From: dingebre@imp.sim.es.com (David Ingebretsen)
Subject: Re: recommend good Editor ??
Reply-To: dingebre@imp.sim.es.com (David Ingebretsen)
Organization: Evans & Sutherland Computer Corp., Salt Lake City, UT
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 22:28:06 GMT


In article <1992Nov18.100310.5043@syma.sussex.ac.uk> you write:
> 
> Could someone recommend the best PD/Shareware Editor for me to use...
> There seem so many around.. DME,DMD,PED etc.etc..
> 
> whats the best guys??
> 
> ta
> neale
> 

For text editing, programming etc. I have always preffered GNUEmacs. I use
it at work on the Suns, and Vaxes, and there is an excellent port for the
Amiga. David Gay did the port and added pull down menus and an AREXX port.
The current version is 1.26 and is a port of GNUEmacs 18.58. It is available
on amiga.physik.unizh.ch

If you are familiar with GNU, you know its power and extensibility. If you
aren't familiar, GNUEmacs is an absolutely amazing piece of software. I don't 
think I could do it justice. Here is the introduction from the manual:

BEGIN QUOTE************** (the typos are mine. I also left out the chapter
                           references for clarity)

You are about to read about GNU Emacs, the GNU incarnation of the Advanced,
self-documenting, customizable, extensible real-time display editor Emacs.
(The 'G' in 'GNU' is not silent.)

We say that Emacs is a display editor because normally the text being edited
is visible on teh screen and is updated automatically as you type your commands.

We call it a real-time editor because the display is updated very frequently,
usually after each character of pair of characters you type. This minimizes
the amount of information you must keep in your head as you edit.

We call Emacs advanced because it provide facilities that go beyond simple
insertion and deletion: filling of text; automatic indentation of programs;
viewing two or more files at once; and dealing in terms of characters,
words, lines, sentences, paragraphs, and pages, as well as expressions  and
comments in several different programming languages. It is much easier
to type one command meaning "go to the end of the paragraph" than to find that
spot with simple cursor keys.

Self-documenting means that at any time you can type a special character,
Control-h, to find out what your options are. You can also use it to find
out why any command does, or to find all the commands that pertain to a topic.

Customizable means that you can change the definitions of Emacs commands in
little ways. For example, if you use a programming language in which comments
start with '<**' and end with '**>', you can tell the Emacs comment 
manipulation commands to use those strings. Another sort of customization is
rearrangement of the command set. For example, if you prefer the four basic
cursor motion commands (up, down, left, right) on keys in a diamond pattern
on the keyboard, you can have it.

Extensible means that you can go beyond simple customization and write
entirely new commands, programs in the Lisp language to be run by Emacs's
own Lisp interpreter. Emacs is an "on-line extensible" system, which means
that it is divided into many functions that call each other, any of which can
be redefined in the middle of an editing sessoin. Any part of Emacs can be
replaced without making a separate copy of all of Emacs. Most of the editing
commands of Emacs are written in Lisp already; the few exceptions could
have been written in Lisp but are written in C for effciency. Although only
a programmer can write an extension, anybody can use it afterward.

************************END QUOTE

One last comment on its power. I found some Lisp extensions that open a
screen in EMACS that emulates an RPN calculator and symbol manipulator.

I have another set of Lisp files that when loaded will search the autodocs.
I can open a program, put the cursor on a function call and hit a key sequence
and Emacs will open a screen with the appropriate autodoc at the function
description.

Another set of Lisp and C files that turn it into a HEX editor.

Again, if you know GNU Emacs, I don't think I told you anything new. If
you don't, take a good look at it.

The Amiga port requires Amiga DOS 2.04 and about 1.5 to 2 megabytes of
disk space.

-- 
	David

	Disclaimer: The content of this message in no way reflects the
	            opinions of my employer, nor are my actions
		    encouraged, supported, or acknowledged by my
		    employer.


-- 
	David

	Disclaimer: The content of this message in no way reflects the
	            opinions of my employer, nor are my actions
		    encouraged, supported, or acknowledged by my
		    employer.