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Aucbvax.4877 fa.editor-p utzoo!decvax!ucbvax!editor-people Sun Nov 1 14:22:28 1981 Re: Integrating Editors with Programming Languages >From Admin.JQJ@SU-SCORE Sun Nov 1 14:12:34 1981 When I say I want a picture editor, I at least want facilities like those provided by SIL, e.g. simple commands to "draw a box at the current point", or "move the current rectangular area left 5 spaces and down one", or "delete the current box".

If I'm doing a "boxes and arrows" picture, I want to be able to type a LISP form in standard READ format and have an approximation of the picture produced automatically. Then I want simple commands to allow me to modify the picture, e.g. equivalents of RPLACA and RPLACD. Of course, the package can only perform an approximation, since based on ((X Y) X Y) we don't know if the (X Y) list is shared. What I most certainly don't want to have to do is type every character in the picture or worry about what characters to use for line drawing.

Unfortunately, the "box and arrow" editor, though not hard to write (especially if written in lisp) is only one of many special-purpose picture editors imaginable. What I really want, then, is a general purpose picture editor that is easily customized for such special purpose tasks. But I also want to have a picture editor that is easy for the novice to use, i.e. has a command set that seems "natural" in some sense. I don't know what that command set would look like. -------

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