This is

as days pass by, by Stuart Langridge

. Here I write about many things. In the past I wrote about other things but the past is past. I write code for people to play with, I write about my life on Twitter, and I write here.

On I wrote Put a bullet in the editor, here comes the predator, on the subject of Uncategorized.

I need a new editor. I want something that has all the following characteristics:

  • Runs on Linux
  • Runs in a console/xterm
  • Has an X version (although I can live with 'xterm -e fooedit $FILENAME' if I must)
  • Syntax highlighting (including Python, HTML, and email, and ideally easily configurable)
  • Allows rebinding of keys easily (i.e., I should be able to map ^Q to quit by putting "^" followed by "Q" into my config file, not by having to work out which combination of weird octal keycodes my terminal sends when I hit ^Q)
  • Is not modeful (vim in insertmode does not qualify)
  • Is completely scriptable in Python, or, failing that:
  • Allows me to pass either the whole file or a highlighted area through an external command, and allows me to bind a key to do this with named commands directly (so I can hit one bound key and have the whole file passed to an external command I specifed in my config file, not have to enter the command every time)
  • Comes with a sane set of default keybindings (including highlighting text with shift-arrows) so I don't have to rebind the world
  • Is not Emacs

I am open to suggestions for anything that meets these criteria. I've been looking for the perfect editor for, ooh, two years or so. One day I'll find it...

sil

Pete: nedit, as you say, is X11 only, which is no good. I spend a lot of time (all the time I’m at work, in fact) sshed into my home machine, so my editor has to be console-capable.Hixie: the reason it says up there “is not Emacs” is because Emacs doesn’t, to my mind, come with a sane set of default keybindings, so I’d have to rebind everything. Now, I know some people like the Emacs bindings, but not me, and I don’t want to spend ages understanding Emacs to do it; yes, I don’t doubt that there are drop-in “wordstar-keybindings.el” files or whatever out there, but I don’t understand how to use that sort of thing, and life, I fear, is too short to learn…

Ian Hickson

XEmacs does all the above.

Pete Dunshee

Have you tried nedit? [www.nedit.org] It has support for syntax highlighting, scripting in python, and key binding. It only runs in X11, but I’ve been using it for years and have been extremely satisfied.

This website belongs to Stuart Langridge. Contact details are available. Don't eat yellow snow. Valid HTML5, at least in theory, except for the bits that aren't because I'm that futuristic that I'm ahead of the spec, oh yes. HTML5 help from Bruce Lawson, among others. Fonts from the superb FontSquirrel. End.