IE

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 IE is a screen editor, based on single keystroke commands, and immediate entry of text.

 Author:   Richard Marshall
 Manual:   http://history.dcs.ed.ac.uk/archive/os/APM/MANUAL/IE.TEX.html
 Family:   MiniComputerFamily EdinburghFamily
 Platform: VMS, EMAS, APM-OS
 License:  Commercial

I don't know if the IE which I found here (with an empty Wiki page) is the same IE that I am familiar with, but I can tell you a little about the editor called IE that I know about...

This was an editor written by Richard Marshall at Edinburgh University around 1978 or 1979. A rather mangled attempt to convert the TeX manual source into HTML is online at http://history.dcs.ed.ac.uk/archive/os/APM/MANUAL/IE.TEX.html and the source of the editor, written in the Imp language, has been located on an old floppy disk and will be put online soon. The editor is also callable as an external procedure, with an interface definition here: http://history.dcs.ed.ac.uk/archive/os/APM/INC/IE.IMP.html

IE was not a portable editor in the sense of being able to use multiple input devices, although it did run on several operating systems (VMS, and EMAS and APM-OS - the latter two being written at Edinburgh). However IE's "big thing" was that it bound just about every conceivable screen editor command to one of the function keys of the Visual Technologies Visual 200 terminals (an extended DEC VTxxx clone). This style of editor was either loved or hated by Edinburgh people; those who loved the regularity and structure of the local command line editor, ecce, usually detested IE. But people who could never learn Ecce's programmable command lines just loved IE! I think it was one of those classic right brain/left brain dichotomies! Edinburgh's classic editor, ecce, is also well documented and will be added to this Wiki shortly.

-- GrahamToal?


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Last edited December 25, 2007 11:04 pm (diff)
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