# JOE - Joe's Own Editor [TOC] ## Syntax __joe [global-options] [ [local-options] filename ]...__
__jstar [global-options] [ [local-options] filename ]...__
__jmacs [global-options] [ [local-options] filename ]...__
__rjoe [global-options] [ [local-options] filename ]...__
__jpico [global-options] [ [local-options] filename ]...__ ## Description JOE is a powerful console screen editor. It has a "mode-less" user interface which is similar to many user-friendly PC editors. Users of Micro-Pro's WordStar or Borland's "Turbo" languages will feel at home. JOE is a full featured UNIX screen-editor though, and has many features for editing programs and text. JOE also emulates several other editors. JSTAR is a close imitation of WordStar with many "JOE" extensions. JPICO is a close imitation of the Pine mailing system's PICO editor, but with many extensions and improvements. JMACS is a GNU-EMACS imitation. RJOE is a restricted version of JOE, which allows you to edit only the files specified on the command line. Although JOE is actually five different editors, it still requires only one executable, but one with five different names. The name of the editor with an "rc" appended gives the name of JOE's initialization file, which determines the personality of the editor. JOE is free software; you can distribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation. JOE is available over the Internet from . ## Usage To start the editor, type __joe__ followed by zero or more names of files you want to edit. Each file name may be preceded by a local option setting (see the local options table which follows). Other global options, which apply to the editor as a whole, may also be placed on the command line (see the global options table which follows). If you are editing a new file, you can either give the name of the new file when you invoke the editor, or in the editor when you save the new file. A modified syntax for file names is provided to allow you to edit program output, standard input/output, or sections of files or devices. See the section [Filenames](#filenames) below for details. Once you are in the editor, you can type in text and use special control-character sequences to perform other editing tasks. To find out what the control-character sequences are, read the rest of this man page or type __^K H__ for help in the editor. Now for some obscure computer-lore: The __^__ means that you hold down the __Control__ key while pressing the following key (the same way the __Shift__ key works for uppercase letters). A number of control-key sequences are duplicated on other keys, so that you don't need to press the control key: __Esc__ will work in place of __^\[__, __Del__ will work in place of __^?__, __Backspace__ will work in place of __^H__, __Tab__ will work in place of __^I__, __Return__ or __Enter__ will work in place of __^M__ and __Linefeed__ will work in place of __^J__. Some keyboards may give you trouble with some control keys. __^___, __^^__ and __^@__ can usually be entered without pressing shift (i.e., try __^-__, __^6__ and __^2__). Other keyboards may reassign these to other keys. Try: __^.__, __^,__ and __^/__. __^Space__ can usually be used in place of __^@__. __^\\__ and __^\]__ are interpreted by many communication programs, including telnet and kermit. Usually you just hit the key twice to get it to pass through the communication program. On some keyboards, holding the __Alt__ key down while pressing another key is the same as typing __Esc__ before typing the other key. Once you have typed __^K H__, the first help window appears at the top of the screen. You can continue to enter and edit text while the help window is on. To page through other topics, hit __Esc ,__ and __Esc .__ (that is, __Esc ,__ and __Esc .__). Use __^K H__ to dismiss the help window. You can customize the keyboard layout, the help screens and a number of behavior defaults by copying JOE's initialization file (usually __/etc/joe/joerc__) to __.joerc__ in your home directory and then by modifying it. See the section [joerc](#joerc) below. To have JOE used as your default editor for e-mail and News, you need to set the __EDITOR__ and __VISUAL__ environment variables in your shell initialization file (__.cshrc__ or __.profile__) to refer to JOE (JOE usually resides as __/usr/bin/joe__). There are a number of other obscure invocation parameters which may have to be set, particularly if your terminal screen is not updating as you think it should. See the section [Environment variables](#evariables) below. ## Command Line Options These options can also be specified in the joerc file. Local options can be set depending on the file-name extension. Programs (.c, .h or .p extension) usually have autoindent enabled. Wordwrap is enabled on other files, but rc files have it disabled. An option is enabled when it's given like this: -wordwrap An option is disabled when it's given like this: --wordwrap Some options take arguments. Arguments are given like this: -lmargin 5 The following global options may be specified on the command line: * asis
Characters with codes above 127 will be sent to the terminal as-is, instead of as inverse of the corresponding character below 128. If this does not work, check your terminal server. This option has no effect if UTF-8 encoding is used.
* assume_256color
Assume ANSI-like terminal emulator supports 256 colors even if termcap entry says it doesn't.
* assume_color
Assume ANSI-like terminal emulator supports color even if termcap entry says it doesn't.
* autoswap
Automatically swap __^K B__ with __^K K__ if necessary to mark a legal block during block copy/move commands.
* backpath path
Sets path to a directory where all backup files are to be stored. If this is unset (the default) backup files are stored in the directory containing the file.
* baud nnn
Set the baud rate for the purposes of terminal screen optimization (overrides value reported by stty). JOE inserts delays for baud rates below 19200, which bypasses tty buffering so that typeahead will interrupt the screen output. Scrolling commands will not be used for 38400 baud and above. This is useful for X-terms and other console ttys which really aren't going over a serial line.
* beep
Enable beeps when edit commands return errors, for example when the cursor goes past extremes.
* break_links
When enabled, JOE first deletes the file before writing it in order to break hard-links and symbolic-links.
* break_hardlinks
When enabled, and the file is not a symbolic links, JOE first deletes the file before writing it in order to break hard-links.
* brpaste
When JOE starts, send command to the terminal emulator that enables "bracketed paste mode" (but only if the terminal seems to have the ANSI command set). In this mode, text pasted into the window is bracketed with ESC \[ 2 0 0 ~ and ESC \[ 2 0 1 ~.
* colors __scheme__
Sets the color scheme.
* columns nnn
Set number of columns in terminal emulator (in case termcap entry is wrong). This is only useful on old system which don't have the "get window size" ioctl.
* csmode
Enable continued search mode: Successive __^K F__s repeat the current search instead of prompting for a new one.
* dopadding
Enable JOE to send padding NULs to the terminal (for very old terminals).
* exask
When set, __^K X__ prompts for a new name before saving the file.
* floatmouse
When set, mouse clicks can position the cursor beyond the ends of lines.
* guess_crlf
When set, JOE tries to guess the file format MS-DOS or UNIX.
* guess_indent
When set, JOE tries to guess the indentation character and indentation step based on the contents of the file. The algorithm is to find the greatest common factor of the three most common indentations found in the file.
* guess_non_utf8
When set, enable guessing of non-UTF-8 files in UTF-8 locales.
* guess_utf8
When set, enable guessing of UTF-8 files in non-UTF-8 locales.
* guess_utf16
When set, enable guessing of UTF-16 files. If a UTF-16BE or UTF-16LE file is detected, it is converted to UTF-8 during load, and converted back to UTF-16 during save.
* helpon
When set, start off with the on-line help enabled.
* help_is_utf8
When set, the help text in the joerc file is assumed to be UTF-8.
* hiline
When set, the current line is highlighted. The current color scheme must support this.
* icase
Search is case insensitive by default when set.
* joe_state
Enable reading and writing of ~/.joe_state file
* joexterm
Set this if xterm was configured with --paste64 option for better mouse support.
* keepup
The column number on the status line is updated constantly when this is set, otherwise it is updated only once a second.
* language __language__
Sets language for aspell.
* lightoff
Automatically turn off __^K B__ __^K K__ highlighting after a block operation.
* lines nnn
Set number of lines in terminal emulator (in case termcap entry is wrong). This is only useful on old system which don't have the "get window size" ioctl.
* marking
Enable marking mode: highlights between __^K B__ and cursor.
* menu_above
Put menus above prompt instead of below them.
* menu_explorer
Stay in menu when a directory is selected (otherwise the directory is added to the path and the cursor jumps back to the prompt).
* menu_jump
Jump into the file selection menu when __Tab__ __Tab__ is hit.
* mid
If this option is set and the cursor moves off the window, the window will be scrolled so that the cursor is in the center. This option is forced on slow terminals which don't have scrolling commands.
* left nn
This sets the number of columns the screen scrolls to the left when cursor moves past the left edge or when the crawll command is issued. If nn is negative, then it's the fraction of the screen to scroll. For example, -2 means scroll 1/2 the screen.
