README for vile, version 9.3
-----------------------------
vile is a text editor which is extremely compatible with vi in terms
of "finger feel". in addition, it has extended capabilities in many areas,
notably multi-file editing and viewing, key rebinding, real X window
system support, an optional embedded perl interpreter, and robust
support for non-Unix hosts.
the authors of vile are Paul Fox, Tom Dickey, and Kevin Buettner.
many patches have been contributed by a lot of users. we thank them.
more recent additions to this README appear near the bottom. that is, most
of the newest stuff is at the end, not up here where you are.
visit
ftp://invisible-island.net/vile
ftp://ftp.phred.org/pub/vile
to be sure it's still the latest.
impatient? just type "./configure; make", and get a cup of coffee, decaf
if necessary.
want X11 support? you'd better look at doc/config.doc, although
"./configure --with-screen=x11"; make" may well do what you want.
want PC support? look for precompiled binaries at the various ftp sites.
want to build vile on a PC host? refer to the file README.PC .
want VMS support? you'll need to build vile yourself. refer to the
file README.VMS .
if you like vile, and wish to be informed of new releases, let me
know -- i maintain a mailing list for that purpose. don't worry -- the
volume won't fill your inbox.
paul fox, pgf@foxharp.boston.ma.us (original author)
kevin buettner, kev@primenet.com
tom dickey, dickey@herndon4.his.com (current maintainer)
------------------------------------------------------
Up-to-date copies of vile, including executables for DOS, Win32 and
OS/2 are found at
ftp://invisible-island.net/vile/
which is mirrored at
ftp://ftp.phred.org/pub/vile/
Development patches are found at
ftp://invisible-island.net/vile/patches/
ftp://ftp.phred.org/pub/vile/patches/
In addition, we have distributed copies at other sites, including
metalabs.unc.edu (Linux), hobbes.nmsu.edu (OS/2) and the VMS Freeware
CDROM's.
------------------------------------------------------
Send bug reports to
bugs@vile.cx
Requests to be put on the announcement list should go to
announce-request@vile.cx
------------------------------------------------------
extracts from the original README, from February, 1992:
VILE -- VI Like Emacs: a vi workalike put together from Micro-Emacs by Paul Fox
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This editor grew out of a frustration that although lots of
eager programmers have tackled rewrites of Emacs, with new and
better features (not to mention free source), I've not seen
anything similar done with the Second True Editor. (The
First, of course, being /bin/ed)
...
vile retains the multiple buffer/multiple window features of
MicroEMACS, but the "finger-feel", if you will, is very much
that of vi. It is definitely not a clone, in that some
substantial stuff is missing, and the screen doesn't look
quite the same. But what matters most is that one's "muscle
memory" does the right thing to the text in front of you, and
that is what vile tries to do for vi users. THIS IS NOT A
"CLONE"! But it feels good. (Put another way, the things
that you tend to type over and over probably work -- things
done less frequently, like configuring a .exrc file, are quite
different.)
...
The collective developers of Micro-Emacs should be
complimented that the changes were as easy as they were.
...
Paul G. Fox June, 1991, and February, 1992
p.s. By the way, I'm _not_ the same Paul Fox who wrote Crisp, the Brief
work-alike.
-----------------------
September, 1992
I don't have much to add to the original README -- vile has gotten a lot
better since I first released it, thanks to a lot of users and a lot of
bug reports. It compiles and runs without modification on most major UNIXes,
and under DOS. It offers vi finger feel, and most (not all) of its features.
I hope it fills someone's need out there. -pgf 9/92
(Special thanks to Dave Lemke and Pete Rucszinski, for X and DOS support,
and (in no particular order) to Eric Krohn, Willem Kasdorp, J.C.Webber,
Warren Vik, Julia Harper, Chris Sherman, Thomas Woo, Yanek Martinson, Miura
Masahiro, Tom Dickey for lots of bug reports and suggestions and patience.)
------------------------------
April, 1993
Well, here's an update on vile. The first release was a long time
ago (a couple of years?). Tom Dickey has been contributing a _whole_ lot
of good changes. vile now runs on VMS, and is much more stable on DOS
thanks to Tom. For me, vile is becoming an "old" program -- I first worked
on it in 1989 sometime. So it's been fun to have someone contributing
fixes so energetically. Thanks Tom.
