Apply the "frame around text area" patch and associated geometry fixes. Looks

[nedit.git] / doc / help.etx

.. $Id: help.etx,v 1.38 2003/01/02 01:48:29 yooden Exp $
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.. .. This table of contents is only for the HTML version of this document.
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Table of Contents
-----------------

    Getting_Started_                    
                                        
    Basic Operation                     Macro/Shell Extensions
      Selecting_Text_                      Shell_Commands_and_Filters_
      Finding_and_Replacing_Text_          Learn/Replay_
      Cut_and_Paste_                       Macro_Language_
      Using_the_Mouse_                     Macro_Subroutines_
      Keyboard_Shortcuts_                  Highlighting_Information_
      Shifting_and_Filling_                Range_Sets_
      File_Format_                         Action_Routines_
                                        Customizing
    Features for Programming              Customizing_NEdit_
      Programming_with_NEdit_              Preferences_
      Tabs/Emulated_Tabs_                  X_Resources_
      Auto/Smart_Indent_                   Key_Binding_
      Syntax_Highlighting_                 Highlighting_Patterns_
      Finding_Declarations_(ctags)_        Smart_Indent_Macros_
      Calltips_
 
    Regular Expressions                 NEdit_Command_Line_
      Basic_Regular_Expression_Syntax_   Client/Server_Mode_
      Metacharacters_                    Crash_Recovery_
      Parenthetical_Constructs_          Version_
      Advanced_Topics_                   Distribution_Policy_
      Example_Regular_Expressions_       Mailing_Lists_
                                        Problems/Defects_

.. ~ html
Getting Started
---------------

  Welcome to NEdit!
.. ~ NEDITDOC
.. .. What appears below will always print whether or not NEDITDOC is defined.
..

  NEdit is a standard GUI (Graphical User Interface) style text editor for
  programs and plain-text files.  Users of Macintosh and MS Windows based text
  editors should find NEdit a familiar and comfortable environment.  NEdit
  provides all of the standard menu, dialog, editing, and mouse support, as
  well as all of the standard shortcuts to which the users of modern GUI based
  environments are accustomed.  For users of older style Unix editors, welcome
  to the world of mouse-based editing!

.. ? NEDITDOC~
..   NEdit is freely distributed under the terms of the Gnu General Public
..   License.

.. .. This stuff will always be invisible, unless NEDITDOC is defined
.. 
.. Installing NEdit
.. ----------------
.. 
..   NEdit is a single stand-alone executable file which can be installed by simply
..   copying the appropriate executable "nedit" for your system.  Both sources and
..   executables are available from http://www.nedit.org.  The optional "nc" (NEdit
..   Client) program is also available for users who want to run nedit in
..   client/server mode.
.. 
.. Getting Started
.. ---------------
.. ~ NEDITDOC

  Help sections of interest to new users are listed under the "Basic Operation"
  heading in the top-level Help menu:

* Selecting_Text_
* Finding_and_Replacing_Text_
* Cut_and_Paste_
* Using_the_Mouse_
* Keyboard_Shortcuts_
* Shifting_and_Filling_

  Programmers should also read the introductory section under the "Features for
  Programming" section:

      Programming_with_NEdit_

  If you get into trouble, the Undo command in the Edit menu can reverse any
  modifications that you make.  NEdit does not change the file you are editing
  until you tell it to Save.

3>Editing an Existing File

  To open an existing file, choose Open... from the file menu. Select the file
  that you want to open in the pop-up dialog that appears and click on OK.  You
  may open any number of files at the same time.  Each file will appear in its
  own editor window.  Using Open... rather than re-typing the NEdit command and
  running additional copies of NEdit, will give you quick access to all of the
  files you have open via the Windows menu, and ensure that you don't
  accidentally open the same file twice.  NEdit has no "main" window.  It
  remains running as long as at least one editor window is open.

3>Creating a New File

  If you already have an empty (Untitled) window displayed, just begin typing
  in the window.  To create a new Untitled window, choose New from the File
  menu.  To give the file a name and save its contents to the disk, choose Save
  or Save As... from the File menu.

3>Backup Files

  NEdit maintains periodic backups of the file you are editing so that you can
  recover the file in the event of a problem such as a system crash, network
  failure, or X server crash.  These files are saved under the name `~filename`
  (on Unix) or `_filename` (on VMS), where filename is the name of the file you
  were editing.  If an NEdit process is killed, some of these backup files may
  remain in your directory.  (To remove one of these files on Unix, you may
  have to prefix the `~' (tilde) character with a (backslash) to prevent the
  shell from interpreting it as a special character.)

3>Shortcuts

  As you become more familiar with NEdit, substitute the control and function
  keys shown on the right side of the menus for pulling down menus with the
  mouse.

  Dialogs are also streamlined so you can enter information quickly and without
  using the mouse*.  To move the keyboard focus around a dialog, use the tab
  and arrow keys.  One of the buttons in a dialog is usually drawn with a
  thick, indented, outline.  This button can be activated by pressing Return or
  Enter.  The Cancel or Dismiss button can be activated by pressing escape. 
  For example, to replace the string "thing" with "things" type:

      <ctrl-r>thing<tab>things<return>

  To open a file named "whole_earth.c", type:

      <ctrl-o>who<return>

  (how much of the filename you need to type depends on the other files in the
  directory).  See the section called "Keyboard_Shortcuts_" for more details.

  * Users who have set their keyboard focus mode to "pointer" should set
  "Popups Under Pointer" in the Default Settings menu to avoid the additional
  step of moving the mouse into the dialog.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Basic Operation
===============

Selecting Text
--------------

  NEdit has two general types of selections, primary (highlighted text), and
  secondary (underlined text). Selections can cover either a simple range of
  text between two points in the file, or they can cover a rectangular area of
  the file. Rectangular selections are only useful with non-proportional (fixed
  spacing) fonts.

  To select text for copying, deleting, or replacing, press the left mouse
  button with the pointer at one end of the text you want to select, and drag
  it to the other end. The text will become highlighted. To select a whole
  word, double click (click twice quickly in succession). Double clicking and
  then dragging the mouse will select a number of words. Similarly, you can
  select a whole line or a number of lines by triple clicking or triple
  clicking and dragging. Quadruple clicking selects the whole file. After
  releasing the mouse button, you can still adjust a selection by holding down
  the shift key and dragging on either end of the selection. To delete the
  selected text, press delete or backspace. To replace it, begin typing.

  To select a rectangle or column of text, hold the Ctrl key while dragging the
  mouse. Rectangular selections can be used in any context that normal
  selections can be used, including cutting and pasting, filling, shifting,
  dragging, and searching. Operations on rectangular selections automatically
  fill in tabs and spaces to maintain alignment of text within and to the right
  of the selection. Note that the interpretation of rectangular selections by
  Fill Paragraph is slightly different from that of other commands, the section
  titled "Shifting_and_Filling_" has details.

  The middle mouse button can be used to make an additional selection (called
  the secondary selection). As soon as the button is released, the contents of
  this selection will be copied to the insert position of the window where the
  mouse was last clicked (the destination window). This position is marked by a
  caret shaped cursor when the mouse is outside of the destination window.  If
  there is a (primary) selection, adjacent to the cursor in the window, the new
  text will replace the selected text. Holding the shift key while making the
  secondary selection will move the text, deleting it at the site of the
  secondary selection, rather than copying it.

  Selected text can also be dragged to a new location in the file using the
  middle mouse button. Holding the shift key while dragging the text will copy
  the selected text, leaving the original text in place. Holding the control
  key will drag the text in overlay mode.

  Normally, dragging moves text by removing it from the selected position at
  the start of the drag, and inserting it at a new position relative to to the
  mouse. Dragging a block of text over existing characters, displaces the
  characters to the end of the selection. In overlay mode, characters which are
  occluded by blocks of text being dragged are simply removed. When dragging
  non-rectangular selections, overlay mode also converts the selection to
  rectangular form, allowing it to be dragged outside of the bounds of the
  existing text.

  The section "Using_the_Mouse_" sumarizes the mouse commands for making primary
  and secondary selections. Primary selections can also be made via keyboard
  commands, see "Keyboard_Shortcuts_".
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Finding and Replacing Text
--------------------------

  The Search menu contains a number of commands for finding and replacing text.

  The Find... and Replace... commands present dialogs for entering text for
  searching and replacing.  These dialogs also allow you to choose whether you
  want the search to be sensitive to upper and lower case, or whether to use
  the standard Unix pattern matching characters (regular expressions). 
  Searches begin at the current text insertion position.

  Find Again and Replace Again repeat the last find or replace command without
  prompting for search strings.  To selectively replace text, use the two
  commands in combination: Find Again, then Replace Again if the highlighted
  string should be replaced, or Find Again again to go to the next string.

  Find Selection searches for the text contained in the current primary
  selection (see Selecting_Text_).  The selected text does not have to be in the
  current editor window, it may even be in another program.  For example, if
  the word dog appears somewhere in a window on your screen, and you want to
  find it in the file you are editing, select the word dog by dragging the
  mouse across it, switch to your NEdit window and choose Find Selection from
  the Search menu.

  Find Incremental is yet another variation on searching, where every character
  typed triggers a new search.  Incremental searching is generally the quickest
  way to find something in a file, because it gives you the immediate feedback
  of seeing how your search is progressing, so you never need to type more than
  the minimally sufficient search string to reach your target.

3>Searching Backwards

  Holding down the shift key while choosing any of the search or replace
  commands from the menu (or using the keyboard shortcut), will search in the
  reverse direction.  Users who have set the search direction using the buttons
  in the search dialog, may find it a bit confusing that Find Again and Replace
  Again don't continue in the same direction as the original search (for
  experienced users, consistency of the direction implied by the shift key is
  more important).