* right nn
This sets the number of columns the screen scrolls to the right when cursor moves past the right edge or when the crawlr command is issued. If nn is negative, then it's the fraction of the screen to scroll. For example, -3 means scroll 1/3 the screen.
* mouse
Enable xterm mouse support.
* nobackups
Disable backup files.
* nocurdir
Disable current-directory prefix in prompts.
* noexmsg
Disable exiting message ("File not changed so no update needed")
* nolinefeeds
Disable sending linefeeds to preserve screen history in terminal emulator's scroll-back buffer (only relevant when notite mode is enabled).
* nolocks
Disable EMACS compatible file locks.
* nomodcheck
Disable periodic file modification check.
* nonotice
This option prevents the copyright notice from being displayed when the editor starts.
* nosta
This option eliminates the top-most status line. It's nice for when you only want to see your text on the screen or if you're using a vt52.
* notagsmenu
Disable selection menu for tags search with multiple results.
* notite
Disable ti and te termcap sequences which are usually set up to save and restore the terminal screen contents when JOE starts and exits.
* pastehack
If keyboard input comes in as one block assume it's a mouse paste and disable autoindent and wordwrap.
* noxon
Disable __^S__ and __^Q__ flow control, possibly allowing __^S__ and __^Q__ to be used as editor keys.
* orphan
Orphan extra files given on the command line instead of creating windows for them (the files are loaded, but you need to use switch-buffer commands to access them).
* pg nnn
Set number of lines to keep during Page Up and Page Down (use -1 for 1/2 window size).
* regex
Use standard regular expression syntax by default, instead of the JOE syntax (where special characters have their meaning only when preceded with backslash).
* restore
Set to have cursor positions restored to last positions of previously edited files.
* rtbutton
Swap left and right mouse buttons.
* search_prompting
Show previous search string in search command (like in PICO).
* skiptop nnn
When set to N, the first N lines of the terminal screen are not used by JOE and are instead left with their original contents. This is useful for programs which call JOE to leave a message for the user.
* square
Enable rectangular block mode.
* transpose
Transpose rows with columns in all menus.
* title
Display context (titles) in status line. When enabled this shows the first line of the function that the cursor is in on the status line. The syntax file context.jsf identifies which lines are title lines.
* type
Select file type, overriding the automatically determined type. The file types are defined in the __ftyperc__ file.
* undo_keep nnn
Sets number of undo records to keep (0 means infinite).
* usetabs
Set to allow rectangular block operations to use tabs.
* wrap
Enable search to wrap to beginning of file.
The following local options may be specified on the command line: * +nnn
The cursor starts on the specified line.
* autoindent
Enable auto-indent mode. When you hit __Enter__ on an indented line, the indentation is duplicated onto the new line.
* c_comment
Enable __^G__ skipping of C-style comments /* ... */
* cpara __characters__
Sets list of characters which can indent paragraphs.
* cnotpara __characters__
Sets list of characters which begin lines which are definitely not part of paragraphs.
* cpp_comment
Enable __^G__ skipping of C++-style comments // ...
* crlf
JOE uses CR-LF as the end of line sequence instead of just LF. This is for editing MS-DOS or VMS files.
* encoding __encoding__
Set file encoding (like utf-8 or 8859-1).
* flowed
Set to force an extra space after each line of a paragraph but the last.
* force
When set, a final newline is appended to the file if there isn't one when the file is saved.
* french
When set, only one space is inserted after periods in paragraph reformats instead of two.
* hex
Enable hex-dump mode.
* highlight
Enable syntax highlighting.
* highlighter_context
Enable use of syntax file to identify comments and strings which should be skipped over during __^G__ matching.
* indentc nnn
Sets the indentation character for shift left and shift right (__^K ,__ and __^K .__). Use 32 for __Space__, 9 for __Tab__.
* indentfirst
When set, the smart home key jumps to the indentation point first, otherwise it jumps to column 1 first.
* istep nnn
Sets indentation step.
* linums
Enable line number display.
* lmargin
Set left margin.
* lmsg
Define left-side status bar message.
* overwrite
Enable overtype mode. Typing overwrites existing characters instead of inserting before them.
* picture
Enable "picture" mode- allows cursor to go past ends of lines.
* pound_comment
__^G__ ignores # ... comments.
* purify
Fix indentation if necessary before shifting or smart backspace. For example, if indentation uses a mix of tabs and spaces, and indentc is space, then indentation will be converted to all spaces before the shifting operation.
* rdonly
Set read-only mode.
* rmargin nnn
Set right margin.
* rmsg __string__
Define right-side status bar message.
* semi_comment
__^G__ ignores ; ... comments.
* single_quoted
__^G__ ignores '...'
* smartbacks
Enable smart backspace and tab. When this mode is set backspace and tab indent or unindent based on the values of the istep and indentc options.
* smarthome
Home key first moves cursor to beginning of line, then if hit again, to the first non-blank character.
* smsg __string__
Define status command format when cursor is on a character.
* spaces
Insert spaces when __Tab__ key is hit.
* syntax __syntax__
Set syntax for syntax highlighting.
* tab nnn
Set tab stop width.
* text_delimiters __word delimiter list__
Give list of word delimiters which __^G__ will step through. For example, "begin=end:if=elif=else=endif" means that __^G__ will jump between the matching if, elif, else and endif. * vhdl_comment
__^G__ ignores -- ... comments
* wordwrap
JOE wraps the previous word when you type past the right margin.
* zmsg __string__
Define status command format when cursor is at end of file.
* xmsg __string__
Define startup message (usually the copyright notice).
* aborthint __string__
Give the key sequence to show in prompts for abort (usually ^C).
* helphint __string__
Give the key sequence to show in prompts for help (usually ^K H).
### Colors and attributes Combine attributes and up to one foreground color and one background color to create arguments for color options like text_color. For example: bold+bg_green+blue * Attributes: bold, inverse, blink, dim, underline, italic, stricken (strike out) and dunderline (double-underline) * Foreground colors: white, cyan, magenta, blue, yellow, green, red, or black * Background colors: bg_white, bg_cyan, bg_magenta, bg_blue, bg_yellow, bg_green, bg_red or bg_black With a 16 color or 256 color terminal emulator (export TERM=xterm-16color), these brighter than normal colors become available: > Note that you need an xterm which was compiled to support 16 or 256 colors > and a matching termcap/terminfo entry for it. * Foreground: WHITE, CYAN, MAGENTA, BLUE, YELLOW, GREEN, RED or BLACK * Background: bg_WHITE, bg_CYAN, bg_MAGENTA, bg_BLUE, bg_YELLOW, bg_GREEN, bg_RED or bg_BLACK With a 256 color terminal emulator (export TERM=xterm-256color), these become available: > Note that you need an xterm which was compiled to support 256 colors and a > matching termcap/terminfo entry for it. * fg_RGB and bg_RGB, where R, G and B rand from 0 - 5. So: fg_500 is bright red. * fg_NN and bg_NN give shades of grey, where the intensity, NN, ranges from 0 - 23. ### Status line definition strings -lmsg defines the left-justified string and -rmsg defines the right-justified string. The first character of -rmsg is the background fill character. -smsg defines the status command (__^K Space__). -zmsg defines it when the cursor is at the end of the file. The last character of smsg or zmsg is the fill character. The following escape sequences can be used in these strings: %t 12 hour time %u 24 hour time %T O for overtype mode, I for insert mode %W W if wordwrap is enabled %I A if autoindent is enabled %X Rectangle mode indicator %n File name %m '(Modified)' if file has been changed %* '*' if file has been changed %R Read-only indicator %r Row (line) number %c Column number %o Byte offset into file %O Byte offset into file in hex %a Ascii value of character under cursor %A Ascii value of character under cursor in hex %w Width of character under cursor %p Percent of file cursor is at %l No. lines in file %k Entered prefix keys %S '*SHELL*' if there is a shell running in window %M Macro recording message %y Syntax %e Encoding %x Context (first non-indented line going backwards) %dd day %dm month %dY year %Ename% value of environment variable %Tname% value of option (ON or OFF for Boolean options) These formatting escape sequences may also be given: \i Inverse \u Underline \b Bold \d Dim \f Blink \l Italic \s Strikeout \z Double underline
## Basic Editing When you type characters into the editor, they are normally inserted into the file being edited (or appended to the file if the cursor is at the end of the file). This is the normal operating mode of the editor. If you want to replace some existing text, you have to delete the old text before or after you type in the replacement text. The __Backspace__ key can be used for deleting text: move the cursor to right after the text you want to delete and hit __Backspace__ a number of times. Hit the __Enter__ or __Return__ key to insert a line-break. For example, if the cursor was in the middle of a line and you hit __Enter__, the line would be split into two lines with the cursor appearing at the beginning of the second line. Hit __Backspace__ at the beginning of a line to eliminate a line-break. Use the arrow keys to move around the file. If your keyboard doesn't have arrow keys (or if they don't work for some reason), use __^F__ to move forwards (right), __^B__ to move backwards (left), __^P__ to move to the previous line (up), and __^N__ to move to the next line (down). The right and left arrow keys simply move forwards or backwards one character at a time through the text: if you're at the beginning of a line and you press left-arrow, you will end up at the end of the previous line. The up and down