Date   : Fri, 10 Jul 1992 17:04:08 GMT
From   : math.fu-berlin.de!wolff@uunet.uu.net (Thomas Wolff)
Subject: Re: Wordstar clone

alpha@wyvern.twuug.com (Joe Wright) writes:

>> Is there an editor (in C) which works something like Wordstar's non-document
mode? <<

In about 10 days I plan to post my adaptation of mined to the newsgroup
comp.editors .
It is not quite a Wordstar clone but it has Wordstar's basic cursor key
layout and is 
equally easy and naturally to use. Here is the short overview:


Some notes about mined: Its original version is the editor that comes along 
with Andrew S. Tanenbaum's freely available operating system minix. 
It is small, quick, and easy to use. However, when I found the version one 
of my work-mates had adapted to vt100 terminals for use on Sun machines, 
it was not solid either nor was it flexible enough to meet my needs.

Meanwhile its basic characteristics are:
- type in as you'd imagine, no mode switching, logical positioning, i.e. the 
  text appears where the cursor is, not at some funny other place like in vi
- cursor movement: basic functions available in (Wordmaster-/Wordstar-like) 
  graphic control key layout as well as the keyboards cursor movement keys; 
  use of a "hop key" for fortifying movement commands, thus making it easy 
  to remember twice the amount of basic functions (similar to Wordstar's ^Q)
- two key commands (starting with escape) for the less frequent functions
- fully functioning with all terminals (using termcap/terminfo); also works 
  with curses but that was only built in for a quick port to VMS; curses 
  should not be selected in unix versions for two reasons: the output 
  behaviour seems to be clumsier than with direct terminal control and 
  many unix curses implementations still dare to obstruct the use of 
  8-bit character sets
- fully functioning in windows which may be resized at any time and the 
  editor will react immediately and install a correct screen image; the 
  cursor stays at the point of text where it was
- can be positioned on screen with mouse if terminal sends control sequence
- no accidental quit without save or overwrite of file not read before without 
  prior prompting in any way of exiting/writing
- search functions, replacement functions with or without confirmation dialogue
- suspend command with automatic file saving
- ability to read text from standard input or to write it to standard output
- change working directory / change file name commands
- cut/copy/paste/write-paste-buffer-to-file commands with appending versions 
  and an inter-window paste (actually paste between invocations of mined)
- most significant error messages (as a contrast to usual unix commands)
- start at specified line number possible; view only mode available
- panic handling on external interrupts with attempts to save text
- runs on Unix, VMS, MSDOS


Thomas Wolff
Freie Universit:at Berlin
wolff@inf.fu-berlin.de