3>Selective Replacement

  To replace only some occurrences of a string within a file, choose Replace...
  from the Search menu, enter the string to search for and the string to
  substitute, and finish by pressing the Find button.  When the first
  occurrence is highlighted, use either Replace Again (^T) to replace it, or
  Find Again (^G) to move to the next occurrence without replacing it, and
  continue in such a manner through all occurrences of interest.

  To replace all occurrences of a string within some range of text, select the
  range (see Selecting_Text_), choose Replace... from the Search menu, type the
  string to search for and the string to substitute, and press the "R. in
  Selection" button in the dialog.  Note that selecting text in the Replace...
  dialog will unselect the text in the window.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Cut and Paste
-------------

  The easiest way to copy and move text around in your file or between windows,
  is to use the clipboard, an imaginary area that temporarily stores text and
  data.  The Cut command removes the selected text (see Selecting_Text_) from
  your file and places it in the clipboard.  Once text is in the clipboard, the
  Paste command will copy it to the insert position in the current window.  For
  example, to move some text from one place to another, select it by dragging
  the mouse over it, choose Cut to remove it, click the pointer to move the
  insert point where you want the text inserted, then choose Paste to insert
  it.  Copy copies text to the clipboard without deleting it from your file. 
  You can also use the clipboard to transfer text to and from other Motif
  programs and X programs which make proper use of the clipboard.

  There are many other methods for copying and moving text within NEdit windows
  and between NEdit and other programs.  The most common such method is
  clicking the middle mouse button to copy the primary selection (to the
  clicked position).  Copying the selection by clicking the middle mouse button
  in many cases is the only way to transfer data to and from many X programs. 
  Holding the Shift key while clicking the middle mouse button moves the text,
  deleting it from its original position, rather than copying it.  Other
  methods for transferring text include secondary selections, primary selection
  dragging, keyboard-based selection copying, and drag and drop.  These are
  described in detail in the sections: "Selecting_Text_", "Using_the_Mouse_", 
  and "Keyboard_Shortcuts_".
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Using the Mouse
---------------

  Mouse-based editing is what NEdit is all about, and learning to use the more
  advanced features like secondary selections and primary selection dragging
  will be well worth your while.

  If you don't have time to learn everything, you can get by adequately with
  just the left mouse button:  Clicking the left button moves the cursor. 
  Dragging with the left button makes a selection.  Holding the shift key while
  clicking extends the existing selection, or begins a selection between the
  cursor and the mouse.  Double or triple clicking selects a whole word or a
  whole line.

  This section will make more sense if you also read the section called,
  "Selecting_Text_", which explains the terminology of selections, that is,
  what is meant by primary, secondary, rectangular, etc.


3>Button and Modifier Key Summary

  General meaning of mouse buttons and modifier keys:

4>  Buttons

      Button 1 (left)    Cursor position and primary selection

      Button 2 (middle)  Secondary selections, and dragging and
                         copying the primary selection

      Button 3 (right)   Quick-access programmable menu and pan
                         scrolling

4>  Modifier keys

      Shift   On primary selections, (left mouse button):
                 Extends selection to the mouse pointer
              On secondary and copy operations, (middle):
                 Toggles between move and copy

      Ctrl    Makes selection rectangular or insertion
              columnar

      Alt*    (on release) Exchange primary and secondary
              selections.


3>Left Mouse Button

  The left mouse button is used to position the cursor and to make primary
  selections.

    Click         Moves the cursor

    Double Click  Selects a whole word

    Triple Click  Selects a whole line

    Quad Click    Selects the whole file

    Shift Click   Adjusts (extends or shrinks) the
                  selection, or if there is no existing
                  selection, begins a new selection
                  between the cursor and the mouse.

    Ctrl+Shift+   Adjusts (extends or shrinks) the
    Click         selection rectangularly.

    Drag          Selects text between where the mouse
                  was pressed and where it was released.

    Ctrl+Drag     Selects rectangle between where the
                  mouse was pressed and where it was
                  released.


3>Right Mouse Button

  The right mouse button posts a programmable menu for frequently used commands.

    Click/Drag    Pops up the background menu (programmed
                  from Preferences -> Default Settings ->
                  Customize Menus -> Window Background).

    Ctrl+Drag     Pan scrolling.  Scrolls the window
                  both vertically and horizontally, as if
                  you had grabbed it with your mouse.


3>Middle Mouse Button

  The middle mouse button is for making secondary selections, and copying and
  dragging the primary selection.

    Click         Copies the primary selection to the
                  clicked position.

    Shift+Click   Moves the primary selection to the
                  clicked position, deleting it from its
                  original position.

    Drag          1) Outside of the primary selection:
                      Begins a secondary selection.
                  2) Inside of the primary selection:
                      Moves the selection by dragging.

    Ctrl+Drag     1) Outside of the primary selection:
                      Begins a rectangular secondary
                      selection.
                  2) Inside of the primary selection:
                      Drags the selection in overlay
                      mode (see below).

  When the mouse button is released after creating a secondary selection:

    No Modifiers  If there is a primary selection,
                  replaces it with the secondary
                  selection.  Otherwise, inserts the
                  secondary selection at the cursor
                  position.

    Shift         Move the secondary selection, deleting
                  it from its original position.  If
                  there is a primary selection, the move
                  will replace the primary selection
                  with the secondary selection.
                  Otherwise, moves the secondary
                  selection to to the cursor position.

    Alt*          Exchange the primary and secondary
                  selections.


  While moving the primary selection by dragging with the middle mouse button:

    Shift         Leaves a copy of the original
                  selection in place rather than
                  removing it or blanking the area.

    Ctrl          Changes from insert mode to overlay
                  mode (see below).

    Escape        Cancels drag in progress.

  Overlay Mode: Normally, dragging moves text by removing it from the selected
  position at the start of the drag, and inserting it at a new position
  relative to to the mouse. When you drag a block of text over existing
  characters, the existing characters are displaced to the end of the
  selection.  In overlay mode, characters which are occluded by blocks of text
  being dragged are simply removed.  When dragging non-rectangular selections,
  overlay mode also converts the selection to rectangular form, allowing it to
  be dragged outside of the bounds of the existing text.

  Mouse buttons 4 and 5 are usually represented by a mouse wheel nowadays. 
  They are used to scroll up or down in the text window.

  * The Alt key may be labeled Meta or Compose-Character on some keyboards. 
  Some window managers, including default configurations of mwm, bind
  combinations of the Alt key and mouse buttons to window manager operations. 
  In NEdit, Alt is only used on button release, so regardless of the window
  manager bindings for Alt-modified mouse buttons, you can still do the
  corresponding NEdit operation by using the Alt key AFTER the initial mouse
  press, so that Alt is held while you release the mouse button.  If you find
  this difficult or annoying, you can re-configure most window managers to skip
  this binding, or you can re-configure NEdit to use a different key
  combination.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Keyboard Shortcuts
------------------

  Most of the keyboard shortcuts in NEdit are shown on the right hand sides of
  the pull-down menus.  However, there are more which are not as obvious.  These
  include; dialog button shortcuts; menu and dialog mnemonics; labeled keyboard
  keys, such as the arrows, page-up, page-down, and home; and optional Shift
  modifiers on accelerator keys, like [Shift]Ctrl+F.


3>Menu Accelerators

  Pressing the key combinations shown on the right of the menu items is a
  shortcut for selecting the menu item with the mouse.  Some items have the shift
  key enclosed in brackets, such as [Shift]Ctrl+F.  This indicates that the shift
  key is optional.  In search commands, including the shift key reverses the
  direction of the search.  In Shift commands, it makes the command shift the
  selected text by a whole tab stop rather than by single characters.


3>Menu Mnemonics

  Pressing the Alt key in combination with one of the underlined characters in
  the menu bar pulls down that menu.  Once the menu is pulled down, typing the
  underlined characters in a menu item (without the Alt key) activates that
  item.  With a menu pulled down, you can also use the arrow keys to select menu
  items, and the Space or Enter keys to activate them.


3>Keyboard Shortcuts within Dialogs

  One button in a dialog is usually marked with a thick indented outline. 
  Pressing the Return or Enter key activates this button.

  All dialogs have either a Cancel or Dismiss button.  This button can be
  activated by pressing the Escape (or Esc) key.

  Pressing the tab key moves the keyboard focus to the next item in a dialog. 
  Within an associated group of buttons, the arrow keys move the focus among the
  buttons.  Shift+Tab moves backward through the items.

  Most items in dialogs have an underline under one character in their name. 
  Pressing the Alt key along with this character, activates a button as if you
  had pressed it with the mouse, or moves the keyboard focus to the associated
  text field or list.

  You can select items from a list by using the arrow keys to move the
  selection and space to select.

  In file selection dialogs, you can type the beginning characters of the file
  name or directory in the list to select files


3>Labeled Function Keys

  The labeled function keys on standard workstation and PC keyboards, like the
  arrows, and page-up and page-down, are active in NEdit, though not shown in the
  pull-down menus.

  Holding down the control key while pressing a named key extends the scope of
  the action that it performs.  For example, Home normally moves the insert
  cursor the beginning of a line.  Ctrl+Home moves it to the beginning of the
  file. Backspace deletes one character, Ctrl+Backspace deletes one word.

  Holding down the shift key while pressing a named key begins or extends a
  selection.  Combining the shift and control keys combines their actions.  For
  example, to select a word without using the mouse, position the cursor at the
  beginning of the word and press Ctrl+Shift+RightArrow.  The Alt key modifies
  selection commands to make the selection rectangular.

  Under X and Motif, there are several levels of translation between keyboard
  keys and the actions they perform in a program.  The "Customizing_NEdit_", and
  "X_Resources_" sections of the Help menu have more information on this subject. 
  Because of all of this configurability, and since keyboards and standards for
  the meaning of some keys vary from machine to machine, the mappings may be
  changed from the defaults listed below.

