thus make sure that you don't place your documents in the same folder. By default the root folder and application data folder are:

  {program files}\WinEdt Team\WinEdt 7
  {user application data}\WinEdt Team\WinEdt 7

These are certainly no places for your own documents! However, should you decide to specify a custom folder during WinEdt's Installation keep the above warning in mind: uninstall will delete it!

Whatever custom location you might specify it should end with "\WinEdt". In particular, "\WinEdt" is not automatically appended to the specified location (as one might erroneously assume with possibly serious consequences should WinEdt be uninstalled and thus the destination folder erased)!

Installer

WinEdt uses a reputable open source installer: NSIS. The installer will make sure that WinEdt is installed with elevated privileges and thus placed in the proper (usually write-protected) folder inside Program Files.

Generated installers and uninstallers accept a few options on the command line. These options give the user a bit more control over the installation process.

Common Options
  • /NCRC
      Disables the CRC check.

  • /S
      Runs the installer or uninstaller silently.

Installer-Specific Options
  • /D=
      Sets the default installation directory. It must be the last parameter used in the command line and must not contain any quotes, even if the path contains spaces. Only absolute paths are supported.
Uninstaller-Specific Options
  • _?=
      Sets the default uninstallation directory. It also stops the uninstaller from copying itself to the temporary directory and running from there. It must be the last parameter used in the command line and must not contain any quotes, even if the path contains spaces.

WinEdt-Specific Installer Options

WinEdt's installer implements a few extra command line switches that can come in handy for silent installation:

  • /USERPROFILE=
      Set to 1 enables the creation of a user profile.

  • /STARTMENUICON=
      Set to 1 creates a Start menu shortcut.

  • /DESKTOPICON=
      Set to 1 creates a Desktop shortcut.

  • /ASSOCIATEFILES=
      Set to 1 creates a default set of icons and filetypes associations in Windows registry.

Note that the above options have no effect on non-silent installations. By default, all are enabled (set to 1) except for /ASSOCIATEFILES.

Filetype association task can be (selectively) performed through WinEdt's Configuration Wizard. However, on Windows with UAC this usually requires elevated privileges (in order to modify the proper registry entries). Network administrators can specify /ASSOCIATEFILES=1 if they want WinEdt to be associated with common TeX files during a silent installation (rather than leaving the task to users who may not have sufficient experience or privileges to succeed in doing so themselves).

WinEdt-Specific Uninstaller Options

WinEdt's uninstaller implements a few extra command line switches that can come in handy for silent uninstallation:

  • /USERPROFILE=
      Set to 1 deletes user profile folder.

  • /REGDATA=
      Set to 1 deletes WinEdt registration data from Windows registry.

Note that the above options have no effect on non-silent uninstallations. By default, /USERPROFILE is enabled (set to 1) while /REGDATA is disabled (set to 0).

Important: On Windows Vista, 7, or 8 (with UAC) enabling the creation of user profiles during the installation is essential (this is the default setting and should not be disabled unless you know what you are doing). If you want to change anything in WinEdt's install folder later, you will have to run WinEdt as an administrator. This applies to changing the profile settings as well as to entering registration data for all users!

    Hint: To start WinEdt with administrative privileges right-click on its icon (link) and choose Run as Administrator from the context popup menu: only then can WinEdt write or modify global data (such as secure registration data for all users) in its Program Files folder. Elevated privileges are also required in order to create filetype associations on UAC-enabled Windows.