ntanaka@gandalf.cs.cmu.edu (Nobuyoshi Tanaka) (11/09/88)
Thank you for your responses. I must summarize the result but it is hard
job for me to summarize them without spoiling them. So, I will COLLECT
(not summarize) all the responses. I apologize...
Some responses were posted not e-mailed, so I will not include them.
Thanks again.
--Nobu
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From: uwslh!lishka@spool.cs.wisc.edu (Fish-Guts)
Message-Id: <8810251915.AA00597@uwslh.UUCP>
Although "Structured" and "Text" editors are two different
conceptual models, in the real world there are many editors that are
not simply "Structured" and not simply "Text-Oriented." For instance,
I use Gnu-Emacs at work, which has different "major-modes" for
enterring text or code. One mode (called "text-mode") word-wraps and
justifies all the text that I type in so that I can concentrate on
writing, and forget exactly how I am formatting a particular line.
This is sort of a "structured-English" mode. Another mode allows one
to enter text, but formats it in a style suitable for C-code...this
mode aids greatly in writing programs, because the editor formats the
text correctly. If one wants more structure, Gnu-Emacs can be
programmed (using a built-in Lisp language) to rigidly control the
structure of a language (although noone has done this for anything but
Lisp to date).
Other editors I have used are *mush* more structured. One of the
editors on the Xerox 1108 Lisp-Workstations *only* allowed legal Lisp
code to be enterred; everything was rejected before even inserting the
text. This editor was *highly* structured towards Lisp, and was sort
of a pain to use. One of my favorite editors came with a
C-environment that was sold for the Commodore 64. The basic editor
was completely unstructured; i.e. you could enter anything you wanted.
However, it had a command that allowed one to run a C-syntax-checker
over the current edit-buffer to make sure the code that you had just
written conformed to the Kernighan-Ritchie standard.
If the above sounds too technical, don't worry. I am just trying
to give examples of "real-world" editors, which typically are *not*
just "Structured" editors and are *not* just "Text" editors. Most are
somewhere between the two extremes.
If you are looking for an excellent (although very large) editor,
I would recommend Gnu-Emacs. It is essentially free (you need only
pay the shipping charge), but it is only available for Unix. It is
also monstrous (the executable alone is 1 megabyte, and the support
files needed must consume over 2 megabytes), and has an amazing amount
of functions, which makes it a bit hard to learn initially. However,
once one knows the basics, there is a lot of power available.
______________________________________________________________________
From: johnm@uts.amdahl.com (John Murray)
Message-Id: <m0eC0MU-00007aC@amdahl.uts.amdahl.com>
The XEDIT component of IBM's VM/SP mainframe opsys is a very
powerful text editor. It has a macro interface to the standard
VM command languages EXEC & REXX. Macros are commonly used to
format the screen displays, set reserved and protected fields,
etc. Thus, you can use the editor to build full-screen interactive
menus, for example.
Since the macro programs take over every time the user hits Enter,
or a function key, the facility can be used to do syntax
checking on the fly, justification, pretty-printing, etc. At Amdahl,
we use XEDIT & REXX extensively to check and format Assembler source
code.
There is an imitation of XEDIT for IBM PCs called KEDIT available
from Mansfield Software, which works with Mansfield's Personal REXX.
But it's not nearly as good as the real thing.
Hope this helps.
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From: celerity!jjw@ucsd.edu
Message-Id: <8810310546.AA11786@ucsd.edu>
I suspect I will not be alone in saying this. Most Emacs editors provide
exactly this capability. It is possible to define editing packages which
define how to recognize and format various kinds of blocks depending on the
kind of file being editted. "Standard" packages are often supplied and it
is possible to define your own if you don't like the standard. It is also
possible to redefine what key strokes cause which editing operations so if
you want you can make your Emacs behave like vi, Wordstar, ...
______________________________________________________________________
From: DORFMAN@ECLA.USC.EDU
Message-ID: <12443956734.16.DORFMAN@ECLA.USC.EDU>
On October 25 you inquired about Structured Editors in the
Software Engineering Digest. Mr. Gary Pace of my organization (Lockheed
Missiles & Space Co., Sunnyvale, Calif.) suggested that you contact
Xinotech Research about their editor called Program Composer:
Xinotech Research, Inc.
Technology Center, Suite 213
1313 Fifth St. SE
Minneapolis, Minn. 55414
612-379-3844
Mr. Pace may be contacted at 408-742-7791; or I will forward to
him any messages you send via E-mail. We would also be interested in
your summary of responses.
Merlin Dorfman
408-756-8204
DORFMAN@ECLA.USC.EDU
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