One thing that's changed since I first started vile is that "lots of eager
programmers" have now tackled rewrites of vi. There are several good work-
alikes out there: elvis (the "king" :-), xvi, vim, stevie, and recent
versions of vip-mode in GNU emacs. [add "nvi" to that list. and whatever
happened to xvi? -pgf 12/94] From what little I've used any of
these, they all seem like real good programs. vile feels different from
most of them, mainly due to its roots in MicroEmacs. You may or may not
like it. If you don't, try one of the others. There's certainly no reason
to not have a vi-like editor on just about any machine you choose. (yeah,
I know -- I'm assuming you _want_ a vi-like editor... :-) Enjoy.
Oh yes -- building it. On UNIX, type "make", and choose one of the predefined
targets. Like "make linux". [ not anymore -- use "configure; make" -pgf 12/94]
DOS makefiles are named after the compiler they support: makefile.tbc for
Turbo-C, makefile.wat. There is support in "makefile" for Microsoft-C, but
it's next to useless -- if anyone puts together a good "nmake" makefile,
could you pass it along? [that support isn't there anymore. -pgf 12/94]
The Watcom C/386 v9.0 compiler should also work -- the makefile to use is
makefile.wat.
The latest version of vile is usually available for ftp at "ftp.cayman.com",
in the pub/vile directory. [not anymore -- it's at "id.wing.net" in the
"pub/pgf/vile" directory. -pgf 12/94] Sometimes there's a compiled DOS
binary there too. I don't maintain a mailing list, or anything like that
to inform folks of new releases -- you just sort of have to check once in a
while, or send me mail... [ I've set up a mailing list -- contact me to be
added -pgf 7/93]
paul
------------------------------
July, 1993
More new features: infinite undo, modification time checking, and, at
long last, primitive support for the :map command. [:map is now fully
functional -pgf, 12/94] I've also received patches that let vile compile
for DOS with the DJ GCC compiler. Have I mentioned filename completion?
Tom Dickey provided that and variable/modename/command completion too.
If you would like to be informed, via email, of new vile releases (bearing
in mind that the newest release may be _more_ likely to be buggy, rather
than _less_), please send me mail, and I will add you to my list. The email
will probably contain a capsule summary of the most recent changes to the
code.
Thanks to Tuan Dang for the Watcom and DJ GCC work. I don't know much
about djgpp, the DOS port of djgcc, but take a look at makefile.djg.
pgf
-------------------------------
March, 1994
The X support in xvile has been given a huge boost with contributions from
Kevin Buettner -- scrollbars, Motif widget support make it feel like a real
application... We now have rectangular regions. DOS support is getting
better all the time. The major version number got bumped to 4 somewhere
along the line, because Tom and I were getting tired of 3. There are quite
a few new "modes", some to support vi functionality, some altogether new.
We should have keyboard selections and highlighted regions soon...
pgf, pgf@foxharp.boston.ma.us
-------------------------------
December, 1994
hmmmm -- lets see. new stuff. see the CHANGES and help files for details.
- vile is now completely autoconf'ed -- you should be able to type
either "./configure; make" or "./configure --with-screen=x11" to build
it on any (unix-like) platform.
- :map and :map! are now much more complete, but still by no means
done. expect to have to edit your favorite macros to make
them work.
- :abbr now works.
- along with proper :map support comes proper function key support.
function keys defined for your terminal in the termcap/info database
are now premapped and can be bound to as #-1 etc. so those of
you with ESC [ 10 ~ style function keys should be happy now.
- mouse clicks which move the cursor now count as proper motion
commands in both xvile and vile-in-an-xterm. this means, for
instance, that '' or `` will get you back to where you were before
you clicked the mouse, and you can apply operators to mouse
movements. for example -- click the mouse somewhere, hit 'd' to
start a delete operation, and click the mouse somewhere else. the
text between the two mouse-click locations will be deleted.
- on-line help (just a single line) for every function, available
with describe-{bindings,function,key} commands.
- new modes to better control beeping and the "working..." message.