3>Modifier Keys (in general)

    Ctrl   Extends the scope of the action that the key
           would otherwise perform.  For example, Home
           normally moves the insert cursor to the beginning
           of a line. Ctrl+Home moves it to the beginning of
           the file.  Backspace deletes one character, Ctrl+
           Backspace deletes one word.

    Shift  Extends the selection to the cursor position. If
           there's no selection, begins one between the old
           and new cursor positions.

    Alt    When modifying a selection, makes the selection
           rectangular.

  (For the effects of modifier keys on mouse button presses, see the section
  titled "Using_the_Mouse_")

3>All Keyboards

    Escape        Cancels operation in progress: menu
                  selection, drag, selection, etc.  Also
                  equivalent to cancel button in dialogs.

    Backspace     Delete the character before the cursor

    Ctrl+BS       Delete the word before the cursor

    Arrows --

      Left        Move the cursor to the left one character

      Ctrl+Left   Move the cursor backward one word
                  (Word delimiters are settable, see
                  "Customizing_NEdit_", and "X_Resources_")

      Right       Move the cursor to the right one character

      Ctrl+Right  Move the cursor forward one word

      Up          Move the cursor up one line

      Ctrl+Up     Move the cursor up one paragraph.
                  (Paragraphs are delimited by blank lines)

      Down        Move the cursor down one line.

      Ctrl+Down   Move the cursor down one paragraph.

    Ctrl+Return   Return with automatic indent, regardless
                  of the setting of Auto Indent.

    Shift+Return  Return without automatic indent,
                  regardless of the setting of Auto Indent.

    Ctrl+Tab      Insert an ASCII tab character, without
                  processing emulated tabs.

    Alt+Ctrl+<c>  Insert the control-code equivalent of
                  a key <c>

    Ctrl+/        Select everything (same as Select
                  All menu item or ^A)

    Ctrl+\        Unselect

    Ctrl+U        Delete to start of line

3>PC Standard Keyboard

    Ctrl+Insert   Copy the primary selection to the
                  clipboard (same as Copy menu item or ^C)
                  for compatibility with Motif standard key
                  binding
    Shift+Ctrl+
    Insert        Copy the primary selection to the cursor
                  location.

    Delete        Delete the character before the cursor.
                  (Can be configured to delete the character
                  after the cursor, see "Customizing_NEdit_",
                  and "X_Resources_")

    Ctrl+Delete   Delete to end of line.

    Shift+Delete  Cut, remove the currently selected text
                  and place it in the clipboard. (same as
                  Cut menu item or ^X) for compatibility
                  with Motif standard key binding
    Shift+Ctrl+
    Delete        Cut the primary selection to the cursor
                  location.

    Home          Move the cursor to the beginning of the
                  line

    Ctrl+Home     Move the cursor to the beginning of the
                  file

    End           Move the cursor to the end of the line

    Ctrl+End      Move the cursor to the end of the file

    PageUp        Scroll and move the cursor up by one page.

    Ctrl+PageUp   Scroll and move the cursor left by one
                  page.
    PageDown      Scroll and move the cursor down by one
                  page.

    Ctrl+PageDown Scroll and move the cursor right by one
                  page.

    F10           Make the menu bar active for keyboard
                  input (Arrow Keys, Return, Escape,
                  and the Space Bar)

3>Specialty Keyboards  

  On machines with different styles of keyboards, generally, text editing
  actions are properly matched to the labeled keys, such as Remove,
  Next-screen, etc..  If you prefer different key bindings, see the section
  titled "Key_Binding_" under the Customizing heading in the Help menu.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Shifting and Filling
--------------------

3>Shift Left, Shift Right

  While shifting blocks of text is most important for programmers (See Features
  for Programming), it is also useful for other tasks, such as creating
  indented paragraphs.

  To shift a block of text one tab stop to the right, select the text, then
  choose Shift Right from the Edit menu.  Note that the accelerator keys for
  these menu items are Ctrl+9 and Ctrl+0, which correspond to the right and
  left parenthesis on most keyboards.  Remember them as adjusting the text in
  the direction pointed to by the parenthesis character.  Holding the Shift key
  while selecting either Shift Left or Shift Right will shift the text by one
  character.

  It is also possible to shift blocks of text by selecting the text
  rectangularly, and dragging it left or right (and up or down as well).  Using
  a rectangular selection also causes tabs within the selection to be
  recalculated and substituted, such that the non-whitespace characters remain
  stationary with respect to the selection.


3>Filling  

  Text filling using the Fill Paragraph command in the Edit menu is one of the
  most important concepts in NEdit.  And it will be well worth your while to
  understand how to use it properly.

  In plain text files, unlike word-processor files, there is no way to tell
  which lines are continuations of other lines, and which lines are meant to be
  separate, because there is no distinction in meaning between newline
  characters which separate lines in a paragraph, and ones which separate
  paragraphs from other text.  This makes it impossible for a text editor like
  NEdit to tell parts of the text which belong together as a paragraph from
  carefully arranged individual lines.

  In continuous wrap mode (Preferences -> Wrap -> Continuous), lines
  automatically wrap and unwrap themselves to line up properly at the right
  margin.  In this mode, you simply omit the newlines within paragraphs and let
  NEdit make the line breaks as needed.  Unfortunately, continuous wrap mode is
  not appropriate in the majority of situations, because files with extremely
  long lines are not common under Unix and may not be compatible with all
  tools, and because you can't achieve effects like indented sections, columns,
  or program comments, and still take advantage of the automatic wrapping.

  Without continuous wrapping, paragraph filling is not entirely automatic. 
  Auto-Newline wrapping keeps paragraphs lined up as you type, but once
  entered, NEdit can no longer distinguish newlines which join wrapped text,
  and newlines which must be preserved.  Therefore, editing in the middle of a
  paragraph will often leave the right margin messy and uneven.

  Since NEdit can't act automatically to keep your text lined up, you need to
  tell it explicitly where to operate, and that is what Fill Paragraph is for. 
  It arranges lines to fill the space between two margins, wrapping the lines
  neatly at word boundaries.  Normally, the left margin for filling is inferred
  from the text being filled.  The first line of each paragraph is considered
  special, and its left indentation is maintained separately from the remaining
  lines (for leading indents, bullet points, numbered paragraphs, etc.). 
  Otherwise, the left margin is determined by the furthest left non-whitespace
  character.  The right margin is either the Wrap Margin, set in the
  preferences menu (by default, the right edge of the window), or can also be
  chosen on the fly by using a rectangular selection (see below).

  There are three ways to use Fill Paragraph.  The simplest is, while you are
  typing text, and there is no selection, simply select Fill Paragraph (or type
  Ctrl+J), and NEdit will arrange the text in the paragraph adjacent to the
  cursor.  A paragraph, in this case, means an area of text delimited by blank
  lines.

  The second way to use Fill Paragraph is with a selection.  If you select a
  range of text and then chose Fill Paragraph, all of the text in the selection
  will be filled.  Again, continuous text between blank lines is interpreted as
  paragraphs and filled individually, respecting leading indents and blank
  lines.

  The third, and most versatile, way to use Fill Paragraph is with a
  rectangular selection.  Fill Paragraph treats rectangular selections
  differently from other commands.  Instead of simply filling the text inside
  the rectangular selection, NEdit interprets the right edge of the selection
  as the requested wrap margin.  Text to the left of the selection is not
  disturbed (the usual interpretation of a rectangular selection), but text to
  the right of the selection is included in the operation and is pulled in to
  the selected region.  This method enables you to fill text to an arbitrary
  right margin, without going back and forth to the wrap-margin dialog, as well
  as to exclude text to the left of the selection such as comment bars or other
  text columns.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

File Format
-----------

  While plain-text is probably the simplest and most interchangeable file
  format in the computer world, there is still variation in what plain-text
  means from system to system.  Plain-text files can differ in character set,
  line termination, and wrapping.

  While character set differences are the most obvious and pose the most
  challenge to portability, they affect NEdit only indirectly via the same font
  and localization mechanisms common to all X applications.  If your system is
  set up properly, you will probably never see character-set related problems
  in NEdit.  NEdit can not display Unicode text files, or any multi-byte
  character set.

  The primary difference between an MS DOS format file and a Unix format file,
  is how the lines are terminated.  Unix uses a single newline character.  MS
  DOS uses a carriage-return and a newline.  NEdit can read and write both file
  formats, but internally, it uses the single character Unix standard.  NEdit
  auto-detects MS DOS format files based on the line termination at the start
  of the file.  Files are judged to be DOS format if all of the first five line
  terminators, within a maximum range, are DOS-style.  To change the format in
  which NEdit writes a file from DOS to Unix or visa versa, use the Save As...
  command and check or un-check the MS DOS Format button.

  Wrapping within text files can vary among individual users, as well as from
  system to system.  Both Windows and MacOS make frequent use of plain text
  files with no implicit right margin.  In these files, wrapping is determined
  by the tool which displays them.  Files of this style also exist on Unix
  systems, despite the fact that they are not supported by all Unix utilities. 
  To display this kind of file properly in NEdit, you have to select the wrap
  style called Continuous.  Wrapping modes are discussed in the sections:
  Customizing -> Preferences, and Basic Operation -> Shifting and Filling.

  The last and most minute of format differences is the terminating newline. 
  Some Unix compilers and utilities require a final terminating newline on all
  files they read and fail in various ways on files which do not have it.  Vi
  and approximately half of Unix editors enforce the terminating newline on all
  files that they write; Emacs does not enforce this rule.  Users are divided
  on which is best.  NEdit makes the final terminating newline optional
  (Preferences -> Default Settings -> Append Line Feed on Save).
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Features for Programming
========================

Programming with NEdit
----------------------

  Though general in appearance, NEdit has many features intended specifically
  for programmers.  Major programming-related topics are listed in separate
  sections under the heading: "Features for Programming": Syntax_Highlighting_,
  Tabs/Emulated_Tabs_, Finding_Declarations_(ctags)_, Calltips_, and 
  Auto/Smart_Indent_.  Minor topics related to programming are discussed below:

3>Language Modes

  When NEdit initially reads a file, it attempts to determine whether the file
  is in one of the computer languages that it knows about.  Knowing what language
  a file is written in allows NEdit to assign highlight patterns and smart indent
  macros, and to set language specific preferences like word delimiters, tab
  emulation, and auto-indent.  Language mode can be recognized from both the file
  name and from the first 200 characters of content.  Language mode recognition
  and language-specific preferences are configured in: Preferences -> Default
  Settings -> Language Modes....

