T (A Tiny Editor)

(C) Copyright IBM Corporation 1987, 1993 T v2.20 - A Tiny Editor ======================= Changes From Previous Version ----------------------------- The major change between the previous version (v2.00) and this version (v2.20) is the support for editing lines longer than 256 characters; lines may now be up to 65,528 characters long. This is particularly useful with OS/2, where lines in CONFIG.SYS are often longer than 256 characters. Also please note there is a change to the operation of the MARK RIGHT and MARK LEFT functions and there are a few changes in the custom definition file syntax, to provide improved readability and consistency. Introduction ------------ There are times even in today's world of multi-megabyte personal computers when a quick, simple and small text editor is of benefit. With a .EXE file of less than 10,000 bytes T is designed to fit that role. For the DOS user trying to cram more and more into 640K the advantages of small size are obvious, for the OS/2 user the speed and ability to run when even Presentation Manager is unavailable may prove just as useful. This document gives a very brief introduction to the Tiny Editor. Refer to the full documentation in T.DOC for all the details of the editor's commands and keyboard functions. T.DOC also describes how T may be customised to suit individual preferences for things like screen colours and keyboard layouts. Installation ------------ The only file required to use T is the single executable: T.EXE for DOS or T2.EXE for OS/2. This should be placed in the current directory or in a subdirectory listed in the PATH. The help file THELP.HLP gives a summary of the editor's features. It may be useful to have this available the first few times T is used. Pressing the F1 help key will attempt to load and show this help file. Simple Editing -------------- To start the editor just enter the command T from a DOS prompt or T2 from an OS/2 prompt. This command can be followed by any number of filenames which will be loaded ready for editing. If no filenames are given a new empty file will be created. The cursor starts on the editor's command line (the third line up from the bottom). Any valid T command may be entered on the command line and is executed when the Enter key is pressed. Some valid commands include: EDIT - To load a new file into the editor. FILE - To write the currently displayed file back to disk. PRINT - To print the currently displayed file. DOS - To run a DOS or OS/2 command. The cursor can be moved between the command line and the file's data area by pressing the Esc key. In the data area it can be moved anywhere between the "Top of File" and "End of File" markers. At any point new text can be entered or the existing text changed. To add a new line press Ctrl-Enter and to delete a line press Ctrl-Backspace.  One or more lines can be marked by pressing Alt-L on the first and last lines of the block to be marked. Marked lines can be moved by pressing Alt-M, copied with Alt-C or deleted with Alt-D. The current line can be repeated with Alt-R, split at the cursor position with Alt-S and joined with the following line with Alt-J. If more than one file is being edited at once the "ring" of files can be cycled around by pressing F10 or F11. Editing several files at once is particularly useful in conjunction with marked lines, as lines from one file can be moved or copied into a different file. When all the required changes have been made the file can be written back to disk by pressing F2 and quitted with F3. Alternatively F4 will perform both these actions in one go. If you decide to abandon all the changes made just press F3 and answer the question "Throw away changes?" with a "y". To search for a particular piece of text, switch onto the command line and enter the command: /text T will search from the current cursor position forwards to find the next occurrence of the "text". Normally T requires an exact-case match (i.e. it would not find TEXT or even Text); to force an any-case match add a "c" option to the command like this: /text/c To do a search and replace, again switch onto the command line and this time use the command: c/this/that This will find the next occurrence of "this" and ask a question "Yes/No/Go/Last/Quit?". Respond with a Y, N, G, L or Q as required: Yes - to change "this" to "that" and search for the next "this". No - to not make the change, but continue the search for the next "this". Go - to make this change and all subsequent changes up to the end of the file without further prompting. Last - to make this change and to stop searching. Quit - to not make this change and to stop searching. To make all the changes straightaway, without prompting add the "*" option to the change command like so: c/this/that/* Customisation ------------- T may be customised to change the colours, keyboard assignments and one or two other settings. Take a look at the TKEYS.DEF file which describes the standard configuration. If you want to alter it, make a copy of TKEYS.DEF and edit it to reflect your required changes. Then run the TKEY.EXE customiser program to update the editor, like this: TKEY TKEYS.DEF T.EXE ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- by: Tim Baldwin IBM UK Laboratories Ltd. Hursley Park Winchester, Hampshire, England. Internet: baldy@vnet.ibm.com October 1993