- autowrite mode now supported, on a global or buffer-by-buffer basis.
- popup windows now adjust their size to their contents -- less screen
space is wasted for small window, and more is used for big windows.
- file and command completion is now more emacs/bash/tcsh-like, in
that possible choices are shown when you hit a second TAB key. this
can be tuned via a new mode, "popup-choices"
- "quoted" motions, which highlight the text they will act on. type
a 'q', and start moving around, then type another 'q'.
- various fixes to the macro language, for core dumps and usability.
- file.bak and file~ backup files now supported.
- infinite (?) screen sizes should now be supported under X.
- it's now possible to break lines by putting ^M in the replacement
pattern.
- selections, the modelines, and the cursor, under xvile, can all
have different colors.
- color support for termcap, at least on the linux console.
- put'ing from registers (i.e. 'p' and 'P' commands) should be much
faster.
- multiple (error) messages arising from running a macro or a startup
file will now accumulate in a new popup window.
- a simple, probably incomplete file-locking protocol is available,
but is not compiled in by default. the organization which
contributed the code (Baan Development) uses it to aid their
multi-user development. turn on OPT_LCKFILES in estruct.h and
"set usefilelock" in your .vilerc to play with it.
- Windows NT support -- console mode only. anyone want to port this
to the Windows95 console? it's probably not hard, though i haven't
looked into it very hard.
- lots of bug fixes
-------------------------------
Febrary, 1995
xvile now supports color attributes, which means we can do some
primitive syntax coloring of C programs, using the external filter,
"c-filt". this is still pretty new stuff. expect it to get better
with age.
-------------------------------
November, 1995
lots of new users in the last year, due to better advertising
and inclusion in some of the big linux and freebsd archives.
support for NT and OS/2 has gotten much better, and lots of
little bugs have been fixed, and features added. Win32 support
is very good these days, thanks mostly to the efforts of Rick
Sladkey.
-------------------------------
June, 1996
gee, i don't remember _what_ we've done recently. enjoy.
-------------------------------
September, 1996
tom dickey has volunteered to take over releases, and maintaining
"official" sources. i'll still contribute, but more as part of the
"audience". tom has done a _huge_ amount of work over the years
on vile -- i _really_ appreciate it... -pgf
-------------------------------
May, 1998
vile 8.0 is released. Major new features include: an embedded
perl interpreter (available on Unix and Win32 hosts), an editable
mini-buffer, majormodes, enhancement of user-defined procedures to
the point that they may now be bound to user-defined keystrokes,
tag completion, and addition of a win32 gui (called winvile).
-------------------------------
Oct, 1998
vile 8.1 and 8.2 are released. These are primarily bugfix releases.
Refer to the CHANGES files for details. Tom Dickey continues to
improve winvile, which now supports scroll bars and two new
command-line options that control the editor's geometry and font.
Apr, 1999
vile 8.3 is released. This release includes much enhanced syntax
filter capabilities. The filters are now much faster, mainly because
vile uses a new command attribute-from-filter to apply their output
directly as attributes to the buffer rather than modifying (and
allowing undo).
The organization of the keyword files for the syntax filters is now
associated with majormodes. Syntax filters are defined for most of the
predefined majormodes which include:
adamode jsmode perlmode
awkmode keymode sccsmode
batmode latexmode shmode
cmode lexmode sqlmode
cshmode m4mode tcmode
cwebmode mailmode tclmode
dclmode makemode timode
diffmode mmsmode txtmode
htmlmode nrmode vilemode
imakemode pasmode yaccmode
javamode
Other changes of note (this is not an exhaustive list):
+ removed/rewrote code which would prevent us from making vile available
under more liberal licensing.
+ winvile and xvile have icons.
+ new macro directives added, including:
~local ~hidden ~with ~endwith ~elsewith
+ many VMS bug fixes and enhancements. 8.3 is a keeper if you use VMS.
Nov, 1999
vile 8.4/9.0 is released, distributed with GPL licensing.
In addition to improvements to syntax highlighting, e.g., user-definable
color schemes, vile's macro language has been extended
+ procedures can be parameterized.
+ several new functions simplify handling of external filenames, and
parsing strings.
