Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!ut-emx!mjl From: mjl@ut-emx.UUCP (Maurice LeBrun) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga Subject: CygnusEd Professional Keywords: Ced editors Emacs Message-ID: <10766@ut-emx.UUCP> Date: 24 Feb 89 21:54:47 GMT Organization: The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas Lines: 75 --- Being a hardened Emacs user (Gnu, MG, MicroEmacs, you name it), the decision to buy CygnusEd Pro was a sort of madness. I mean, I probably wouldn't switch, but I still had to see if it was as fast as everyone said. Well, once I got my copy, I fell in love with the speed, but couldn't part with my beloved emacs command set. There was the memacs macro set that came with distribution, but there were still *so* many differences. Finally I realized that the kill-commands (the biggest compatibility problem) could be mapped onto Emacsian ways by redefining all the kill commands as a (1) mark-block, (2) appropriate move (prev word, next word, end of line), and (3) cut. Then all the kills could be retrieved by a simple yank, though of course multiple kills are lost. To be fair, Emacs would benefit from a separate kill and copy buffer, but a separate word-kill and line-kill buffer (as in CED) is (IMHO) completely unnecessary. As you can guess, I eventually gave up on MG (what I had been using, though I still use it on the vax at work :-), and use CED exclusively. Overall, it is a *fine* product that makes me feel very fortunate to have an Amiga. However, since there is apparently an upgrade in the works, I would like to mention the following problems/gripes that I would like to see fixed: (1) There needs to be some method of viewing macro definitions. It is a real pain to write and debug complex macros without this capability. An easy way of doing this might be to allow macro definition from an ARexx script (I've had no luck with this). (2) The behavior of the end-of-line and beginning-of-line also make it difficult in macro writing. If the cursor's already there, the command FAILS (I don't see how the exhibited behavior can be considered a feature). (3) Rebinding arbitrary keys. Examples: Rebind )]} to insert-; cursor-left; find-matching-bracket; cursor-right (similar to emacs). To GET RID OF the CTRL- and CTRL- bindings. Why? Well, with an emacsian command set, CTRL- followed by a cursor move up or down is a fairly common operation. Press that cursor key just a bit too soon (before you've released the CTRL), and POOF! you're now at the beginning or end of the buffer. Extremely, incredibly annoying. To rebind SHIFT- and SHIFT-; I've just used these to move by word for too long to change now (so currently I don't use them). Some small ones: (4) Preserve case of file name. Here's the scenario. You have a file named TestCase.doc, and you invoke ced via 1> ed testcase.doc When you next save, it will be saved as 'testcase.doc'. This isn't UNIX, after all. (5) When invoking 'ed' on a file, it should auto expand the buffer for that file (when already open & auto-expand set), not go back to the previous one. (6) I'd like some way of binding to a key those operations which require an argument. 'Repeat key' is one.. I've had no luck mapping this to CTRL-u. Obviously, you do not want to bind the argument itself. (7) On search/replace's, the reply to the prompt always fails (i.e. == No) if typed in upper case, which should be fixed. This may not be a complete list, just those most important to me (or what happened to come to mind right now). Some of these may have already been discussed (I've heard that the asinine 'About' box on startup is being scratched). I really appreciate the support that ASDG is giving this product, and hope CED continues to improve. Maurice LeBrun | "A computer is like a hole in the ground Institute for Fusion Studies | into which you pour money" University of Texas at Austin | Internet: | - some poor, mistaken person, mjl@fusion.ph.utexas.edu | obviously wrong :-)