Chapter 8. Text Editing: Emacs and VI

1. Emacs
1.1. Short Presentation
1.2. Getting Started
1.3. Handling buffers
1.4. Copy, Cut, Paste, Search
1.5. Quit emacs
2. Vi: the ancestor
2.1. Insert Mode, Command Mode, ex Mode...
2.2. Handling Buffers
2.3. Editing Text and Move Commands
2.4. Cut, Copy, Paste
2.5. Quit Vi
3. A last word...

As stated in the introduction, text editing[18] is a fundamental feature when using a UNIX® system. The two editors we are going to take a quick look at are a little difficult to use initially, but once you understand the basics, each one can prove to be a powerful tool. This is particularly because of the numerous edit modes available which provide specific editing features for a great variety of file types (Perl, C++, XML, etc.).



[18] To edit text” means to modify the content of a file containing only letters, digits, and punctuation symbols. It contains no layout information such as fonts, quadding, etc. Such files may be e-mail messages, source code, documents, or even configuration files.