  You can set the language mode manually for a window, by selecting it from the
  menu: Preferences -> Language Modes.

3>Backlighting

  Nedit can be made to set the background color of particular classes of
  characters to allow easy identifcation of those characters. This is
  particularly useful if you need to be able to distiguish between tabs
  and spaces in a file where the difference is important. The colors used
  for backlighting are specified by a resource, "nedit*backlightCharTypes"
  but can be changed for a particular window using the macro built-in function
  set_backlight_string(). You can turn backlighting on and off through the
  Preferences -> Apply Backlighting menu entry.

  If you prefer to have backlighting turned on for all new windows, use
  the Preferences -> Default Settings -> Backlighting -> Apply Backlighting
  menu entry. If you wish to set the current window's backlighting settings
  for new windows, use Preferences -> Default Settings -> Backlighting ->
  Use Current. These settings will be saved along with other preferences
  using Preferences -> Save Defaults.

3>Line Numbers

  To find a particular line in a source file by line number, choose Goto Line
  #... from the Search menu.  You can also directly select the line number text
  in the compiler message in the terminal emulator window (xterm, decterm,
  winterm, etc.) where you ran the compiler, and choose Goto Selected from the
  Search menu.

  To find out the line number of a particular line in your file, turn on
  Statistics Line in the Preferences menu and position the insertion point
  anywhere on the line.  The statistics line continuously updates the line number
  of the line containing the cursor.
  
  To go to a specific column on a given line, choose Goto Line #... from the
  Search menu and enter a line number and a column number separated by a 
  comma.  (e.g. Enter "100,12" for line 100 column 12.)  If you want to go to
  a column on the current line just leave out the line number.  (e.g. Enter
  ",45" to go the column 45 on the current line.)

3>Matching Parentheses

  To help you inspect nested parentheses, brackets, braces, quotes, and other
  characters, NEdit has both an automatic parenthesis matching mode, and a Goto
  Matching command.  Automatic parenthesis matching is activated when you type,
  or move the insertion cursor after a parenthesis, bracket, or brace.  It
  momentarily highlights either the opposite character ('Delimiter') or the
  entire expression ('Range') when the opposite character is visible in the
  window. To find a matching character anywhere in the file, select it or
  position the cursor after it, and choose Goto Matching from the Search menu. 
  If the character matches itself, such as a quote or slash, select the first
  character of the pair.  NEdit will match {, (, [, <, ", ', `, /, and \.
  Holding the Shift key while typing the accelerator key (Shift+Ctrl+M, by
  default), will select all of the text between the matching characters.
  
  When syntax highlighting is enabled, the matching routines can optionally
  make use of the syntax information for improved accuracy. In that case,
  a brace inside a highlighted string will not match a brace inside a comment,
  for instance.
  
3>Opening Included Files

  The Open Selected command in the File menu understands the C preprocessor's
  #include syntax, so selecting an #include line and invoking Open Selected will
  generally find the file referred to, unless doing so depends on the settings of
  compiler switches or other information not available to NEdit.

3>Interface to Programming Tools

  Integrated software development environments such as SGI's CaseVision and
  Centerline Software's Code Center, can be interfaced directly with NEdit via
  the client server interface.  These tools allow you to click directly on
  compiler and runtime error messages and request NEdit to open files, and select
  lines of interest.  The easiest method is usually to use the tool's interface
  for character-based editors like vi, to invoke nc, but programmatic interfaces
  can also be derived using the source code for nc.

  There are also some simple compile/review, grep, ctree, and ctags browsers
  available in the NEdit contrib directory on ftp.nedit.org.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Tabs/Emulated Tabs
------------------

3>Changing the Tab Distance

  Tabs are important for programming in languages which use indentation to show
  nesting, as short-hand for producing white-space for leading indents.  As a
  programmer, you have to decide how to use indentation, and how or whether tab
  characters map to your indentation scheme.

  Ideally, tab characters map directly to the amount of indent that you use to
  distinguish nesting levels in your code.  Unfortunately, the Unix standard
  for interpretation of tab characters is eight characters (probably dating
  back to mechanical capabilities of the original teletype), which is usually
  too coarse for a single indent.

  Most text editors, NEdit included, allow you to change the interpretation of
  the tab character, and many programmers take advantage of this, and set their
  tabs to 3 or 4 characters to match their programming style.  In NEdit you set
  the hardware tab distance in Preferences -> Tabs... for the current window,
  or Preferences -> Default Settings -> Tabs... (general), or Preferences ->
  Default Settings -> Language Modes... (language-specific) to change the
  defaults for future windows.

  Changing the meaning of the tab character makes programming much easier while
  you're in the editor, but can cause you headaches outside of the editor,
  because there is no way to pass along the tab setting as part of a plain-text
  file.  All of the other tools which display, print, and otherwise process
  your source code have to be made aware of how the tabs are set, and must be
  able to handle the change.  Non-standard tabs can also confuse other
  programmers, or make editing your code difficult for them if their text
  editors don't support changes in tab distance.

3>Emulated Tabs

  An alternative to changing the interpretation of the tab character is tab
  emulation.  In the Tabs... dialog(s), turning on Emulated Tabs causes the Tab
  key to insert the correct number of spaces and/or tabs to bring the cursor
  the next emulated tab stop, as if tabs were set at the emulated tab distance
  rather than the hardware tab distance. Backspacing immediately after entering
  an emulated tab will delete the fictitious tab as a unit, but as soon as you
  move the cursor away from the spot, NEdit will forget that the collection of
  spaces and tabs is a tab, and will treat it as separate characters.  To enter
  a real tab character with "Emulate Tabs" turned on, use Ctrl+Tab.

  It is also possible to tell NEdit not to insert ANY tab characters at all in
  the course of processing emulated tabs, and in shifting and rectangular
  insertion/deletion operations, for programmers who worry about the
  misinterpretation of tab characters on other systems.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

..                             ** NOTE **
..
.. The following Tabs Dialog and Customize Window Title Dialog sections
.. should only appear in the online documentation, and not in any of 
.. the other possible forms. The rationale is that they are not directly
.. obtained from the Help menu, but are buried in preference dialogs.
..
.. ? help~
.. Tabs Dialog
.. -----------
.. 
..   The Tabs dialog controls both the operation of the Tab key, and
..   the interpretation of tab characters within a file.
..   
..   The first field, Tab Spacing, controls how  NEdit responds to
..   tab characters in a file.  On most Unix and VMS systems the
..   conventional interpretation of a tab character is to advance the
..   text position to the nearest multiple of eight characters (a tab
..   spacing of 8).  However, many programmers of C and other
..   structured languages, when given the choice, prefer a tab
..   spacing of 3 or 4 characters.  Setting a three or four character
..   hardware tab spacing is useful and convenient as long as your
..   other software tools support it.  Unfortunately, on Unix and VMS
..   systems, system utilities, such as more, and printing software
..   can't always properly display files with other than eight
..   character tabs.
..   
..   Selecting "Emulate Tabs" will cause the Tab key to insert the
..   correct number of spaces or tabs to reach the next tab stop, as
..   if the tab spacing were set at the value in the "Emulated tab
..   spacing" field.  Backspacing immediately after entering an
..   emulated tab will delete it as a unit, but as soon as you move
..   the cursor away from the spot, NEdit will forget that the
..   collection of spaces and tabs is a tab, and will treat it as
..   separate characters.  To enter a real tab character with
..   "Emulate Tabs" turned on, use Ctrl+Tab.
..   
..   In generating emulated tabs, and in Shift Left, Paste Column,
..   and some rectangular selection operations, NEdit inserts blank
..   characters (spaces or tabs) to preserve the alignment of
..   non-blank characters. The bottom toggle button in the Tabs
..   dialog instructs NEdit whether to insert tab characters as
..   padding in such situations. Turning this off, will keep NEdit
..   from automatically inserting tabs. Some software developers
..   prefer to keep their source code free of tabs to avoid its
..   misinterpretation on systems with different tab character
..   conventions.
..    ----------------------------------------------------------------------
..
.. Customize Window Title Dialog
.. -----------------------------
.. 
..   The Customize Window Title dialog allows you to customize 
..   and test the way information will be displayed in each window's 
..   title field.
..   
..   **Definition of the title**
..   
..   The upper half of the dialog can be used to select the various 
..   components that should be displayed in the title. The layout can be 
..   fine-tuned by editing the printf() like format string below the 
..   component buttons: additional characters can be entered, or the 
..   order can be changed.
..   
..   The following sequences are interpreted in the format string:
..   
..    %c    ClearCase view tag (only relevant when NEdit is 
..          used together with ClearCase)
..    %[n]d directory, with one optional numeric digit n 
..          specifying the maximum number of trailing directory 
..          components to display. Skipped components are 
..          replaced by an ellipsis (...).
..    %f    file name, without the path name
..    %h    host name
..    %s    NEdit server name (server mode only)
..    %[*]S file status, either verbose (%S) or brief (%*S).
..          In verbose mode the file status is spelled out: 
..          read-only, locked, and modified. In brief mode, 
..          abbreviations and an asterisk are used for the 
..          respective states: RO, LO, *.
..    %u    user name
..   
..   The format string and the component buttons are continously synchronized.
..   
..   The default format is:
..   
..     {%c} [%s] %f (%S) - %d
..   
..   The resulting title will only contain elements with 
..   a value. Hence, the title is compressed as follows:
..   
..    * Elements with no value are removed.             
..                                                      
..    * Empty parenthesis pairs i.e. (), [] or {}, or parenthesis
..      pairs containing only space(s), are removed.
..                                                      
..    * Sequences of spaces are replaced with one space.
..                                                      
..    * Leading spaces and dashes are removed.          
..                                                      
..    * Trailing spaces and dashes are removed.         
..   
..   If the server name and the ClearCase view tag are identical, only 
..   the first one specified in the format string will be displayed.
..   
..   **Previewing the settings**
..   
..   The lower part of the dialog can be used to test the selected title
..   under various conditions. For some of the components that are selected 
..   for display, various states can be enforced on the preview. 
..   
..   For instance, components that are not always active (such the 
..   NEdit server name) can be turned on or off in the preview.
..   
.. ~ help

Auto/Smart Indent
-----------------

  Programmers who use structured languages usually require some form of
  automatic indent, so that they don't have to continually re-type the
  sequences of tabs and/or spaces needed to maintain lengthy running indents. 
  Version 5.0 of NEdit is the first release of NEdit to offer "smart" indent,
  at least experimentally, in addition to the traditional automatic indent
  which simply lines up the cursor position with the previous line.