arrow keys move forwards and backwards by enough characters so that the cursor appears in the same column that it was in on the original line. If you want to indent the text you enter, you can use the __Tab__ key. This inserts a special control character which makes the characters which follow it begin at the next tab stop. Tab stops normally occur every 8 columns, but this can be changed with the __^T D__ command. PASCAL and C programmers often set tab stops on every 4 columns. If for some reason your terminal screen gets messed up (for example, if you receive a mail notice from biff), you can have the editor refresh the screen by hitting __^R__. There are many other keys for deleting text and moving around the file. For example, hit __^D__ to delete the character the cursor is on instead of deleting backwards like __Backspace__. __^D__ will also delete a line-break if the cursor is at the end of a line. Type __^Y__ to delete the entire line the cursor is on or __^J__ to delete just from the cursor to the end of the line. Hit __^A__ to move the cursor to the beginning of the line it's on. Hit __^E__ to move the cursor to the end of the line. Hit __^U__ or __^V__ for scrolling the cursor up or down 1/2 a screen's worth. "Scrolling" means that the text on the screen moves, but the cursor stays at the same place relative to the screen. Hit __^K U__ or __^K V__ to move the cursor to the beginning or the end of the file. Look at the help screens in the editor to find even more delete and movement commands. If you make a mistake, you can hit __^\___ to "undo" it. On most keyboards you hit just __^-__ to get __^\___, but on some you might have to hold both the __Shift__ and __Control__ keys down at the same time to get it. If you "undo" too much, you can "redo" the changes back into existence by hitting __^^__ (type this with just __^6__ on most keyboards). ### Cursor position history If you were editing in one place within the file, and you then temporarily had to look or edit some other place within the file, you can get back to the original place by hitting __^K -__. This command actually returns you to the last place you made a change in the file. You can step through a history of places with __^K -__ and __^K =__, in the same way you can step through the history of changes with the "undo" and "redo" commands. ### Save and exit When you are done editing the file, hit __^K X__ to exit the editor. You will be prompted for a file name if you hadn't already named the file you were editing. When you edit a file, you actually edit only a copy of the file. So if you decide that you don't want the changes you made to a file during a particular edit session, you can hit __^C__ to exit the editor without saving them. If you edit a file and save the changes, a backup copy of that file is created in the current directory, with a __~__ appended to the name, which contains the original version of the file. ### File operations You can hit __^K D__ to save the current file (possibly under a different name from what the file was called originally). After the file is saved, you can hit __^K E__ to edit a different file. If you want to save only a selected section of the file, see the section on [Blocks](#blocks) below. If you want to include another file in the file you're editing, use __^K R__ to insert it. ### Filenames Wherever JOE expects you to enter a file name, whether on the command line or in prompts within the editor, you may also type: * !command To read or write data to or from a shell command. For example, use __joe '!ls'__ to get a copy of your directory listing to edit or from within the editor use __^K D !mail jhallen@world.std.com__ to send the file being edited to me. * >>filename Use this to have JOE append the edited text to the end of the file "filename." * filename,START,SIZE Use this to access a fixed section of a file or device. __START__ and __SIZE__ may be entered in decimal (ex.: 123) octal (ex.: 0777) or hexadecimal (ex.: 0xFF). For example, use __joe /dev/fd0,508,2__ to edit bytes 508 and 509 of the first floppy drive in Linux. * - Use this to get input from the standard input or to write output to the standard output. For example, you can put JOE in a pipe of commands: __quota -v | joe | mail root__, if you want to complain about your low quota. ### Using JOE in a shell script JOE used to use /dev/tty to access the terminal. This caused a problem with idle-session killers (they would kill JOE because the real tty device was not being accessed for a long time), so now JOE only uses /dev/tty if you need to pipe a file into JOE, as in: echo "hi" | joe If you want to use JOE in a shell script which has its stdin/stdout redirected, but you do not need to pipe to it, you should simply redirect JOE's stdin/stdout to /dev/tty: joe filename /dev/tty

### Word wrap and formatting If you type past the right edge of the screen in a C or PASCAL language file, the screen will scroll to the right to follow the cursor. If you type past the right edge of the screen in a normal file (one whose name doesn't end in .c, .h or .p), JOE will automatically wrap the last word onto the next line so that you don't have to hit __Enter__. This is called word-wrap mode. Word-wrap can be turned on or off with the __^T W__ command. JOE's initialization file is usually set up so that this mode is automatically turned on for all non-program files. See the section below on the [joerc](#joerc) file to change this and other defaults. Aside for Word-wrap mode, JOE does not automatically keep paragraphs formatted like some word-processors. Instead, if you need a paragraph to be reformatted, hit __^K J__. This command "fills in" the paragraph that the cursor is in, fitting as many words in a line as is possible. A paragraph, in this case, is a block of text separated above and below by a blank line. The margins which JOE uses for paragraph formatting and word-wrap can be set with the __^T L__ and __^T R__ commands. If the left margin is set to a value other than 1, then when you start typing at the beginning of a line, the cursor will immediately jump to the left margin. There are a number of options which control the paragraph reformatter and word wrapper: * The __cpara__ option provides a list of characters which can indent a paragraph. For example, in e-mail quoted matter is indicated by __\>__ at the beginnings of line, so this character should be in the cpara list. * The __cnotpara__ option provides a list of characters which, if they are the first non-whitespace character of a line, indicate that the line is not to be included as part of a paragraph for formatting. For example, lines beginning with '.' in nroff can not be paragraph lines. * Autoindent mode affects the formatter. If autoindent is disabled, only the first line will be indented. If autoindent is enabled, the entire paragraph is indented. * __french__ determines how many spaces are inserted after periods. * When __flowed__ is enabled, a space is inserted after each but the last line of the paragraph. This indicates that the lines belong together as a single paragraph in some programs. * When __overtype__ is enabled, the word wrapper will not insert lines. ### Centering If you want to center a line within the margins, use the __^K A__ command. ### Spell checker Hit __Esc N__ to check the spelling of the word the cursor is on using the aspell program (or ispell program if you modify the joerc file). Hit __Esc L__ to check the highlighted block or the entire file if no block is highlighted. JOE passes the language and character encoding to the spell checker. To change the language, hit __^T V__. For example, use en_US for English. ### Overtype mode Sometimes it's tiresome to have to delete old text before or after you insert new text. This happens, for example, when you are changing a table and you want to maintain the column position of the right side of the table. When this occurs, you can put the editor in overtype mode with __^T T__. When the editor is in this mode, the characters you type in replace existing characters, in the way an idealized typewriter would. Also, __Backspace__ simply moves left instead of deleting the character to the left, when it's not at the end or beginning of a line. Overtype mode is not the natural way of dealing with text electronically, so you should go back to insert-mode as soon as possible by typing __^T T__ again. If you need to insert while you're in overtype mode, hit __^@__. This inserts a single __Space__ into the text. ### Control and Meta characters Each character is represented by a number. For example, the number for 'A' is 65 and the number for '1' is 49. All of the characters which you normally see have numbers in the range of 32 - 126 (this particular arbitrary assignment between characters and numbers is called the ASCII character set). The numbers outside of this range, from 0 to 255, aren't usually displayed, but sometimes have other special meanings. The number 10, for example, is used for the line-breaks. You can enter these special, non-displayed __control characters__ by first hitting __^Q__ and then hitting a character in the range __@ A B C ... X Y Z [ ^ ] \\ \___ to get the number 0 - 31, and ? to get 127. For example, if you hit __^Q J__, you'll insert a line-break character, or if you hit __^Q I__, you'll insert a __Tab__ character (which does the same thing the __Tab__ key does). A useful control character to enter is 12 (__^Q L__), which causes most printers to advance to the top of the page. You'll notice that JOE displays this character as an underlined L. You can enter the characters above 127, the __meta characters__, by first hitting __^\\__. This adds 128 to the next (possibly control) character entered. JOE displays characters above 128 in inverse-video. Some foreign languages, which have more letters than English, use the meta characters for the rest of their alphabet. You have to put the editor in __asis__ mode to have these passed untranslated to the terminal. __Note:__ JOE now normally passes all 8-bits to the terminal unless the locale is set to C or POSIX. If the locale is C or POSIX, then the __asis__ flag determines if __meta characters__ are shown in inverse video or passed directly to the terminal. __Note:__ In older version of JOE, you had to