Further improvements have been made to winvile: drag/drop, file open
dialog, better integration with the Windows Explorer and DevStudio.
Jan, 2000
vile 9.1 is released. Highlights since 9.0:
+ continued improvement of syntax coloring (much work here)
+ add an Exporter-like mechanism to Perl5 interface. Instead
of exposing a module's functions to the caller, it exposes them to
vile as registered commands. By renaming the extensions as `.pm',
and making some minor changes to use Vile::Exporter, an extension
becomes visible by simply adding:
use extension;
to vileinit.pl. There is also provision for only including some
commands provided by the extension, and for overriding the keybinding
defined by the developer (documented in the attached module).
Of course you can still say:
require extension;
and do the registering yourself if you so choose.
+ vile's perl interface includes a new Vile::Window module, which may
be used to manipulate vile windows. Examples of the use of this
module may be found in winops.pm.
+ rename most .pl files to .pm (makefile.in).
+ add/improve several perl scripts, including
- capture.pl - implements a perl version of capture-command. This
version incrementally updates the window however.
- shell.pl - revised to use IO:Pty instead of Comm.pl (which
seems to be no longer maintained).
- Manual.pm - display embedded POD documentation.
+ implement watchfd support for the termcap/terminfo versions of vile.
+ added autocolor feature, which updates color syntax highlighting when
the keyboard is inactive for a specified period.
+ Vileserv now also works for vile.
+ changed vmsbuild.com to accept a compiler specification on the VMS
command line, which is much more convenient than editing the build
script by hand. compiler defaults to VAXC on Vax hosts and DECC on
Alpha hosts.
+ Several Win32-specific improvements:
- add the Win32 common dialog "save as" feature to both console
vile and winvile.
- modify directory.pm and dirlist.pm to make them work on win32, i.e.,
by not executing portions that will not work (such as mime types).
- implement autoscrolling feature for winvile, which makes the buffer
scroll in the direction where the mouse leaves the window,
automatically extending selection highlighting.
+ modify backspacelimit mode to allow backspacing through a newline
when nobackspacelimit is specified.
+ add single-quoted strings, which eliminate the need for escaping
backslash (useful in startup/command files)
+ Added binding / support for ^X-_ aka
"historical-buffer-to-current-window".
+ modify logic in ins_any_time() to interpret control characters which
are bound to GOAL or MOTION commands rather than inserting them
without quoting. This allows ^E and ^Y as commands within an insert.
Oct, 2000
vile 9.2 is released. Highlights since 9.1 (modulo bug fixes):
+ improve performance of syntax highlighting with configure option
for compiling-in any of the syntax filters. Use the configure
--with-builtin-filters option. Both internal (built-in) and
external filters are supported.
+ add key binding functions for the different editing modes (insert,
command, minibuffer and default), making it simpler to bind a
space or tab to a given function without having it confused for a
function while in insert mode.
+ Vileserv now uses the registry, so 'perl "use Vileserv"' in your
.vilerc automagically adds the commands startserv, stopserv, and
vileserv-help.
+ added gdb.pm, which runs gdb in a vile window and tracks changes
in editor. (Must be used with shell.pm.)
Several Win32-specific improvements:
+ allow pasting of one line of text into mini-buffer.
+ winopen, winopen-nocd, winsave, and winsave-nocd accept an
optional directory argument, which specifies the initial directory
opened by the Open/Save Win32 common dialogs.
Other Modes:
+ add insert-exec mode to control logic in ins_any_time() which
interprets control characters which are bound to GOAL or MOTION
commands rather than inserting them without quoting (see 9.0a and
9.0b changes). This restores the default behavior, since some
users had control characters bound to a function which was then
executed.
+ add unique-buffers mode, which does dev/inode checking to be sure
files aren't edited more than once.
Syntax Filters:
+ add syntax filters for sed, imake
+ implement abbreviations for syntax keywords, using '*' as the
default delimiter.
+ filters now attribute multi-line regions when appropriate, e.g.,
multi-line comments in C.
Macros and Scripting Support:
+ add &dquery function which prompts for input with a given default
value.
+ implement function &error, which returns true if its argument was
an ERROR token. Modify built-in functions to return ERROR if an
argument was ERROR.