3>Smart Indent

  Smart Indent in this release must still be considered somewhat experimental. 
  Smart indent macros are only available by default for C and C++, and while
  these can easily be configured for different default indentation distances,
  they may not conform to everyone's exact C programming style.  Smart indent
  is programmed in terms of macros in the NEdit macro language which can be
  entered in: Preferences -> Default Settings -> Indent -> Program Smart
  Indent.  Hooks are provided for intervening at the point that a newline is
  entered, either via the user pressing the Enter key, or through
  auto-wrapping; and for arbitrary type-in to act on specific characters typed.

  To type a newline character without invoking smart-indent when operating in
  smart-indent mode, hold the Shift key while pressing the Return or Enter key.

3>Auto-Indent

  With Indent set to Auto (the default), NEdit keeps a running indent.  When
  you press the Return or Enter key, spaces and tabs are inserted to line up
  the insert point under the start of the previous line.

  Regardless of indent-mode, Ctrl+Return always does the automatic indent;
  Shift+Return always does a return without indent.

3>Block Indentation Adjustment

  The Shift Left and Shift Right commands as well as rectangular dragging can
  be used to adjust the indentation for several lines at once.  To shift a
  block of text one character to the right, select the text, then choose Shift
  Right from the Edit menu.  Note that the accelerator keys for these menu
  items are Ctrl+9 and Ctrl+0, which correspond to  the right and left
  parenthesis on most keyboards.  Remember them as adjusting the text in the
  direction pointed to by the parenthesis character.  Holding the Shift key
  while selecting either Shift Left or Shift Right will shift the text by one
  tab stop (or by one emulated tab stop if tab emulation is turned on).  The
  help section "Shifting and Filling" under "Basic Operation" has details.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Syntax Highlighting
-------------------

  Syntax Highlighting means using colors and fonts to help distinguish language
  elements in programming languages and other types of structured files. 
  Programmers use syntax highlighting to understand code faster and better, and
  to spot many kinds of syntax errors more quickly.

  To use syntax highlighting in NEdit, select Highlight Syntax in the
  Preferences menu.  If NEdit recognizes the computer language that you are
  using, and highlighting rules (patterns) are available for that language, it
  will highlight your text, and maintain the highlighting, automatically, as
  you type.

  If NEdit doesn't correctly recognize the type of the file you are editing,
  you can manually select a language mode from Language Modes in the
  Preferences menu.  You can also program the method that NEdit uses to
  recognize language modes in Preferences -> Default Settings -> Language
  Modes....

  If no highlighting patterns are available for the language that you want to
  use, you can create new patterns relatively quickly.  The Help section
  "Highlighting_Patterns_" under "Customizing", has details.

  If you are satisfied with what NEdit is highlighting, but would like it to
  use different colors or fonts, you can change these by selecting Preferences
  -> Default Settings -> Syntax Highlighting -> Text Drawing Styles. 
  Highlighting patterns are connected with font and color information through a
  common set of styles so that colorings defined for one language will be
  similar across others, and patterns within the same language which are meant
  to appear identical can be changed in the same place.  To understand which
  styles are used to highlight the language you are interested in, you may need
  to look at "Highlighting_Patterns_" section, as well.

  Syntax highlighting is CPU intensive, and under some circumstances can affect
  NEdit's responsiveness.  If you have a particularly slow system, or work with
  very large files, you may not want to use it all of the time.  Syntax
  highlighting introduces two kinds of delays.  The first is an initial parsing
  delay, proportional to the size of the file.  This delay is also incurred
  when pasting large sections of text, filtering text through shell commands,
  and other circumstances involving changes to large amounts of text.  The
  second kind of delay happens when text which has not previously been visible
  is scrolled in to view.  Depending on your system, and the highlight patterns
  you are using, this may or may not be noticeable.  A typing delay is also
  possible, but unlikely if you are only using the built-in patterns.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Finding Declarations (ctags)
----------------------------

  NEdit can process tags files generated using the Unix _ctags command or the
  Exuberant Ctags program.  Ctags creates index files correlating names of
  functions and declarations with their locations in C, Fortran, or Pascal source
  code files. (See the ctags manual page for more information).  Ctags produces a
  file called "tags" which can be loaded by NEdit.  NEdit can manage any number
  of tags files simultaneously.  Tag collisions are handled with a popup menu to
  let the user decide which tag to use.  In 'Smart' mode NEdit will automatically
  choose the desired tag based on the scope of the file or module. Once loaded,
  the information in the tags file enables NEdit to go directly to the
  declaration of a highlighted function or data structure name with a single
  command.  To load a tags file, select "Load Tags File" from the File menu and
  choose a tags file to load, or specify the name of the tags file on the NEdit
  command line:

      nedit -tags tags

  NEdit can also be set to load a tags file automatically when it starts up. 
  Setting the X resource nedit.tagFile to the name of a tag file tells NEdit to
  look for that file at startup time (see "Customizing_NEdit_").  The file name
  can be either a complete path name, in which case NEdit will always load the
  same tags file, or a file name without a path or with a relative path, in
  which case NEdit will load it starting from the current directory.  The
  second option allows you to have different tags files for different projects,
  each automatically loaded depending on the directory you're in when you start
  NEdit.  Setting the name to "tags" is an obvious choice since this is the
  name that ctags uses. NEdit normally evaluates relative path tag file
  specifications every time a file is opened. All accessible tag files are
  loaded at this time. To disable the automatic loading of tag files specified
  as relative paths, set the X resource nedit.alwaysCheckRelativeTagsSpecs to
  False.

  To unload a tags file, select "Un-load Tags File" from the File menu and
  choose from the list of tags files.  NEdit will keep track of tags file updates
  by checking the timestamp on the files, and automatically update the tags
  cache. 

  To find the definition of a function or data structure once a tags file is
  loaded, select the name anywhere it appears in your program (see 
  "Selecting_Text_") and choose "Find Definition" from the Search menu.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Calltips
--------
  
  Calltips are little yellow boxes that pop up to remind you what the arguments
  and return type of a function are.  More generally, they're a UI mechanism to
  present a small amount of crucial information in a prominent location.  To 
  display a calltip, select some text and choose "Show Calltip" from the Search
  menu.  To kill a displayed calltip, hit Esc.
  
  Calltips get their information from one of two places -- either a tags file (see
  "Finding_Declarations_(ctags)_") or a calltips file.  First, any loaded calltips 
  files are searched for a definition, and if nothing is found then the tags 
  database is searched.  If a tag is found that matches the hilighted text then
  a calltip is displayed with the first few lines of the definition -- usually 
  enough to show you what the arguments of a function are.
  
  You can load a calltips file by using choosing "Load Calltips File" from the
  File menu.  You can unload a calltips file by selecting it from the 
  "Unload Calltips File" submenu of the File menu.  You can also choose one or
  more default calltips files to be loaded for each language mode using the 
  "Default calltips file(s)" field of the Language Modes dialog.
  
  The calltips file format is very simple.  calltips files are organized in blocks
  separated by blank lines.  The first line of the block is the key, which is the
  word that is matched when a calltip is requested.  The rest of the block is
  displayed as the calltip.  
  
  Almost any text at all can appear in a calltip key or a calltip.  There are no
  special characters that need to be escaped.  The only issues to note are that
  trailing whitespace is ignored, and you cannot have a blank line inside a
  calltip.  (Use a single period instead --  it'll be nearly invisible.)  You should
  also avoid calltip keys that begin and end with '@*' characters, since those are
  used to mark special blocks.

  There are five special block types--comment, include, language, alias, and 
  version--which are distinguished by their first lines, "@* comment @*", 
  "@* include @*", "@* language @*", "@* alias @*", and "@* version @*" respectively 
  (without quotes).

  Comment blocks are ignored when reading calltips files.

  Include blocks specify additional calltips files to load, one per line.  The ~
  character can be used for your $HOME directory, but other shell shortcuts like
  @* and ? can't be used. Include blocks allow you to make a calltips file for your
  project that includes, say, the calltips files for C, Motif, and Xt.

  Language blocks specify which language mode the calltips should be used with. 
  When a calltip is requested it won't match tips from languages other than the
  current language mode.  Language blocks only affect the tips listed after the
  block.

  Alias blocks allow a calltip to have multiple keys.  The first line of the block
  is the key for the calltip to be displayed, and the rest of the lines are
  additional keys, one per line, that should also show the calltip.

  Version blocks are ignored for the time being.

