======================================================================
=                               Edlin                                =
======================================================================

                            Introduction
======================================================================
Edlin is a line editor, and the only text editor provided with early
versions of IBM PC DOS, MS-DOS and OS/2. Although superseded in MS-DOS
5.0 and later by the full-screen MS-DOS Editor, and by Notepad in
Microsoft Windows, it continued to be included in the 32-bit versions
of Microsoft operating systems up to Windows Server 2008 and Windows
10.


                              History
======================================================================
Edlin was created by Tim Paterson in two weeks in 1980, for Seattle
Computer Products's 86-DOS (QDOS) based on the CP/M context editor
'ED', itself distantly inspired by the DEC PDP-10 TOPS-10 EDIT text
editor.

Microsoft acquired 86-DOS and, after some further development, sold it
as MS-DOS, so Edlin was included in v1.0-v5.0 of MS-DOS. From MS-DOS 6
onwards, the only editor included was the new full-screen MS-DOS
Editor.

Windows 95, 98 and ME ran on top of an embedded version of DOS, which
reports itself as MS-DOS 7. As a successor to MS-DOS 6, this did not
include Edlin.

However, Edlin is included in the 32-bit versions of Windows NT and
its derivatives--up to and including Windows 10--because the NTVDM's
DOS support in those operating systems is based on MS-DOS version 5.0.
However, unlike most other external DOS commands, it has not been
transformed into a native Win32 program. It also does not support long
filenames, which were not added to MS-DOS and Windows until long after
Edlin was written.

The FreeDOS version was developed by Gregory Pietsch.


                               Usage
======================================================================
There are only a few commands. The short list can be found by entering
a ? at the edlin prompt.

When a file is open, typing L lists the contents (e.g., 1,6L lists
lines 1 through 6). Each line is displayed with a line number in front
of it.

*1,6L
1: Edlin: The only text editor in early versions of DOS.
2:
3: Back in the day, I remember seeing web pages
4: branded with a logo at the bottom:
5: "This page created in edlin."
6: The things that some people put themselves through. ;-)
*

The currently selected line has an *.  To replace the contents of any
line, the line number is entered and any text entered replaces the
original.  While editing a line pressing Ctrl-C cancels any changes.
The * marker remains on that line.

Entering I (optionally preceded with a line number) inserts one or
more lines before the * line or the line given.  When finished
entering lines, Ctrl-C returns to the edlin command prompt.

*6I
6:*(...or similar)
7:*^C

*7D
*L
1: Edlin: The only text editor in early versions of DOS.
2:
3: Back in the day, I remember seeing web pages
4: branded with a logo at the bottom:
5: "This page created in edlin."
6: (...or similar)
*

:i - Inserts lines of text.
:D - deletes the specified line, again optionally starting with the
number of a line, or a range of lines.  E.g.: 2,4d deletes lines 2
through 4.  In the above example, line 7 was deleted.

:R - is used to replace all occurrences of a piece of text in a given
range of lines, for example, to replace a spelling error.  Including
the ? prompts for each change.  E.g.: To replace 'prit' with 'print'
and to prompt for each change: ?rprit^Zprint (the ^Z represents
pressing CTRL-Z).  It is case-sensitive.

:S - searches for given text.  It is used in the same way as replace,
but without the replacement text.  A search for 'apple' in the first
20 lines of a file is typed 1,20?sapple (no space, unless that is part
of the search) followed by a press of enter.  For each match, it asks
if it is the correct one, and accepts n or y (or Enter).

:P - displays a listing of a range of lines. If no range is specified,
P displays the complete file from the * to the end. This is different
from L in that P changes the current line to be the last line in the
range.

:T - transfers another file into the one being edited, with this
syntax: [line to insert at]t[full path to file].

:W - (write) saves the file.

:E - saves the file and quits edlin.

:Q - quits edlin without saving.


Scripts
=========
Edlin may be used as a non-interactive file editor in scripts by
redirecting a series of edlin commands.

edlin < script


FreeDOS Edlin
===============
A GPL-licensed clone of Edlin that includes long filename support is
available for download as part of the FreeDOS project. This runs on
operating systems such as Linux or Unix as well as MS-DOS.


                              See also
======================================================================
*List of DOS commands
*ed and ex, similar Unix line editors.
*86-DOS


                           External links
======================================================================
*[https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/windows/it-pro/windows-xp/bb490632(v=technet.10)
Edlin | Microsoft Docs]
*[http://www.computerhope.com/edlin.htm MS-DOS edlin command help]
*[https://github.com/microsoft/MS-DOS/blob/master/v2.0/source/EDLIN.ASM
Open source EDLIN implementation that comes with MS-DOS v2.0]


License
=========
All content on Gopherpedia comes from Wikipedia, and is licensed under CC-BY-SA
License URL: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
Original Article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edlin

You are viewing proxied material from gopherpedia.com. The copyright of proxied material belongs to its original authors. Any comments or complaints in relation to proxied material should be directed to the original authors of the content concerned. Please see the disclaimer for more details.