use __Esc '__ to enter control characters. ## Character sets and UTF-8 JOE natively handles two classes of character sets: UTF-8 and byte coded (like ISO-8859-1). For these character sets, the file is loaded as-is into memory, and is exactly preserved during save, even if it contains UTF-8 coding errors. It can not yet natively handle other major classes such as UTF-16 or GB2312. There are other restrictions: character sets must use LF (0x0A) or CR-LF (0x0D - 0x0A) as line terminators, space must be 0x20 and tab must be 0x09. Basically, the files must be UNIX or MS-DOS compatible text files. This means EBCDIC will not work properly (but you would need to handle fixed record length lines anyway) and character sets which use CR terminated lines (MACs) will not yet work. JOE now supports UTF-16 (both big endian and little endian). It supports UTF-16 by converting to UTF-8 during load, and converting back to UTF-16 during save. The terminal and the file can have different encodings. JOE will translate between the two. Currently, one of the two must be UTF-8 for translation to work. The character set for the terminal and the default character set assumed for files is determined by the 'LC_ALL' environment variable (and if that's not set, LC_CTYPE and LANG are also checked). For example, if LC_ALL is set to: de_DE Then the character set will be ISO-8859-1. If LC_ALL is set to: de_DE.UTF-8 The character set will be UTF-8. Hit __^T E__ to change the coding for the file. Hit __Tab__ __Tab__ at this prompt to get a list of available codings. There are a number of built-in character sets, plus you can install character sets in the ~/.joe/charmaps and /usr/share/joe/charmaps directories. Check: /usr/share/i18n/charmaps for example character set files. Only byte oriented character sets will work. Also, the file should not be gzipped (all of the charmap files in /usr/share/i18n/charmaps on my computer were compressed). The parser is very bad, so basically the file has to look exactly like the example one in /usr/share/joe/charmaps. You can hit __^K Space__ to see the current character set. You can hit __^Q x__ to enter a Unicode character if the file coding is UTF-8. ## Prompts Most prompts record a history of the responses you give them. You can hit up and down arrow to step through these histories. Prompts are actually single line windows with no status line, so you can use any editing command that you normally use on text within the prompts. The prompt history is actually just other lines of the same "prompt file". Thus you can can search backwards though the prompt history with the normal __^K F__ command if you want. Since prompts are windows, you can also switch out of them with __^K P__ and __^K N__. ### Completion and selection menus You can hit __Tab__ in just about any prompt to request JOE to complete the word you are typing. If JOE beeps, there are either no completions or many. As with the "bash" shell, hit __Tab__ twice to bring up a list of all the possibilities. This list is actually a menu, but by default, the cursor does not jump into it since it is usually easier to just type in your selection. You can, however, jump into the menu window with __^K P__ (move to previous window) and use the arrow keys and <Enter> to make your selection. Also in a menu, you can hit the first letter of any of the items to make the cursor jump directly to it. The __^T__ option menu works like this. If the menu is too large to fit in the window, you can hit Page Up and Page Down to scroll it (even if you have not jumped into it). __Tab__ completion works in the search and replace prompts as well. In this case, JOE tries to complete the word based on the contents of the buffer. If you need search for the __Tab__ character itself, you can enter it with __^Q Tab__. Also, you can hit __Esc Enter__ in a text window to request JOE to complete the word you are typing. As with the search prompt, JOE tries to complete the word based on the contents of the buffer. It will bring up a menu of possibilities if you hit __Esc Enter__ twice. ## Where am I? Hit __^K Space__ to have JOE report the line number, column number, and byte number on the last line of the screen. The number associated with the character the cursor is on (its ASCII code) is also shown. You can have the line number and/or column number always displayed on the status line by placing the appropriate escape sequences in the status line setup strings. Edit the joerc file for details. ## What if I hit __^K__ by accident? Hit the space bar. This runs an innocuous command (it shows the line number on the status bar). ## Temporarily suspending the editor If you need to temporarily stop the editor and go back to the shell, hit __^K Z__. You might want to do this to stop whatever you're editing and answer an e-mail message or read this man page, for example. You have to type __fg__ or __exit__ (you'll be told which when you hit __^K Z__) to return to the editor. ## Searching for text Hit __^K F__ to have the editor search forwards or backwards for a text fragment (__string__) for you. You will be prompted for the text to search for. After you hit __Enter__, you are prompted to enter options. You can just hit __Enter__ again to have the editor immediately search forwards for the text, or you can enter one or more of these options: * __b__
Search backwards instead of forwards. * __i__
Treat uppercase and lower case letters as the same when searching. Normally uppercase and lowercase letters are considered to be different. * __nnn__
(where __nnn__ is a number) If you enter a number, JOE searches for the Nth occurrence of the text. This is useful for going to specific places in files structured in some regular manner. * __r__
Replace text. If you enter the __r__ option, then you will be further prompted for replacement text. Each time the editor finds the search text, you will be prompted as to whether you want to replace the found search text with the replacement text. You hit: __y__ to replace the text and then find the next occurrence, __n__ to not replace this text, but to then find the next occurrence, __r__ to replace all of the remaining occurrences of the search text in the remainder of the file without asking for confirmation (subject to the __nnn__ option above), or __^C__ to stop searching and replacing. You can also hit __B__ or __Backspace__ to back up to the previously found text (if it had been replaced, the replacement is undone). * __a__
The search covers all loaded buffers. So to replace all instances of "foo" with "bar" in all .c files in the current directory: joe *.c ^K F foo ra bar * __e__
The search covers all files in the grep or make error list. You can use a UNIX command to generate a list of files and search and replace through the list. So to replace all instances of "foo" with "bar" in all .c files which begin with f. You can also use "ls" and "find" instead of grep to create the file list. Esc G grep -n foo f*.c ^K F foo re bar * __x__
JOE will use the standard syntax for regular expressions if this option is given. In the standard syntax, these characters have their special meanings directly, and do not have to be escaped with backslash: ., \*, \+, ?, \{, \}, (, ), |, ^, $ and \[. * __y__
JOE will use the JOE syntax for regular expressions instead of the standard syntax. This overrides the "-regex" option. * __v__
JOE will send debug information about the regular expression to the startup log. The log can be viewed with the showlog command. You can hit __^L__ to repeat the previous search. You can hit __^K H__ at the search and replace options prompt to bring up a list of all search and replace options. ### Regular Expressions A number of special character sequences may be entered as search text: * __\\\*__
This finds zero or more of the item to the left. For example, if you give __AB\\\*C__ as the search text, JOE will try to find an A followed by any number of Bs, and then a C. * __\\\+__
This finds one or more of the item to the left. For example, if you give __AB\\\+C__ as the search text, JOE will try to find an A followed by one or more Bs, and then a C. * __\\?__
This indicates that the item to the left is optional. For example, if you give __AB\\?C__ as the search text, JOE will find AC or ABC. * __\\\{min,max\}__
This indicates that JOE should try to find a string with a specific number of occurrences of the item to the left. For example, __AX\\\{2,5\}B__ will match these strings: AXXB, AXXXB, AXXXXB, and AXXXXXB. Min can be left out to indicate 0 occurrences. Max (and the comma) can be left out to indicate any number of occurrences. * __\\.__
This finds exactly one character. For example, if you give __A\\.B__ as the search text, JOE will find AXB, but not AB or AXXB. * __\\!__
This works like __\.__, but matches a balanced C-language expression. For example, if you search for __malloc(\\!\\\*)__, then JOE will find all function calls to __malloc__, even if there was a __)__ within the parenthesis. * __\\|__
This finds the item on the left or the item on the right. For example, if you give __A\\|B__ as the search text, JOE will try to find either an A or a B. * __\\( \\)__
Use these to group characters together. For example, if you search for __\\(foo\\)\\\+__, then JOE will find strings like "foo", and "foofoofoo". * __\^ \$__
These match the beginnings and endings of lines. For example, if you give __\^test\$__, then JOE with find __test__ on a line by itself. * __\< \\\>__
These match the beginnings and endings of words. For example, if you give __\__, then JOE will find the word "is" but will not find the "is" in "this". * __\\\[...]__
This matches any single character which appears within the brackets. For example, if __\\\[Tt]his__ is entered as the search string, then JOE finds both __This__ and __this__. Ranges of characters can be entered within the brackets. For example, __\\\[A-Z]__ finds any uppercase letter. If the first character given in the brackets is __^__, then JOE tries to find any character not given in the the brackets. To include __-__ itself, include it as the last or first character (possibly after __^__). * __\\\\__
Matches a single \\. * __\n__
This finds the special end-of-line or line-break character. A number of special character sequences may also be given in the replacement string: * __\\&__