+ add variable $filename-expr, to specify the actual pattern used
for %F in [Error Expressions]. On DOS and Win32, this is
initialized to a more complex pattern, to accommodate drive
letters.
+ make the ~local directive work for modes.
+ add ~trace directive, which sets or reports the value of the
$debug variable. Use this to trace into internal buffer [Trace].
+ add macros/shifts.rc, which implements left/right shifting of
words in the current line to align with the cursor.
Other Changes:
+ modify color support in xvile to allow the pre-8.3s color scheme
as a special case: setting bcolor to fcolor makes xvile use the
bcolorN resources on syntax-highlighted text rather than the color
selected by bcolor (which is actually taken from the fcolorN
resource in this case).
+ added pushd, popd, dirs commands with accompanying [DirStack].
June, 2002
vile 9.3 is released. Highlights since 9.2 (aside from bug fixes):
+ add dirs-clear and dirs-add commands
+ added select-all and selection-clear commands.
+ change default for $XSHELLFLAGS from "-c" to "-e", which matches the
documentation for $xshell-flags.
+ add write-all-buffers command; writes all buffers whether modified or not
+ add setenv (set-environment-variable) command.
+ added a swap-title mode and $title-format variable.
+ if the user specifies ":w!", and the file is not writable, vile will
(try to) temporarily chmod the file for writable access.
+ added $findpath and $find-cmd state variables and, on win32 and unix
hosts, modified capturecmd (aka ^X-!) to support find operations that
span directory tree(s).
+ reimplement ":args" command to accept a filename expression.
+ add commands "ww!" and "wall!", to respectively write all changed
buffers and write all buffers, using the "w!" behavior of ignoring
readonly file permissions.
+ implement three functions for working with timestamps: &ftime, &stime,
and &date, respectively for file modification time, system time, and
formatted date/time.
+ extend insert-exec to allow ^A and ^X prefixes to be interpreted
in insert mode
+ implemented support for reading/writing Macintosh files, i.e.,
recordseparator=cr. New commands set-rs-cr, set-rs-lf, set-rs-crlf
extend the set-unix-mode and set-dos-mode commands to include Mac's.
+ add &stoken function, which searches for a token in a string, e.g.,
"perl" in $cfgopts by
&stoken "perl" "," $cfgopts
+ add &translate function, e.g.,
&trans "," " " "a,b"
to change commas to spaces
+ add commands leading-detab-til and leading-entab-til, binding those
to ^X-' ' and ^X-^I. Most of the logic was available internally.
+ implemented '< and '> marks, which denote the limits of the
selection.
Perl Interface:
+ add a new command to shell.pm called "xterm", which starts a shell in one
of vile's buffers just as "start-shell" already does, but also starts an
xterm through which one may (also) interact with the shell. The shell
output (and echoed input) is displayed in both the xterm and a vile
buffer.
+ implement perl/Breadcrumbs.pm
+ add perl/Help.pm
+ add perl/CaptHook.pm, which provides useful wrappers for Vile's
"hook" variables.
Win32-Specific:
+ added basic win32 printing for winvile
+ modify ntconio.c so that default fcolor is 7
+ change paste in winvile to insert at DOT rather than after. Also,
when pasting in insert mode, set DOT to the end of the inserted
text.
+ improve paste-by-right-mouse-click operation in winvile by NOT
setting the insertion point at the position where the mouse happens
to be when executing the right-click, but rather pasting at the
current DOT (i.e. right-mouse-click never sets DOT).
+ when popup-menu is inactive, if text is selected, right-click copies
to w32clipboard; otherwise right-click pastes from w32clipboard.
+ added icursor (insertion cursor) mode.
Syntax Filters:
+ add Verlog and ECLiPSe (Prolog dialect) filters
+ add syntax filter for BASIC, and majormodes basicmode and
Visual Basic (vbmode).
Other Changes:
+ add 'mouse' mode for OS/2 (CSet), to disable mouse when not wanted.
+ add $prompt variable, to allow changing the command-line prompt.
-------------------------------
$Header: /usr/build/vile/vile/RCS/README,v 1.88 2002/06/26 00:25:57 tom Exp $
-------------------------------