  You can use calltips in your own macros using the calltip() and kill_calltip()
  macro subroutines and the $calltip_ID macro variable.  See the 
  Macro_Subroutines_ section for details.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  
Regular Expressions
===================

Basic Regular Expression Syntax
-------------------------------

  Regular expressions (regex's) are useful as a way to match inexact sequences
  of characters.  They can be used in the `Find...' and `Replace...' search
  dialogs and are at the core of Color Syntax Highlighting patterns.  To specify
  a regular expression in a search dialog, simply click on the `Regular
  Expression' radio button in the dialog.

  A regex is a specification of a pattern to be matched in the searched text. 
  This pattern consists of a sequence of tokens, each being able to match a
  single character or a sequence of characters in the text, or assert that a
  specific position within the text has been reached (the latter is called an
  anchor.)  Tokens (also called atoms) can be modified by adding one of a number
  of special quantifier tokens immediately after the token.  A quantifier token
  specifies how many times the previous token must be matched (see below.)

  Tokens can be grouped together using one of a number of grouping constructs,
  the most common being plain parentheses.  Tokens that are grouped in this way
  are also collectively considered to be a regex atom, since this new larger
  atom may also be modified by a quantifier.

  A regex can also be organized into a list of alternatives by separating each
  alternative with pipe characters, `|'.  This is called alternation.  A match
  will be attempted for each alternative listed, in the order specified, until a
  match results or the list of alternatives is exhausted (see Alternation_
  section below.)

3>The 'Any' Character

  If a dot (`.') appears in a regex, it means to match any character exactly
  once.  By default, dot will not match a newline character, but this behavior
  can be changed (see help topic Parenthetical_Constructs_, under the
  heading, Matching Newlines).

3>Character Classes

  A character class, or range, matches exactly one character of text, but the
  candidates for matching are limited to those specified by the class.  Classes
  come in two flavors as described below:

     [...]   Regular class, match only characters listed.
     [^...]  Negated class, match only characters NOT listed.

  As with the dot token, by default negated character classes do not match
  newline, but can be made to do so.

  The characters that are considered special within a class specification are
  different than the rest of regex syntax as follows. If the first character in
  a class is the `]' character (second character if the first character is `^')
  it is a literal character and part of the class character set.  This also
  applies if the first or last character is `-'.  Outside of these rules, two
  characters separated by `-' form a character range which includes all the
  characters between the two characters as well.  For example, `[^f-j]' is the
  same as `[^fghij]' and means to match any character that is not `f', `g',
  `h', `i', or `j'.

3>Anchors

  Anchors are assertions that you are at a very specific position within the
  search text.  NEdit regular expressions support the following anchor tokens:

     ^    Beginning of line
     $    End of line
     <    Left word boundary
     >    Right word boundary
     \B   Not a word boundary

  Note that the \B token ensures that the left and right characters are both
  delimiter characters, or that both left and right characters are
  non-delimiter characters.  Currently word anchors check only one character,
  e.g. the left word anchor `<' only asserts that the left character is a word
  delimiter character.  Similarly the right word anchor checks the right
  character.

3>Quantifiers

  Quantifiers specify how many times the previous regular expression atom may
  be matched in the search text.  Some quantifiers can produce a large
  performance penalty, and can in some instances completely lock up NEdit.  To
  prevent this, avoid nested quantifiers, especially those of the maximal
  matching type (see below.)

  The following quantifiers are maximal matching, or "greedy", in that they
  match as much text as possible.

     *   Match zero or more
     +   Match one  or more
     ?   Match zero or one

  The following quantifiers are minimal matching, or "lazy", in that they match
  as little text as possible.

     *?   Match zero or more
     +?   Match one  or more
     ??   Match zero or one

  One final quantifier is the counting quantifier, or brace quantifier. It
  takes the following basic form:

     {min,max}  Match from `min' to `max' times the
                previous regular expression atom.

  If `min' is omitted, it is assumed to be zero.  If `max' is omitted, it is
  assumed to be infinity.  Whether specified or assumed, `min' must be less
  than or equal to `max'.  Note that both `min' and `max' are limited to
  65535.  If both are omitted, then the construct is the same as `*'.   Note
  that `{,}' and `{}' are both valid brace constructs.  A single number
  appearing without a comma, e.g. `{3}' is short for the `{min,min}' construct,
  or to match exactly `min' number of times.

  The quantifiers `{1}' and `{1,1}' are accepted by the syntax, but are
  optimized away since they mean to match exactly once, which is redundant
  information.  Also, for efficiency, certain combinations of `min' and `max'
  are converted to either `*', `+', or `?' as follows:

     {} {,} {0,}    *
     {1,}           +
     {,1} {0,1}     ?

  Note that {0} and {0,0} are meaningless and will generate an error message at
  regular expression compile time.

  Brace quantifiers can also be "lazy".  For example {2,5}? would try to match
  2 times if possible, and will only match 3, 4, or 5 times if that is what is
  necessary to achieve an overall match.

3>Alternation

  A series of alternative patterns to match can be specified by separating them
  with vertical pipes, `|'.  An example of _alternation would be `a|be|sea'. 
  This will match `a', or `be', or `sea'. Each alternative can be an
  arbitrarily complex regular expression. The alternatives are attempted in
  the order specified.  An empty alternative can be specified if desired, e.g.
  `a|b|'.  Since an empty alternative can match nothingness (the empty string),
  this guarantees that the expression will match.

3>Comments

  Comments are of the form `(?#<comment text>)' and can be inserted anywhere
  and have no effect on the execution of the regular expression.  They can be
  handy for documenting very complex regular expressions.  Note that a comment
  begins with `(?#' and ends at the first occurrence of an ending parenthesis,
  or the end of the regular expression... period.  Comments do not recognize
  any escape sequences.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Metacharacters
--------------

3>Escaping Metacharacters

  In a regular expression (regex), most ordinary characters match themselves.  
  For example, `ab%' would match anywhere `a' followed by `b' followed by `%'
  appeared in the text.  Other characters don't match themselves, but are
  metacharacters. For example, backslash is a special metacharacter which
  'escapes' or changes the meaning of the character following it. Thus, to
  match a literal backslash would require a regular expression to have two
  backslashes in sequence. NEdit provides the following escape sequences so
  that metacharacters that are used by the regex syntax can be specified as
  ordinary characters.

     \(  \)  \-  \[  \]  \<  \>  \{  \}
     \.  \|  \^  \$  \*  \+  \?  \&  \\

3>Special Control Characters

  There are some special characters that are  difficult or impossible to type. 
  Many of these characters can be constructed as a sort of metacharacter or
  sequence by preceding a literal character with a backslash. NEdit recognizes
  the following special character sequences:

     \a  alert (bell)
     \b  backspace
     \e  ASCII escape character (***)
     \f  form feed (new page)
     \n  newline
     \r  carriage return
     \t  horizontal tab
     \v  vertical tab

     *** For environments that use the EBCDIC character set,
         when compiling NEdit set the EBCDIC_CHARSET compiler
         symbol to get the EBCDIC equivalent escape
         character.)

3>Octal and Hex Escape Sequences

  Any ASCII (or EBCDIC) character, except null, can be specified by using
  either an octal escape or a hexadecimal escape, each beginning with \0 or \x
  (or \X), respectively.  For example, \052 and \X2A both specify the `*'
  character.  Escapes for null (\00 or \x0) are not valid and will generate an
  error message.  Also, any escape that exceeds \0377 or \xFF will either cause
  an error or have any additional character(s) interpreted literally. For
  example, \0777 will be interpreted as \077 (a `?' character) followed by `7'
  since \0777 is greater than \0377.

  An invalid digit will also end an octal or hexadecimal escape.  For example,
  \091 will cause an error since `9' is not within an octal escape's range of
  allowable digits (0-7) and truncation before the `9' yields \0 which is
  invalid.

3>Shortcut Escape Sequences

  NEdit defines some escape sequences that are handy shortcuts for commonly
  used character classes.

   \d  digits            0-9
   \l  letters           a-z, A-Z, and locale dependent letters
   \s  whitespace        \t, \r, \v, \f, and space
   \w  word characters   letters, digits, and underscore, `_'

  \D, \L, \S, and \W are the same as the lowercase versions except that the
  resulting character class is negated.  For example, \d is equivalent to
  `[0-9]', while \D is equivalent to `[^0-9]'.

  These escape sequences can also be used within a character class.  For
  example, `[\l_]' is the same as `[a-zA-Z@_]', extended with possible locale 
  dependent letters. The escape sequences for special characters, and octal
  and hexadecimal escapes are also valid within a class.

3>Word Delimiter Tokens

  Although not strictly a character class, the following escape sequences
  behave similarly to character classes:

     \y   Word delimiter character
     \Y   Not a word delimiter character

  The `\y' token matches any single character that is one of the characters
  that NEdit recognizes as a word delimiter character, while the `\Y' token
  matches any character that is NOT a word delimiter character.  Word delimiter
  characters are dynamic in nature, meaning that the user can change them through
  preference settings.  For this reason, they must be handled differently by the
  regular expression engine.  As a consequence of this, `\y' and `\Y' can not be
  used within a character class specification.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Parenthetical Constructs
------------------------

3>Capturing Parentheses

  Capturing Parentheses are of the form `(<regex>)' and can be used to group
  arbitrarily complex regular expressions.  Parentheses can be nested, but the
  total number of parentheses, nested or otherwise, is limited to 50 pairs. 
  The text that is matched by the regular expression between a matched set of
  parentheses is captured and available for text substitutions and
  backreferences (see below.)  Capturing parentheses carry a fairly high
  overhead both in terms of memory used and execution speed, especially if
  quantified by `*' or `+'.

3>Non-Capturing Parentheses

  Non-Capturing Parentheses are of the form `(?:<regex>)' and facilitate
  grouping only and do not incur the overhead of normal capturing parentheses. 
  They should not be counted when determining numbers for capturing parentheses
  which are used with backreferences and substitutions.  Because of the limit
  on the number of capturing parentheses allowed in a regex, it is advisable to
  use non-capturing parentheses when possible.