This gets replaced by the text which matched the search string. For example, if the search string was __\<\\\*\\\>__, which matches words, and you give __"\\&"__, then JOE will put quote marks around words. * __\1 - \9__
These get replaced with the text which matched the Nth grouping; the text within the Nth set of \\( \\). * __\\l, \\u__
Convert the next character of the replacement text to lowercase or uppercase. * __\\L, \\U__
Convert all following replacement text to lowercase or uppercase. Conversion stops when \\E is encountered. * __\\\\__
Use this if you need to put a __\\__ in the replacement string. * __\n__
Use this if you need to put a line-break in the replacement string. Some examples: Suppose you have a list of addresses, each on a separate line, which starts with "Address:" and has each element separated by commas. Like so: Address: S. Holmes, 221b Baker St., London, England If you wanted to rearrange the list, to get the country first, then the city, then the person's name, and then the address, you could do this: Type __^K F__ to start the search, and type: __Address:\\(\\.\\\*\\),\\(\\.\\\*\\),\\(\\.\\\*\\),\\(\\.\\\*\\)\$__ to match "Address:", the four comma-separated elements, and then the end of the line. When asked for options, you would type __r__ to replace the string, and then type: __Address:\4,\3,\1,\2__ To shuffle the information the way you want it. After hitting return, the search would begin, and the sample line would be changed to: Address: England, London, S. Holmes, 221b Baker St. ### Escape sequences JOE understands the following escape sequences withing search and replacement strings: * \\x{10ffff}
This matches a specific Unicode code point given in hexadecimal. * \\xFF
This matches a specific character specified in hexadecimal. * \\377
This matches a specific character specified in octal. * \\p{Ll}
This matches any character in the named Unicode category or block. The block names, such as "Latin-1 Supplement" or "Arabic" can be found here: [Unicode Blocks](ftp://ftp.unicode.org/Public/8.0.0/ucd/Blocks.txt) The category names such as "Ll" can be found here: [Unicode Categories](ftp://ftp.unicode.org/Public/5.1.0/ucd/UCD.html#General_Category_Values) Note that a single letter matches all of the category names which start with that letter. For example, \\p{N} (any number) include \\p{Nd} (decimal digit), \\p{Nl} (letter number) and \\p{No} (other number). * \\d
This matches any Unicode digit. This is the same as \\p{Nd}. * \\D
This matches anything except for a Unicode digit. This is the same as \\\[^\\p{Nd}]. * \\w
This matches any word character. This is the same as \\\[^\\p{C}\\p{P}\\p{Z}]. * \\W
This matches anything except for a word character. This is the same as \\\[\\p{C}\\p{P}\\p{Z}]. * \\s
This matches any space character. This is the same as \\\[\\t\\r\\f\\n\\p{Z}]. * \\S
This matches anything except for a spacing character. This is the same as \\\[^\\t\\r\\f\\n\\p{Z}]. * \\i
This matches an identifier start character. This is the same as \\\[\\p{L}\\p{Pc}\\p{Nl}]. * \\I
This matches anything except for an identifier start character. This is the same as \\\[^\\p{L}\\p{Pc}\\p{Nl}]. * \\c
This matches an identifier continuation character. This is the same as \\\[\\i\\p{Mn}\\p{Mc}\\p{Nd}\\x{200c}\\x{200d}]. * \\C
This matches anything except for an identifier continuation character. This is the same as \\\[^\\i\\p{Mn}\\p{Mc}\\p{Nd}\\x{200c}\\x{200d}]. * \\t Tab * \\n Newline * \\r Carriage return * \\b Backspace * \\a Alert * \\f Formfeed * \\e Escape * \\\\ Backslash ## Incremental search Use __Esc S__ to start an increment search forwards, or __Esc R__ to start an incremental search backwards. As you type the search string, the cursor will jump to the first text that matches the regular expression you have entered so far. Hit __Esc S__ or __Esc R__ again to find the next occurrence of the text or to switch the direction of the search. __^S__, __^\\__ and __^L__ have the same effect as __Esc S__. __^R__ has the same effect as __Esc R__. These keys are to support JMACS. Hit __Backspace__ to undo the last incremental search action. The last action could be a repeat of a previous search or the entering of a new character. Use __^Q__ to insert control characters into the search text. Previously, \` could also be used for this. Hit any other key to exit the increment search. ## Goto matching delimiter Hit __^G__ to jump between matching delimiters. This works on both character delimiters (like '(' and ')') and word delimiters for languages like Pascal and Verilog which use "begin" and "end" to delimit blocks. It also works for matching start and end tags in XML. If a word is not known, __^G__ starts a search with the word moved into the search prompt. For __^G__ to work on word delimiters, the cursor must be positioned on the first letter of the word. So in XML, if the cursor is on the < in <foo>, it will jump to the >. But if it is one the 'f', it will jump to the matching </foo>. Likewise, in C, __^G__ will jump between #if, #else and #endif, but you need to position the cursor on the letter, not the '#'. __^G__ is smart enough to skip delimiters found in quoted or commented-out matter. You need to tell JOE how your language indicates this: see the __ftyperc__ file for examples of how this is done. The are a number of options which control the behavior of __^G__. These options control which kinds of comments __^G__ can skip over: * c_comment * cpp_comment * pount_comment * semi_comment * vhdl_comment These options determine which kinds of strings __^G__ can skip over: * single_quoted * double_quoted This option allows an annotated syntax file to determine which text can be counted as comments or strings which can be skipped over by __^G__: * highlighter_context This option enables the use of syntax files to identify comments and strings which should be skipped over during __^G__ matching. The syntax file states should be annotated with the __string__ and __comment__ keywords for this to work. * text_delimiters This option provides a list of word delimiters to match. For example, "begin=end:if=elif=else=endif" means that __^G__ will jump between the matching if, elif, else and endif. It will also jump between begin and end. __^G__ has a built-in table for matching character delimiters- it knows that __(__ goes with __)__. __^G__ has a built-in parser to handle start/end tag matching for XML. ## Regions If you want to move, copy, save or delete a specific section of text, you can do it with highlighted blocks. First, move the cursor to the start of the section of text you want to work on, and press __^K B__. Then move the cursor to the character just after the end of the text you want to affect and press __^K K__. The text between the __^K B__ and __^K K__ should become highlighted. Now you can move your cursor to someplace else in your document and press __^K M__ to move the highlighted text there. You can press __^K C__ to make a copy of the highlighted text and insert it to where the cursor is positioned. __^K Y__ to deletes the highlighted text. __^K W__, writes the highlighted text to a file. A very useful command is __^K /__, which filters a block of text through a UNIX command. For example, if you select a list of words with __^K B__ and __^K K__, and then type __^K / sort__, the list of words will be sorted. Another useful UNIX command for __^K /__, is __tr__. If you type __^K / tr a-z A-Z__, then all of the letters in the highlighted block will be converted to uppercase. ### How do I deselect a highlighted region? After you are finished with some region operations, you can just leave the highlighting on if you don't mind it (but don't accidentally hit __^K Y__). If it really bothers you, however, just hit __^K B ^K K__, to turn the highlighting off. Beginning with JOE 4.2, you can hit __^C__ to cancel the region selection. ### New ways of selecting regions The classic way is to hit __^K B__ at the beginning and __^K K__ at the end. These set pointers called markb and markk. Once these are set you can jump to markb with __Esc B__ and jump to markk with __Esc K__. New way: hit Ctrl-__Right Arrow__ to start selecting rightward. Each time you hit Ctrl-__Right Arrow__, the block is extended one more to the right. This uses a simple macro: "begin_marking,rtarw,toggle_marking". Unfortunately, there is no standard way to get the keysequence given by the terminal emulator when you hit Ctrl-__Right Arrow__. Instead you have to determine this sequence yourself and enter it directly in the joerc file. Some examples are given for Xterm and gnome-terminal. Hit __^Q__ Ctrl-__Right Arrow__ within JOE to have the sequence shown on your screen. Note that Putty uses __Esc Esc \[ C__ which will not appear with __^Q Right Arrow__ (also __Esc Esc__ is the set bookmark command, so you need to unbind it to do this in Putty). Also you can hit Ctrl-__Delete__ to cut and Ctrl-__Insert__ to paste if the sequence for these keys are known. The mouse can also be used to select text if mouse support is enabled in JOE. ## Indenting program blocks Auto-indent mode is toggled with the __^T I__ command. The __joerc__ file is normally set up so that files with names ending with .p, .c or .h have auto-indent mode enabled. When auto-indent mode is enabled and you hit __Enter__, the cursor will be placed in the same column that the first non-whitespace character was on in the original line. You can use the __^K ,__ and __^K .__ commands to shift a block of text to the left or right. If no highlighting is set when you give these commands, the program block (as indicated by indentation) that the cursor is located in will be selected, and will be moved by subsequent __^K ,__ and __^K .__ commands. The number of columns these commands shift by and the character used for shifting can be set through the istep and indentc options. These options are available in the __^T__ menu. Also, __^T =__ can be used to quickly select from a number of common values for indentation step and character. JOE has a number of additional options related to indenting programs: * smartbacks
Enable smart backspace and tab. When this mode is set __Backspace__ and __Tab__ indent or unindent based on the values of the istep and indentc options.
