an editor that doesn't require any esc or control keys to be used...

Jerry Feldman gaf at blu.org
Thu Aug 15 23:12:49 EDT 2002


Ed (or ex) would certainly work. At one time it was the only Unix editor. 
And likewise, I use ex commands nearly every day eventhough I use EMACS as 
my editor of choice. However, full screen editors are more useful for 
writing code than line editors.
"Adam S. Moskowitz" wrote:

> Excuse me? Remember, we're talking about EDITORS here, not WORD
> PROCESSORS. What more is there to do that ed (or maybe ex) can't
> handle?
> 
> I'm a vi user from far too long ago -- but I use the "escape-to-ex"
> (i.e., ":") nearly every day. Why? Not for the simple stuff -- but for
> the HARD STUFF! Global search and replace? Piece of cake. Want
> confirmation of each change with that? Only one character different.
> Need a Turing-complete language to edit your code? It hasn't been
> proven, but ed can do a lot more than people think -- conditional tests,
> buffers, branching, etc.
> 
> It's not pretty, but it gets the job done, and usually in many fewer
> keystrokes than most WYSIWYG editors. And while I wouldn't want to go
> back to line-mode TECO (which is what I used before vi), I'd rather go
> "back" to ed than be forced to use any GUI-based editor for writing
> code.
-- 
Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>
Boston Linux and Unix user group
http://www.blu.org PGP key id:C5061EA9
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