3>Positive Look-Ahead

  Positive look-ahead constructs are of the form `(?=<regex>)' and implement a
  zero width assertion of the enclosed regular expression.  In other words, a
  match of the regular expression contained in the positive look-ahead
  construct is attempted.  If it succeeds, control is passed to the next
  regular expression atom, but the text that was consumed by the positive
  look-ahead is first unmatched (backtracked) to the place in the text where
  the positive look-ahead was first encountered.

  One application of positive look-ahead is the manual implementation of a
  first character discrimination optimization.  You can include a positive
  look-ahead that contains a character class which lists every character that
  the following (potentially complex) regular expression could possibly start
  with.  This will quickly filter out match attempts that can not possibly
  succeed.

3>Negative Look-Ahead

  Negative look-ahead takes the form `(?!<regex>)' and is exactly the same as
  positive look-ahead except that the enclosed regular expression must NOT
  match.  This can be particularly useful when you have an expression that is
  general, and you want to exclude some special cases.  Simply precede the
  general expression with a negative look-ahead that covers the special cases
  that need to be filtered out.
  
3>Positive Look-Behind

  Positive look-behind constructs are of the form `(?<=<regex>)' and implement
  a zero width assertion of the enclosed regular expression in front of the
  current matching position.  It is similar to a positive look-ahead assertion,
  except for the fact the the match is attempted on the text preceeding the
  current position, possibly even in front of the start of the matching range
  of the entire regular expression.
  
  A restriction on look-behind expressions is the fact that the expression
  must match a string of a bounded size.  In other words, `*', `+', and `{n,}'
  quantifiers are not allowed inside the look-behind expression. Moreover,
  matching performance is sensitive to the difference between the upper and
  lower bound on the matching size.  The smaller the difference, the better the
  performance.  This is especially important for regular expressions used in
  highlight patterns.
  
  Another (minor) restriction is the fact that look-**ahead** patterns, nor
  any construct that requires look-ahead information (such as word boundaries)
  are supported at the end of a look-behind pattern (no error is raised, but
  matching behaviour is unspecified). It is always possible to place these
  look-ahead patterns immediately after the look-behind pattern, where they
  will work as expected.
  
  Positive look-behind has similar applications as positive look-ahead.
  
3>Negative Look-Behind

  Negative look-behind takes the form `(?<!<regex>)' and is exactly the same as
  positive look-behind except that the enclosed regular expression must
  NOT match. The same restrictions apply.
  
  Note however, that performance is even more sensitive to the distance 
  between the size boundaries: a negative look-behind must not match for 
  **any** possible size, so the matching engine must check **every** size.

3>Case Sensitivity

  There are two parenthetical constructs that control case sensitivity:

     (?i<regex>)   Case insensitive; `AbcD' and `aBCd' are
                   equivalent.

     (?I<regex>)   Case sensitive;   `AbcD' and `aBCd' are
                   different.

  Regular expressions are case sensitive by default, that is, `(?I<regex>)' is
  assumed.  All regular expression token types respond appropriately to case
  insensitivity including character classes and backreferences.  There is some
  extra overhead involved when case insensitivity is in effect, but only to the
  extent of converting each character compared to lower case.

3>Matching Newlines

  NEdit regular expressions by default handle the matching of newlines in a way
  that should seem natural for most editing tasks.  There are situations,
  however, that require finer control over how newlines are matched by some
  regular expression tokens.

  By default, NEdit regular expressions will NOT match a newline character for
  the following regex tokens: dot (`.'); a negated character class (`[^...]');
  and the following shortcuts for character classes:

     `\d', `\D', `\l', `\L', `\s', `\S', `\w', `\W', `\Y'

  The matching of newlines can be controlled for the `.' token, negated
  character classes, and the `\s' and `\S' shortcuts by using one of the
  following parenthetical constructs:

     (?n<regex>)  `.', `[^...]', `\s', `\S' match newlines

     (?N<regex>)  `.', `[^...]', `\s', `\S' don't match
                                            newlines

  `(?N<regex>)' is the default behavior.

3>Notes on New Parenthetical Constructs

  Except for plain parentheses, none of the parenthetical constructs capture
  text.  If that is desired, the construct must be wrapped with capturing
  parentheses, e.g. `((?i<regex))'.

  All parenthetical constructs can be nested as deeply as desired, except for
  capturing parentheses which have a limit of 50 sets of parentheses,
  regardless of nesting level.

3>Back References

  Backreferences allow you to match text captured by a set of capturing
  parenthesis at some later position in your regular expression.  A
  backreference is specified using a single backslash followed by a single
  digit from 1 to 9 (example: \3).  Backreferences have similar syntax to
  substitutions (see below), but are different from substitutions in that they
  appear within the regular expression, not the substitution string. The number
  specified with a backreference identifies which set of text capturing
  parentheses the backreference is associated with. The text that was most
  recently captured by these parentheses is used by the backreference to
  attempt a match.  As with substitutions, open parentheses are counted from
  left to right beginning with 1.  So the backreference `\3' will try to match
  another occurrence of the text most recently matched by the third set of
  capturing parentheses.  As an example, the regular expression `(\d)\1' could
  match `22', `33', or `00', but wouldn't match `19' or `01'.

  A backreference must be associated with a parenthetical expression that is
  complete.  The expression `(\w(\1))' contains an invalid backreference since
  the first set of parentheses are not complete at the point where the
  backreference appears.

3>Substitution

  Substitution strings are used to replace text matched by a set of capturing
  parentheses.  The substitution string is mostly interpreted as ordinary text
  except as follows.

  The escape sequences described above for special characters, and octal and
  hexadecimal escapes are treated the same way by a substitution string. When
  the substitution string contains the `&' character, NEdit will substitute the
  entire string that was matched by the `Find...' operation. Any of the first
  nine sub-expressions of the match string can also be inserted into the
  replacement string.  This is done by inserting a `\' followed by a digit from
  1 to 9 that represents the string matched by a parenthesized expression
  within the regular expression.  These expressions are numbered left-to-right
  in order of their opening parentheses.

  The capitalization of text inserted by `&' or `\1', `\2', ... `\9' can be
  altered by preceding them with `\U', `\u', `\L', or `\l'.  `\u' and `\l'
  change only the first character of the inserted entity, while `\U' and `\L'
  change the entire entity to upper or lower case, respectively.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Advanced Topics
---------------

3>Substitutions

  Regular expression substitution can be used to program automatic editing
  operations.  For example, the following are search and replace strings to find
  occurrences of the `C' language subroutine `get_x', reverse the first and
  second parameters, add a third parameter of NULL, and change the name to
  `new_get_x':

     Search string:   `get_x *\( *([^ ,]*), *([^\)]*)\)'
     Replace string:  `new_get_x(\2, \1, NULL)'

3>Ambiguity

  If a regular expression could match two different parts of the text, it will
  match the one which begins earliest.  If both begin in the same place but
  match different lengths, or match the same length in different ways, life
  gets messier, as follows.

  In general, the possibilities in a list of alternatives are considered in
  left-to-right order.  The possibilities for `*', `+', and `?' are considered
  longest-first, nested constructs are considered from the outermost in, and
  concatenated constructs are considered leftmost-first. The match that will be
  chosen is the one that uses the earliest possibility in the first choice that
  has to be made.  If there is more than one choice, the next will be made in
  the same manner (earliest possibility) subject to the decision on the first
  choice.  And so forth.

  For example, `(ab|a)b*c' could match `abc' in one of two ways.  The first
  choice is between `ab' and `a'; since `ab' is earlier, and does lead to a
  successful overall match, it is chosen.  Since the `b' is already spoken for,
  the `b*' must match its last possibility, the empty string, since it must
  respect the earlier choice.

  In the particular case where no `|'s are present and there is only one `*',
  `+', or `?', the net effect is that the longest possible match will be
  chosen.  So `ab*', presented with `xabbbby', will match `abbbb'.  Note that
  if `ab*' is tried against `xabyabbbz', it will match `ab' just after `x', due
  to the begins-earliest rule.  (In effect, the decision on where to start the
  match is the first choice to be made, hence subsequent choices must respect
  it even if this leads them to less-preferred alternatives.)

3>References

  An excellent book on the care and feeding of regular expressions is

          Mastering Regular Expressions, 2nd Edition
          Jeffrey E. F. Friedl
          2002, O'Reilly & Associates
          ISBN 0-596-00289-0
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Example Regular Expressions
---------------------------

  The following are regular expression examples which will match:

* An entire line.
!       ^.*$
!
* Blank lines.
!       ^$
!
* Whitespace on a line.
!       \s+
!
* Whitespace across lines.
!       (?n\s+)
!
* Whitespace that spans at least two lines. Note minimal matching `*?' quantifier.
!       (?n\s*?\n\s*)
!
* IP address (not robust).
!       (?:\d{1,3}(?:\.\d{1,3}){3})
!
* Two character US Postal state abbreviations (includes territories).
!       [ACDF-IK-PR-W][A-Z]
!
* Web addresses.
!       (?:http://)?www\.\S+
!
* Case insensitive double words across line breaks.
!       (?i(?n<(\S+)\s+\1>))
!
* Upper case words with possible punctuation.
!       <[A-Z][^a-z\s]*>
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Macro/Shell Extensions
======================

Shell Commands and Filters
--------------------------

  The Shell menu (Unix versions only) allows you to execute Unix shell commands
  from within NEdit.  You can add items to the menu to extend NEdit's command
  set or to incorporate custom automatic editing features using shell commands
  or editing languages like awk and sed.  To add items to the menu, select
  Preferences -> Default Settings Customize Menus -> Shell Menu.  NEdit comes
  pre-configured with a few useful Unix commands like spell and sort, but we
  encourage you to add your own custom extensions.

