[comp.sys.hp] HP 3000 text editor

singer@XN.LL.MIT.EDU (Matthew R. Singer) (01/22/88)

As per the subject...

I am looking for full screen text editor the the HP 3000.  PD
perferred as its easier than getting someone to spend money on
the thing.  Suggestions for commercial solutions to this are
also welcome.


Matt Singer

dennett@kodak.UUCP (Charlie Dennett) (01/24/88)

In article <879@xn.LL.MIT.EDU> singer@XN.LL.MIT.EDU (Matthew R. Singer) writes:
>I am looking for full screen text editor the the HP 3000.  PD
>perferred as its easier than getting someone to spend money on
>the thing.  Suggestions for commercial solutions to this are
>also welcome.
I was poking around the other day in the programs that came on the Las Vegas
swap tape.  There is a full screen editor on the tape.  The program file
is FSE.PUB.VEGAS.  I was not all that impressed with it.           

If you have TDP, did you realize that it has a screen editor built in?  I
have it on one of my machines but have not had the time to play with it, yet.

If you are on good terms with your HP SE, ask him if he can get you a copy
of one that HP uses inhouse.  Of course, it won't be supported but it's
better than nothing.  Now, if HP would only come out of the dark ages and
supply a screen editor with their system!

-- 
Charlie Dennett            | UUCP: ...!rutgers!rochester!kodak!dennett
Eastman Kodak Company      | Voice: 716-726-4480
901 Elmgrove Road          | Company Mail: Dept 420 Technical Support Services
Rochester, NY 14650        | Company DECnet: VXMM01::DENNETT

paul@vixie.UUCP (Paul Vixie Esq) (01/25/88)

In article <1109@kodak.UUCP> dennett@kodak.UUCP (charlie dennett) writes:
>[...] <879@xn.LL.MIT.EDU> singer@XN.LL.MIT.EDU (Matthew R. Singer) writes:
>>I am looking for full screen text editor the the HP 3000.  PD
>>perferred as its easier than getting someone to spend money on
>>the thing.  Suggestions for commercial solutions to this are
>>also welcome.

I wrote an editor called VUE some years ago.  It was an almost-complete
emulation of a program by the same name that came from Alpha Microsystems,
and I emulated it because it was the only full-screen editor I'd ever seen.
It was about 4000 lines of SPL, worked on almost any smart ascii terminal
(terminal descriptions were loaded at runtime), and I was selling it for
(hold onto your stomachs, now) $1000 a copy.  I sold two copies that way.
First and last time I ever sold code instead of the hours of time spent
writing it, an interesting experience.

The code was written for MPE IV on a 512K series II.  At 2400 baud, the lack
of type-ahead was a great way to make my typing less sloppy :-)..

Then I met VI and EMACS.  I was embarrassed as hell to have charged for VUE
when I saw that MicroEmacs was free and far superior.  I considered putting
VUE on a CSL tape (?), but that would have meant writing documentation for
it, as well as pissing off the two people I'd already sold it to :-).  Instead
I started to rewrite it in Pascal/3000 and make the key-bindings user
definable, as well as making the optimized-terminal-independent-screen-lib
a little more optimized and a little more terminal independent, as well as
more readable (like, how about some comments, maybe?).  UNIX stole me away
from all that, and the Series II has subsequently turned to dust, probably
taking all my code with it (I know that *I* sure never got a tape of it...)

Anybody remember when ^R would make a 64 crash?  You can bet that my editor
was unpopular after that little episode... It didn't run in Priv Mode, either.
Just "non-terminated read mode", which meant that you could get single
characters from the keyboard without hitting return after each one...

Ah, memories.

>If you have TDP, did you realize that it has a screen editor built in?  I
>have it on one of my machines but have not had the time to play with it, yet.

TDP's full-screen editor depends on the block-mode capability of HP terminals.
This has several disadvantages -- it lacks word-wrap and other features that
the terminal usually doesn't have, there is no backup file in case of power
outages (my editor didn't have this, but it could have, and HP terminals
can't), and you need an HP terminal (whose keyboards have always depressed 
me, and whose character attributes are implemented oddly).

>Now, if HP would only come out of the dark ages and
>supply a screen editor with their system!

Get a 9000 and run HP/UX, you'll get emacs and VI. :-)

-- 
Paul A Vixie Esq
paul%vixie@uunet.uu.net
{uunet,ptsfa,hoptoad}!vixie!paul
San Francisco, (415) 647-7023

gstanfld@hpccc.HP.COM (Gill Stanfield) (10/22/88)

HPEDIT, a new product available from HP DMK, is a product-ized
version (supported version) of the previously mentioned full-
screen editor used within HP.  I've switched to HPEDIT from Voodoo,
and have found many areas to be improved. Check it out, I think a
demo version is available.