* smarthome
The __Home__ and __^A__ keys first move the cursor to the beginning of the line, then if hit again, to the first non-blank character.
* indentfirst
Smart home goes to first non-blank character first, instead of going to the beginning of the line first.
* purify
Fix indentation if necessary before shifting or smart backspace. For example, if indentation uses a mix of tabs and spaces, and indentc is space, then indentation will be converted to all spaces before the shifting operation.
* guess_indent
When set, JOE tries to guess the indentation character and indentation step based on the contents of the file. The algorithm is to find the greatest common factor of the three most common indentations found in the file.
## Rectangle mode Type __^T X__ to have __^K B__ and __^K K__ select rectangular blocks instead of stream-of-text blocks. This is also known as columnar mode. This mode is useful for moving, copying, deleting or saving columns of text. You can also filter columns of text with the __^K /__ command- if you want to sort a column, for example. The insert file command, __^K R__ is also affected. When rectangle mode is selected, overtype mode is also useful (__^T T__). When overtype mode is selected, rectangles will replace existing text instead of getting inserted before it. Also the delete block command (__^K Y__) will clear the selected rectangle with __Spaces__ and __Tabs__ instead of deleting it. Overtype mode is especially useful for the filter block command (__^K /__), since it will maintain the original width of the selected column. ## Picture mode Use __^T P__ to enter or exit picture mode. Picture mode helps with ASCII drawings. Picture mode controls how JOE handles the case where the cursor is past the ends of lines. This happens when you use the up or down arrow keys to move the cursor from the end of a long line to a short line. If you attempt to type a character in this case: If picture mode is off, the cursor will jump to the end of the line and insert it there. If picture mode is on, the line is filled with spaces so that the character can be inserted at the cursor position. ## Windows You can edit more than one file at the same time or edit two or more different places of the same file. To do this, hit __^K O__, to split the screen into two windows. Use __^K P__ or __^K N__ to move the cursor into the top window or the lower window. Use __^K E__ to edit a new file in one of the windows. A window will go away when you save the file with __^K X__ or abort the file with __^C__. If you abort a file which exists in two windows, one of the window goes away, not the file. You can hit __^K O__ within a window to create even more windows. If you have too many windows on the screen, but you don't want to eliminate them, you can hit __^K I__. This will show only the window the cursor is in, or if there was only one window on the screen to begin with, try to fit all hidden windows on the screen. If there are more windows than can fit on the screen, you can hit __^K N__ on the bottom-most window or __^K P__ on the top-most window to get to them. If you gave more than one file name to JOE on the command line, each file will be placed in a different window. You can change the height of the windows with the __^K G__ and __^K T__ commands. ### Windowing system model JOE has an unusual model for its windowing system. Basically you have a ring of windows, but only a section of this ring may fit on the screen. The windows not on the screen still exist, they are just scrolled off. When you hit __^K N__ on the bottom window of the screen, it scrolls further windows from the ring onto the screen, possibly letting the top window scroll out of view. Native JOE tries to keep each loaded buffer in a window, so users can find all of the buffers by scrolling through the windows. The __explode__ command (__^K I__) either expands all windows to the size of the screen so that only one window can fit on the screen, or shrinks them all as much as possible to fit many on the screen. On the other hand, JOE supports "orphan" buffers- files loaded into the editor, but which are not in a window. __^C__ normally closes a window and discards the buffer that was in it. If you hit __^C__ on the last remaining window, it will normally exit the editor. However, if there are orphan buffers, __^C__ will instead load them into this final window to give you a chance to explicitly discard them. If the __orphan__ option is given on the command line, as in __joe -orphan *.c__, then JOE only loads the first file into a window and leaves all the rest as orphans. __orphan__ also controls whether the edit command __^K E__ creates a new window for a newly loaded file, or reuses the current window (orphaning its previous occupant). The __bufed__ command prompts for a name of a buffer to switch into a window. Its completion list will show all buffers, including orphans and buffers which appear in other windows. __Esc V__ and __Esc U__ (__nbuf__ and __pbuf__ commands) allow you to cycle through all buffers within a single window. Windows maintain a stack of occupants to support the pop-up shell window feature. When a pop-up window is dismissed, the previous buffer is returned to the window. ## Scratch buffers Scratch buffers are buffers which JOE does not worry about trying to preserve. JOE will not ask to save modified scratch buffers. Pop-up shell windows, the startup log and compile and grep message windows are scratch buffers. You can create your own scratch buffer with the __scratch__ command. The following commands load scratch buffers: * __showlog__ Show startup log * __mwind__ Show message window (compile / grep messages from __Esc C__ and __Esc G__ commands). ## Keyboard macros Macros allow you to record a series of keystrokes and replay them with the press of two keys. This is useful to automate repetitive tasks. To start a macro recording, hit __^K \[__ followed by a number from 0 to 9. The status line will display (Macro n recording...). Now, type in the series of keystrokes that you want to be able to repeat. The commands you type will have their usual effects. Hit __^K ]__ to stop recording the macro. Hit __^K__ followed by the number you recorded the macro in to execute one iteration of the key-strokes. For example, if you want to put "**" in front of a number of lines, you can type: __^K \[ 0 ^A \*\* __ __^K ]__ Which starts the macro recording, moves the cursor to the beginning of the line, inserts "\*\*", moves the cursor down one line, and then ends the recording. Since we included the key-strokes needed to position the cursor on the next line, we can repeatedly use this macro without having to move the cursor ourselves, something you should always keep in mind when recording a macro. ### Keyboard macro subroutines If you find that the macro you are recording itself has a repeated set of key-strokes in it, you can record a macro within the macro, as long as you use a different macro number. Also you can execute previously recorded macros from within new macros. ### Query suspend If your macro includes a prompt for user input, and you want the user to fill in the prompt every time the macro is executed, hit __^K ?__ at the point in the macro recording where the user action is required. Keyboard input will not be recorded at this point. When the user completes the prompt, macro recording will continue. When the macro is executed, the macro player will pause at the point where __^K ?__ was entered to allow user input. When the user completes the prompt, the player continues with the rest of the macro. ### Repeat You can use the repeat command, __^K \\__, to repeat a macro, or any other edit command or even a normal character, a specified number of times. Hit __^K \\__, type in the number of times you want the command repeated and press __Enter__. The next edit command you now give will be repeated that many times. For example, to delete the next 20 lines of text, type: __^K \\ 20____^Y__ ## Macros and commands A macro is a comma separated list of commands. When the macro is executed, each command is executed until either the end of the list is reached, or one of the commands fails (non-zero return value from the command). Failed commands beep if you have beeps enabled (__^T B__). Hit __Esc D__ to insert the current set of keyboard macros as text into the current buffer. For example, the "\*\*" insert macro above looks like this: home,"**",dnarw ^K 0 Macro 0 You could insert this into your .joerc file and change the key sequence (the __K 0__) to something more permanent. ### Define your own You can bind macros to key sequences or define your own named macros in the joerc file. For example, this will define a macro called __foo__: :def foo eof,bol __foo__ will position the cursor at the beginning of the last line of the file. __eof__ jumps to the end of the file. __bol__ jumps to the beginning of a line. Once a macro has been named this way it will show up in the completion list of the __Esc X__ command prompt. ### Command prompt You can execute a macro directly by typing it into the command prompt. Hit __Esc X__ to bring up the command prompt. Hit __Tab__ at this prompt for a completion list of all available commands. Here is a [complete list of commands](#list). ### Macro don't stop modifier Sometimes, you expect commands to sometimes fail, but want the rest of the commands in the list to be executed anyway. To mark a command which is allowed to fail, postfix it with '!'