[ale] from linux-kernel: "ed: the One True Editor"

[Jason Boyles]

----- Begin included message -----
  From: patl at athena.mit.edu (Patrick J. LoPresti) 
  Message-ID: <1991Jul11.031731.9260 at athena.mit.edu> 
  Sender: news at athena.mit.edu (News system) 
  Subject: The True Path (long) 
  Date: 11 Jul 91 03:17:31 GMT 
  Newsgroups: alt.religion.emacs,alt.slack 
  Organization: Massachusetts Institute of Technology 
  Lines: 95 

  When I log into my Xenix system with my 110 baud teletype, both vi 
  *and* Emacs are just too damn slow. They print useless messages like, 
  'C-h for help' and '"foo" File is read only'. So I use the editor 
  that doesn't waste my VALUABLE time. 

  Ed, man! !man ed 

  ED(1) UNIX Programmer's Manual ED(1) 

  NAME 
  ed - text editor 

  SYNOPSIS 
  ed [ - ] [ -x ] [ name ] 
  DESCRIPTION 
  Ed is the standard text editor. 
  ----- 

  Computer Scientists love ed, not just because it comes first 
  alphabetically, but because it's the standard. Everyone else loves ed 
  because it's ED! 

  "Ed is the standard text editor." 

  And ed doesn't waste space on my Timex Sinclair. Just look: 

  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root 24 Oct 29 1929 /bin/ed 
  -rwxr-xr-t 4 root 1310720 Jan 1 1970 /usr/ucb/vi 
  -rwxr-xr-x 1 root 5.89824e37 Oct 22 1990 /usr/bin/emacs 

  Of course, on the system *I* administrate, vi is symlinked to ed. 
  Emacs has been replaced by a shell script which 1) Generates a syslog 
  message at level LOG_EMERG; 2) reduces the user's disk quota by 100K; 
  and 3) RUNS ED!!!!!! 

  "Ed is the standard text editor." 

  Let's look at a typical novice's session with the mighty ed: 

  golem> ed 

  ? 
  help 
  ? 
  ? 
  ? 
  quit 
  ? 
  exit 
  ? 
  bye 
  ? 
  hello? 
  ? 
  eat flaming death 
  ? 
  ^C 
  ? 
  ^C 
  ? 
  ^D 
  ? 

  --- 
  Note the consistent user interface and error reportage. Ed is 
  generous enough to flag errors, yet prudent enough not to overwhelm 
  the novice with verbosity. 

  "Ed is the standard text editor." 

  Ed, the greatest WYGIWYG editor of all. 

  ED IS THE TRUE PATH TO NIRVANA! ED HAS BEEN THE CHOICE OF
  EDUCATED AND IGNORANT ALIKE FOR CENTURIES! ED WILL NOT CORRUPT YOUR
  PRECIOUS BODILY FLUIDS!! ED IS THE STANDARD TEXT EDITOR! ED MAKES THE SUN 
  SHINE AND THE BIRDS SING AND THE GRASS GREEN!! 

  When I use an editor, I don't want eight extra KILOBYTES of worthless 
  help screens and cursor positioning code! I just want an EDitor!! 
  Not a "viitor". Not a "emacsitor". Those aren't even WORDS!!!! ED! 
  ED! ED IS THE STANDARD!!! 

  TEXT EDITOR. 

  When IBM, in its ever-present omnipotence, needed to base their 
  "edlin" on a UNIX standard, did they mimic vi? No. Emacs? Surely 
  you jest. They chose the most karmic editor of all. The standard. 

  Ed is for those who can *remember* what they are working on. If you 
  are an idiot, you should use Emacs. If you are an Emacs, you should 
  not be vi. If you use ED, you are on THE PATH TO REDEMPTION. THE 
  SO-CALLED "VISUAL" EDITORS HAVE BEEN PLACED HERE BY ED TO
  TEMPT THE FAITHLESS. DO NOT GIVE IN!!! THE MIGHTY ED HAS SPOKEN!!! 

  -- 
  Miquel van Smoorenburg | Our vision is to speed up time, 
  miquels at cistron.nl | eventually eliminating it. 

----- End included message -----

 
----
Jason Boyles <jason at alltel.net>