Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watmath!clyde!cbosgd!gwspc!cbcsta!n8emr!lwv From: lwv@n8emr.UUCP (Larry W. Virden) Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple Subject: Re: AMACS vs MicroEmacs Message-ID: <374@n8emr.UUCP> Date: 12 Dec 87 21:42:08 GMT References: <8712112336.AA18794@crash.cts.com> Reply-To: lwv@n8emr.UUCP (Larry W. Virden) Organization: N8EMR's Ham BBS (HBBS), Columbus,Ohio Lines: 50 Obviously MicroEmacs doesnt need MY words to defend it, but for the uninitiated, MicroEmacs is a free editor, written in C, which currently is distributed to run on all manner of Unix machines, Amigas, Atari's and MS-Dos machines. Someone put together a half hearted port to the Mac, with only a small portion of the full functionality of the editor, and made it available about a year ago. It was one of the cheapest means for a programmer to get at a 'real' editor (excuse the expression). This was based on a 3.8 or earlier version. MicroEmacs is now at version 3.9e. The current MicroEmacs as distributed does NOT support the Mac. This may show up in 3.9f or later - then again, it may not. It Supports more programmable features than ANY editor currently available on the IIgs. I dont know much about Mac editors but would guess that the same situation exists there. This program allows you to write macros for any function keys that your terminal / computer has - and you have all the source so that function key can mean anything that you want it to - for instance Open-Apple and lower case, OA-Upper case, Option-lower case, Option Upper case aOpen and Option and control characters, etc. could ALL be function keys on the IIgs if it were ported to this machine. In environments where it is supported, one can escape to the shell, run other commands and place the output in a window (oh, I forgot to mention, quite a large number of windows and buffers can be open at once), or you can feed the contents of a window TO a command and put the results in that place. You can define all sorts of sophisticated macros using a multi-line macro language. There are all sorts of modes built in, such as C mode (making the entry and editing of C code easier), etc. All in all, quite an impressive editor. Since there are over 10,000 users of this editor (my guesstimate looking at the high level of activity on usenet about it) there are lots of folks finding fixes and adding new code. The author himself posts updates quite often and incorporates new features as they become popular. The biggest advantage to having the source code is that, especially in this case, it is portable enough code that with some work one should be able to get the program up on most any computer of a decent size. The executable is less than 73,000 bytes on a Vax 11/785 running Ultrix 1.2. It is VEYR fast coming up. You can reconfigure all the keys to you liking - make it look and act like freewriter if you want! All in all, the only BAD aspect of this program for IIgs owners is that it has not been ported to the IIgs yet. Once someone takes that task in hand - and a fellow I know on CIS says that he is looking into this - then even WE will be able to get on the band wagon. Yours for equal time. -- Larry W. Virden 75046,606 (CIS) 674 Falls Place, Reynoldsburg, OH 43068 (614) 864-8817 cbosgd!n8emr!lwv (UUCP) cbosgd!n8emr!lwv@PSUVAX1 (BITNET) We haven't inherited the world from our parents, but borrowed it from our children.