. For example, here a macro which hits down page in the window above: prevw,pgdn!,nextw If prevw fails, the macro is aborted as usual. Even if pgdn fails (already at end of buffer), nextw will be executed so that the cursor is returned to the original window. ### Macro repeat argument modifiers Repeat arguments can be specified with __^K \\__. When a command is executed with a repeat argument, it is repeatedly executed the specified number of times. If the repeat argument is negative, an opposite command (if one exists) is executed instead. For example, if you repeat "rtarw" -3 times, "ltarw" will be repeated 3 times. If a negative argument is given for a command which does not have an opposite, the repeat argument is ignored. Normally, if a repeat argument is specified for a macro, the macro is simply repeated the given number of times. If a negative argument is given, the argument is ignored. Sometimes you want to allow negative arguments for macros and have their behavior modified. To do this, postfix each command within the macro which should be switched to its opposite for negative arguments with '-'. For example, here is the page down other window macro: prevw,pgdn-!,nextw Now if you execute this with an argument of -2, it will be repeated twice, but pgup will be executed instead of pgdn. (note that several postfix modifiers can be placed after each command). Sometimes when a repeat argument is given to macro, you want only one of the commands in the list to be repeated, not the entire macro. This can be indicated as follows: prevw,pgdn#!,nextw If this is executed with an argument of 2, prevw is executed once, pgdn is executed twice, and nextw is executed once. Finally, even more complex semantics can be expressed with the "if" command: if~,"arg<0",then, ltarw, else, rtarw, endif When the macro is executed, the "arg" math variable is set to the given repeat argument. The "argset" variable is set to true if the user set an argument, even if it's 1. If no argument was given, argset is false. If any command in the list is postfixed with ~ (if above), the macro is not repeated, even if there is an argument. 'arg' is still set to the given repeat count, however. ### 'psh'/'query' interaction The 'psh' command saves the __^K B__ and __^K K__ positions on a stack. When the macro completes, (or when the 'pop' command is called) the positions are restored. The 'query' command suspends macro execution until the current dialog is complete. It also suspends the automatic 'pop' which happens at the end of a macro- so if the macro ends in a dialog you often want to call 'query' to prevent the __^K B__ __^K K__ positions from being restored too early. ## Tags search If you are editing a large C program with many source files, you can use the __ctags__ program to generate a __tags__ file. This file contains a list of program symbols and the files and positions where the symbols are defined. First, create the tags file with the "ctags" program. For example: ctags *.c *.h This will create a file called "tags" in the current directory. JOE looks for the "tags" file in the current directory. If there is none, it will try to open the file specified by the TAGS environment variable. Paths in the tags file are always relative to location of the tags file itself. The tags file contains a list of identifier definition locations in one of these formats: identifier filename /search-expression/[;comments] identifier filename ?search-expression?[;comments] identifier filename line-number[;comments] Some versions of ctags include class-names in the identifiers: class::member In this case, JOE will match on any of these strings: member ::member class::member Some versions of ctags include a filename in the identifier: filename:identifier In this case JOE will only find the identifier if the buffer name matches the filename. The search-expression is a vi regular expression, but JOE only supports the following special characters: ^ at the beginning means expression starts at beginning of line $ at the end means expression ends at end of line \x quote x (suppress meaning of /, ?, ^ or $) Type __^K ;__ to bring up a tags search prompt. If the cursor had been on an identifier, the prompt is pre-loaded with it. Tab completion works in this prompt (it uses the tags file to find completions). When you hit __Enter__, the tags search commences: If there is one and only one match, JOE will jump directly to the definition. If there are multiple matches, then the behavior is controlled by the notagsmenu option. If notagsmenu is enabled JOE jumps to the first definition. If you hit __^K ;__ again before hitting any other keys, JOE jumps to the next definition, and so on. The "tagjump" command also performs this function. If notagsmenu is disabled, JOE brings up a menu of all the matches. You select the one you want and JOE jumps to it. If you hit __^K ;__ again before hitting any other keys, the same menu re-appears with the cursor left in the original location. You can hit __^K -__ to move the cursor back to the original location before the tags search (often __^C__ will work as well). Since __^K ;__ loads the definition file into the current window, you probably want to split the window first with __^K O__, to have both the original file and the definition file loaded. ## Calculator JOE has a built-in calculator which can be invoked with __Esc M__. ### Math functions sin, cos, tan, exp, sqrt, cbrt, ln, log, asin, acos, atan, sinh, cosh, tanh, asinh, acosh, atanh, int, floor, ceil, abs, erf, erfc, j0, j1, y0, y1 ### Variables * e
Set to 'e'
* pi
Set to 'pi'
* top
Set to line number of top window line
* lines
Set to number of lines in file
* line
Set to current line number
* col
Set to current column number
* byte
Set to current byte number
* size
Set to buffer size
* height
Set to window height
* width
Set to window width
* char
Set to ASCII val of character under cursor
* markv
True if there is a valid block set (^KB ... ^KK)
* rdonly
True if file is read-only
* arg
Current repeat argument
* argset
True if a repeat argument was given
* is_shell
True if executed in an active shell window
* no_windows
No. buffer windows on the screen
* ans
Result of previous expression
### Commands * hex
Hex display mode
* dec
Decimal display mode
* ins
Insert 'ans' into buffer
* sum
Sum of numbers in block
* cnt
Count numbers in block
* avg
Average value of numbers in block
* dev
Standard deviation of numbers in block
* eval
Evaluate math expressions in block (or whole file if no block set).
* joe(...)
Execute a JOE macro (argument in same format as joerc file macros). Return value of JOE macro is returned (for macro success, return true (non-zero)).
For example: joe(sys,"[ 1 == 1 ]",rtn) ([ 1 == 1 ]) is a shell command. "[" is a synonym for the "test" UNIX command. Returns true. Remember: argument for JOE macro command "if" is a math expression. So for example, the macro: if,"joe(sys,\"[ 1 == 1 ]\",rtn)",then,"TRUE",endif Types TRUE into the buffer. ### Operators: * !x
Logical not of x.
* x^y
Raise x to power of y.
* a*b
Multiply.
* a/b
Divide.
* a%b
Modulus.
* a+b
Add.
* a-b
Subtract.
* a<b
True if a is less than b.
* a<=b
True if a is less than or equal to b.
* a>b
True if a is greater than b.
* a>=b
True if a is greater than or equal to b.
* a==b
True if a equals b.
* a!=b
True if a does not equal b.
* a&&b
True if both a and b are true.
* a||b
True if ether a or b are true.
* a?b:c
If a is true return b, otherwise return c.
* a=b
Assign b to a.
* a:b
Execute a, then execute b.
