Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!decwrl!labrea!rutgers!njin!princeton!phoenix!haahr
From: haahr@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Paul Gluckauf Haahr)
Newsgroups: comp.editors
Subject: Re: Writing Editors
Summary: see rob pike's sam paper
Message-ID: <3722@phoenix.Princeton.EDU>
Date: 21 Sep 88 20:56:12 GMT
References: <2892@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV>
Reply-To: haahr@princeton.edu (Paul Gluckauf Haahr)
Organization: Princeton University, Princeton NJ
Lines: 30

in article <2892@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV>
	umalir@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV (Rodrigo Umali) writes:
> Could someone point me to some good books on writing editors? 
> (Specifically: what data structures are used; input/output;
> aesthetics; special features.) I suppose I could read the emacs 
> source, but I haven't learned emacs (yet!).

i would suggest rob pike's paper on the sam editor.  sam is a
modeless, bitmapped mouse based editor with a very sophisticated
command language.  the paper is

	%A Rob Pike
	%T The Text Editor Sam
	%J Software -- Practice and Experience
	%V 17
	%N 11
	%D November 1987
	%P 813-845

the paper is both an explanation of how to use sam
and a description of the implementation.

sam (source) is available from the at&t toolchest.
i believe that the most recent version will run on
5620s, 630s, suns, or X windows.  (it can be run on
a dumb terminal or from a shell script with only the
command language).

paul haahr
princeton!haahr haahr@princeton.edu haahr@pucc.bitnet