I am a big fan of SQL Developer, been using it for about 5 or 6 years now, but I cannot fathom why Block Select *still* doesn't work. I always assumed someone else would raise the issue and it would get fixed but it looks like I'll have to get my finger out and do it myself.
OK, so first of all, the "tick" against the option seems to be backwards. When you first fire-up SQL Developer, Edit -> Block Select is not ticked, and indeed there is no block selection. So you go to the Edit menu, click on Block Select, and now it *is* ticked, but you still don't have Block Selection, you have to go back again, *un*-tick the option and *now* you have Block Select.
So that's the first problem, but I can live with that one, The main problem is that IT DOESN'T ACTUALLY WORK! If you now highlight some code in Block Select mode, it nicely draws the blue highlight block in a rectangle without wrapping lines etc, but if you perform any action on the highlighted text (for example set to Uppercase) then it happens on all the text as if you had done regular full-line selection not block selection. Infuriating (and basically renders the Block Select mode useless).
SQL Developer 4.1.3.20 Build MAIN-20.78
OSX 10.11.4
Java 1.8.0_73
Cheers,
Alan.