&&, || and ? : work as in C and sh as far as side effects: if the left side of && is false, the right side is not evaluated. : is expression separator. ## Shell windows Hit __^K '__ to run a command shell in one of JOE's windows. When the cursor is at the end of a shell window (use __^K V__ if it's not), whatever you type is passed to the shell instead of the buffer. Any output from the shell or from commands executed in the shell is appended to the shell window (the cursor will follow this output if it's at the end of the shell window). This command is useful for recording the results of shell commands- for example the output of __make__, the result of __grep__ping a set of files for a string, or directory listings from __FTP__ sessions. Besides typeable characters, the keys __^C__, __Backspace__, __Del__, __Return__ and __^D__ are passed to the shell. Type the shell __exit__ command to stop recording shell output. If you press __^C__ in a shell window, when the cursor is not at the end of the window, the shell is __kill__ed. If you use Bash, you can hit: __^Q Up Arrow__ and __^Q Down Arrow__ to scroll through Bash's history buffer. Other keys work as well: try __^Q ^A__ to go to beginning of line or __^Q ^E__ to go to end of line. Unfortunately JOE only emulates a dumb terminal, so you have to use a lot of imagination to do any editing beyond hitting backspace. In general, any character quoted with __^Q__ is sent to the shell. Also sent to the shell: __Tab__, __Backspace__, __Enter__, __^C__ and __^D__. ## Pop-up shell windows Hit F1 - F4 to open and switch between shell windows. Pop-up shell windows use a full terminal emulator so that when you type "man ls" it's formatted correctly (it works well enough so that some interactive programs can be used). Even so, the shell window is still an edit buffer. The old shell window (with no terminal emulation) still exists: use __^K '__ to invoke it as usual. This is useful to see control sequences emitted by a program. More of the keys get passed to the running program in pop-up shell windows compared with the older one. There is a :vtshell section of the joerc file to control which ones. In particular arrow keys and Ctrl-C are passed to the program. It means you can easily step through bash history with the arrow keys, or abort programs the normal way with Ctrl-C. On the other hand, loss of Ctrl-C means it's less obvious how to close the window. One way is to move the cursor off of the shell data entry point (with Ctrl-P), and then hit Ctrl-C. Another is to hit __^K Q__. Finally, you can type 'pop' at the command prompt. If you need to pass a key to the shell that JOE normally uses, quote it. For example, if you invoke "emacs -nw" in the shell window, you can exit it with: ^Q ^X ^C To quickly position the cursor back to the point where data is entered into the shell, hit __^K V__. When you open a shell window, a JOE-specific startup-script is sourced. It's located in /etc/joe/shell.sh (also /etc/joe/shell.csh). It contains some aliases which allow you to control JOE with fake shell commands. I have these commands so far: * clear
erase shell window (delete buffer contents)
* joe file
edit a file in JOE
* math 1+2
evaluate equation using JOE's calculator
* cd xyz
change directory, keep JOE up to date
* markb
same as ^KB
* markk
same as ^KK
* mark command
execute shell command, mark it's output
* parse command
execute shell command, parse it's output for file names and line numbers (for find or grep)
* parser comman
execute shell command, parse it's output for errors (for gcc)
* release
release parsed errors
* pop
dismiss shell window (same as ^K Q)
These work by emitting an escape sequence recognized by the terminal emulator: __Esc { joe_macro }__. When this is received, the macro is executed. For security, only macros defined in the joerc file which begin with "shell_" can be executed this way. ### Use cases Pop-up shell windows have a number of nice use cases: * Use it to browse manual pages Hit F1 and type "man fopen". Use 'b' ('u') and space to control _more_ (or _less_) while viewing the manual. You can leave the manual on the screen in one window while editing in another window. * Use it to switch directories Hit F1 and navigate to the directory while using _cd_. Once you are in the right place, hit __^K E__ to load a file (or type "edit file" from the shell). * Use it in conjunction with the error parser to find files Hit F1 and navigate to a directory. Use grep or find (or both) to generate a list of files): ~~~~ parse grep -n FIXME *.c ~~~~ Or: ~~~~ markb; find . | xargs grep -n FIXME; markk; parse ~~~~ (Note that you can't say this: ~~~~ parse find . | xargs grep -n FIXME ~~~~ ...the issue is that only the words to the left of the pipe symbol are passed as arguments to the parse command). Now use __^P__ to position the cursor on one of the lines of the list. Hit __Esc Space__ to have JOE edit the file and jump to the specified line (also you can use __Esc -__ and __Esc =__ to step through the list). * Use it in conjunction with search and replace to edit many files Once JOE has a list of files (from above), use search and replace with the 'e' option to visit all of them: ~~~~ ^K F Find: Options: re Replace: ~~~~ * Build your project Easily capture errors from a build with: ~~~~ parserr make ~~~~ Hit __Esc =__ and __Esc -__ to step through the errors. ### How it works.. * There is a new mode "ansi". (__Esc X__ mode ansi). When this mode is enabled, the screen updater hides escape sequences which are in the buffer. Otherwise you get a big mess from the sequences surrounding colored output from 'ls'. * There is a new built-in syntax: "ansi". (__^T Y__ ansi). This syntax parses the ANSI color control sequences so that text gets colored. * There is a terminal emulator to interpret control sequences from the shell program. It emulates a terminal by modifying the contents of an edit buffer. * When the edit window is resized we tell the shell by issuing the TIOCSSIZE or TIOCSWINSZ ioctl. This way, the program running in the shell knows the window size. ## Compiler and grep/find parsers JOE has two parsers which can be used to generate the error list (list of file names / line numbers). The "parserr" command parses the entire buffer, or if the block is set, just the highighted block for compiler error messages. The messages should be in this format: file.name line-number : The file name needs to be made of numbers, letters, '/', '.' and '-'. It must have at leat one '.' in it. There needs to be a colon somewhere after the line number. Lines not in this format are ignored. The "gparse' command parses the entire buffer, or if the block is set, just the highlighted block for a list of filenames or filenames with line numbers from "grep -n", "find" and similar programs. filename filename: filename:line-number: Once JOE has the error list, there are a number of things you can do with it: * Visit the files/locations in the list with __Esc -__ and __Esc =__ * Search and replace across all files in the list by using the 'e' search and replace option. * Clear the list by using the "release" command. Also, you can use __Esc Space__ ('jump' command) to parse the line the cursor is on and jump to the parsed filename and line number. 'jump' uses the grep/find parser unless 'parserr' had been previously issued in the buffer. ### Grep-find Hit __Esc G__ to bring up the prompt. Enter a command which results in file names with line numbers, for example: 'grep -n fred \*.c'. This will list all instances of 'fred' in the \*.c files. You need the '-n' to get the line numbers. Now you can hit __Esc Space__ on one of the lines to jump to the selected file. Also, you can use __Esc =__ and __Esc -__ to step through each line. ### Compile Hit __Esc C__ to save all modified files and then bring up the compile prompt. Enter the command you want to use for the compiler (typically "make -w"). The compiler will run in a shell window. When it's complete, the results are parsed. The '-w' flag should be given to "make" so that it prints messages whenever it changes directories. The message are in this format: make[1]: Entering directory `/home/jhallen/joe-editor-mercurial/joe' If there are any errors or warnings from the compiler you can hit __Esc Space__ on one of the lines to jump to the selected file. Also, you can use __Esc =__ and __Esc -__ to step through each line. ## Syntax highlighting To enable highlight use __^T H__. To select the syntax, use __^T Y__. You can hit __Tab__ __Tab__ at the prompt for a completion list. JOE tries to determine the syntax to use based on the name and contents of the file. The configuration file /etc/joe/ftyperc contains the definitions. Each syntax is defined by a file located /usr/share/joe/syntax/. ## How JOE syntax highlighting works *from [c.jsf](http://joe-editor.hg.sourceforge.net/hgweb/joe-editor/joe-editor/file/tip/syntax/c.jsf.in), slightly modified* A deterministic state machine that performs lexical analysis of the target language is provided in a syntax file. (This is the "assembly language" of syntax highlighting. A separate program could in principal be used to convert a regular expression NFA syntax into this format). Each state begins with: : is the state's name. is the color used for characters eaten by the state (really a symbol for a user definable color). tells JOE if the current character is part of a comment or a string. This allows JOE to skip over comments and strings when matching characters such as parentheses. To use this feature, the highlighter_context option must be applied to the files highlighted by the corresponding syntax. To apply the option, add it to ftyperc for those file entries. The valid contexts are: * comment This character is part of a comment. Example: /\* comment \*/ * string This character is part of a string. Examples: "string" 'c' 'string' The comment and string delimiters themselves should be marked with the appropriate context. The context is considered to be part of the color, so the recolor=-N and recolormark options apply the context to previous characters. The first state defined is the initial state. Within a state, define transitions (jumps) to other states. Each jump has the form: [