4.4 About Me
Text editing is a required tool for computer users.
It is worth spending the time
to select a text editor that will help you get the
most effective use of your time.
All UNIX systems have
ed (or ex) and vi text editors.
Many will have emacs, pico, and xedit.
All text editors have their place.
Some are better for specific applications than
others. Some require more resources to run.
ed requires very little. emacs and
xedit require the most. In this lab use pico,
xedit or a different UNIX editor.
pico and xedit each have (for me) a simple
and easy-to-learn user interface. These editors are the easiest to use.
ex (or ed) are line oriented text editors that I find
difficult to use.
-
ed is a line-oriented text editor. It looks a lot like
ex, another line oriented text editor.
It is the basis for the vi text editor.
It can be used from any terminal. (Do you still use a KSR-33?)
If you need to set up a system
or an account but cannot get a full screen editor to work, you
may need to use ed.
However, it is likely that just issuing one command (setenv TERM vt102)
can get a full-screen editor to work.
For the most part, you will want to use
a full-screen text editor such as vi, pico,
xedit, or emacs.
You can use all of the ed commands in vi, so it can be a
good place to start.
-
vi is one of the first full-screen text editors. I have been
told that the
author of vi now uses emacs. emacs and pico
may not be on your system though.
So initially you may need to use vi
until you can locate an easier-to-use
full screen editor. vi has various modes. Which mode you are in
does not always show on the screen.
It can be confusing to use. The system administration
command vipw, used to edit the password file /etc/passwd,
initially uses the vi text editor. elvis is a "clone"
of vi.
-
pico is a small, simple, easy-to-use, text editor.
It does not have a lot of fancy features.
It is always in insert mode. There are two lines of help
information at the bottom of the screen.
It does not handle large (multiple
megabyte) files very well.
It is available off of the Internet for free.
Installing
pico is fairly easy.
-
emacs is a very capable text editor, and very large.
On the gort system the emacs executable (1.8 Mbytes)
is more than 14 times as large as the pico executable (.13 Mbytes).
emacs does a lot of
things very well.
The full (free) distribution takes about 40 Mbytes on most systems.
For documentation
there are books, a tutorial, and an on-line (in emacs) hypertext manual.
-
xedit is a "simple" text editor.
It requires an X-11 system (from MIT) to run.
So, the text editor may be simple,
but the support needed is substantial.
At Pima Community College we currently have no X terminals available for students.
Please do the following:
- Log on to a UNIX system.
- Create, using the UNIX editor of your choice,
a file with the following information about
yourself. Place
each of the first 4 items on separate lines.
After the first 4 items, skip a line
and enter a 5 to 10 line paragraph about yourself.
Include your interests and
why you are taking this class.
Use the file name about.me
Your-full-name
day and month of your birthday NO year needed
My favorite color is color
My least favorite color is color
A paragraph - 5 to 10 lines about
yourself and/or your interests.
-
Print out the file about.me
username@gort ~ $lpr about.me
- Log off
username@gort ~ $exit
Turn in the printout from step 4.4 marked as follows:
Your-name
TABER CIS137
Lab 4.4: Editor #1 - About Me
Please turn your lab to Louis Taber or to Pima Community
College employee
in room A-115 of the Santa Rita Building.
Ask them to place it in the dark blue folder in
Louis Taber's mailbox.
Instructor: ltaber@pima.edu ** My new Home at GeoApps in Tucson ** The Pima College Site