  Filter Selection... prompts you for a Unix command to use to process the
  currently selected text.  The output from this command replaces the contents
  of the selection.

  Execute Command... prompts you for a Unix command and replaces the current
  selection with the output of the command.  If there is no  selection, it
  deposits the output at the current insertion point. In the Shell Command
  field, the % character expands to the name (including directory path), and
  the # character expands to the current line number of the file in the window.
  To include a % or # character in the command, use %% or ##, respectively.  

  Execute Command Line uses the position of the cursor in the window to
  indicate a line to execute as a shell command line.  The cursor may be
  positioned anywhere on the line.  This command allows you to use an NEdit
  window as an editable command window for saving output and saving commands
  for re-execution. Note that the same character expansions described above
  in Execute Command also occur with this command.

  The X resource called nedit.shell (See "Customizing_NEdit_") determines which
  Unix shell is used to execute commands.  The default value for this resource
  is /bin/csh.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Learn/Replay
------------

  Selecting Learn Keystrokes from the Macro menu puts NEdit in learn mode.  In
  learn mode, keystrokes and menu commands are recorded, to be played back
  later, using the Replay Keystrokes command, or pasted into a macro in the
  Macro Commands dialog of the Default Settings menu in Preferences.

  Note that only keyboard and menu commands are recorded, not mouse clicks or
  mouse movements since these have no absolute point of reference, such as
  cursor or selection position.  When you do a mouse-based operation in learn
  mode, NEdit will beep (repeatedly) to remind you that the operation was not
  recorded.

  Learn mode is also the quickest and easiest method for writing macros.  The
  dialog for creating macro commands contains a button labeled "Paste Learn /
  Replay Macro", which will deposit the last sequence learned into the body of
  the macro.

3>Repeating Actions and Learn/Replay Sequences

  You can repeat the last (keyboard-based) command, or learn/replay sequence
  with the Repeat... command in the Macro menu.  To repeat an action, first do
  the action (that is, insert a character, do a search, move the cursor), then
  select Repeat..., decide how or how many times you want it repeated, and
  click OK.  For example, to move down 30 lines through a file, you could type:
  <Down Arrow> Ctrl+, 29 <Return>.  To repeat a learn/replay sequence, first
  learn it, then select Repeat..., click on Learn/Replay and how you want it
  repeated, then click OK.

  If the commands you are repeating advance the cursor through the file, you
  can also repeat them within a range of characters, or from the current cursor
  position to the end of the file.  To iterate over a range of characters, use
  the primary selection (drag the left mouse button over the text) to mark the
  range you want to operate on, and select "In Selection" in the Repeat dialog.

  When using In "Selection" or "To End" with a learned sequence, try to do
  cursor movement as the last step in the sequence, since testing of the cursor
  position is only done at the end of the sequence execution.  If you do cursor
  movement first, for example searching for a particular word then doing a
  modification, the position of the cursor won't be checked until the sequence
  has potentially gone far beyond the end of your desired range.

  It's easy for a repeated command to get out of hand, and you can easily
  generate an infinite loop by using range iteration on a command which doesn't
  progress.  To cancel a repeating command in progress, type Ctrl+. (period),
  or select Cancel Macro from the Macro menu.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Macro Language
--------------

  Macros can be called from Macro menu commands, window background menu
  commands, within the smart-indent framework, from the autoload macro file and
  from the command line.
  Macro menu and window background menu commands are defined under Preferences
  -> Default Settings -> Customize Menus.  Help on creating items in these
  menus can be found in the section, Help -> Customizing -> Preferences.

  The autoload macro file is a file of macro commands and definitions which
  NEdit will automatically execute when it is first started.  Its location is
  dependent on your environment:
  
* The default place for the file is '$HOME/.nedit/autoload.nm',
* if the variable $NEDIT_HOME is set in your environment it is located at '$NEDIT_HOME/autoload.nm',
* if you are using old-style run control files (i.e. $HOME/.nedit is a regular file) it is located in '$HOME/.neditmacro'.

  (For VMS, the file is in '$NEDIT_HOME/autoload.nm' if $NEDIT_HOME is set, in
  'SYS$LOGIN:.neditmacro' otherwise.)

  NEdit's macro language is a simple interpreter with integer arithmetic,
  dynamic strings, and C-style looping constructs (very similar to the
  procedural portion of the Unix awk program).  From the macro language, you
  can call the same action routines which are bound to keyboard keys and menu
  items, as well additional subroutines for accessing and manipulating editor
  data, which are specific to the macro language (these are listed in the
  sections titled "Macro_Subroutines_", and "Action_Routines_").


3>Syntax

  An NEdit macro language program consists of a list of statements, each
  terminated by a newline.  Groups of statements which are executed together
  conditionally, such as the body of a loop, are surrounded by curly braces
  "{}".

  Blank lines and comments are also allowed.  Comments begin with a "#" and end
  with a newline, and can appear either on a line by themselves, or at the end
  of a statement.

  Statements which are too long to fit on a single line may be split across
  several lines, by placing a backslash "\" character at the end of each line
  to be continued.


3>Data Types

  The NEdit macro language recognizes only three data types, dynamic character
  strings, integer values and associative arrays. In general strings and
  integers can be used interchangeably. If a string represents an integer
  value, it can be used as an integer. Integers can be compared and
  concatenated with strings. Arrays may contain integers, strings, or arrays.
  Arrays are stored key/value pairs. Keys are always stored as strings.

4>Integer Constants

  Integers are non-fractional numbers in the range of -2147483647 to
  2147483647.  Integer constants must be in decimal.  For example:

    a = -1
    b = 1000

4>Character String Constants

  Character string constants are enclosed in double quotes.  For example:

     a = "a string"
     dialog("Hi there!", "Dismiss")

  Strings may also include C-language style escape sequences:

     \\ Backslash     \t Tab              \f Form feed
     \" Double quote  \b Backspace        \a Alert
     \n Newline       \r Carriage return  \v Vertical tab

  For example, to send output to the terminal from which NEdit was started, a
  newline character is necessary because, like printf, t_print requires
  explicit newlines, and also buffers its output on a per-line basis:

     t_print("a = " a "\n")


3>Variables

  Variable names must begin either with a letter (local variables), or a $
  (global variables).  Beyond the first character, variables may also contain
  numbers and underscores `_'.  Variables are called in to existence just by
  setting them (no explicit declarations are necessary).

  Local variables are limited in scope to the subroutine (or menu item
  definition) in which they appear.  Global variables are accessible from all
  routines, and their values persist beyond the call which created them, until
  reset.

4>Built-in Variables

  NEdit has a number of permanently defined variables, which are used to access
  global editor information and information about the the window in which the
  macro is executing.  These are listed along with the built in functions in
  the section titled "Macro_Subroutines_".


3>Functions and Subroutines

  The syntax of a function or subroutine call is:

     function_name(arg1, arg2, ...)

  where arg1, arg2, etc. represent up to 9 argument values which are passed to
  the routine being called.  A function or subroutine call can be on a line by
  itself, as above, or if it returns a value, can be invoked within a character
  or numeric expression:

     a = fn1(b, c) + fn2(d)
     dialog("fn3 says: " fn3())

  Arguments are passed by value.  This means that you can not return values via
  the argument list, only through the function value or indirectly through
  agreed-upon global variables.

4>Built-in Functions

  NEdit has a wide range of built in functions which can be called from the
  macro language.  These routines are divided into two classes, macro-language
  functions, and editor action routines.  Editor action routines are more
  flexible, in that they may be called either from the macro language, or bound
  directly to keys via translation tables.  They are also limited, however, in
  that they can not return values.  Macro language routines can return values,
  but can not be bound to keys in translation tables.

  Nearly all of the built-in subroutines operate on an implied window, which is
  initially the window from which the macro was started.  To manipulate the
  contents of other windows, use the focus_window subroutine to change the
  focus to the ones you wish to modify.  focus_window can also be used to
  iterate over all of the currently open windows, using the special keyword
  names, "last" and "next".

  For backwards compatibility, hyphenated action routine names are allowed, and
  most of the existing action routines names which contain underscores have an
  equivalent version containing hyphens ('-') instead of underscores.  Use of
  these names is discouraged.  The macro parser resolves the ambiguity between
  '-' as the subtraction/negation operator, and - as part of an action routine
  name by assuming subtraction unless the symbol specifically matches an action
  routine name.

4>User Defined Functions

  Users can define their own macro subroutines, using the define keyword:

     define subroutine_name {
        < body of subroutine >
     }

  Macro definitions can not appear within other definitions, or within macro
  menu item definitions (usually they are found in the autoload macro file).

  The arguments with which a user-defined subroutine or function was invoked,
  are presented as $1, $2, ... , $9.  The number of arguments can be read from
  $n_args.

  To return a value from a subroutine, and/or to exit from the subroutine
  before the end of the subroutine body, use the return statement:

     return <value to return>


3>Operators and Expressions

  Operators have the same meaning and precedence that they do in C, except for
  ^, which raises a number to a power (y^x means y to the x power), rather than
  bitwise exclusive OR.  The table below lists operators in decreasing order of
  precedence.

     Operators                Associativity
     ()
     ^                        right to left
     - ! ++ --                (unary)
     * / %                    left to right
     + -                      left to right
     > >= < <= == !=          left to right
     &                        left to right
     |                        left to right
     &&                       left to right
     ||                       left to right
     (concatenation)          left to right
     = += -= *= /= %=, &= |=  right to left

  The order in which operands are evaluated in an expression is undefined,
  except for && and ||, which like C, evaluate operands left to right, but stop
  when further evaluation would no longer change the result.

4>Numerical Operators

  The numeric operators supported by the NEdit macro language are listed below:

     + addition
     - subtraction or negation
     * multiplication
     / division
     % modulo
     ^ power
     & bitwise and
     | bitwise or

  Increment (++) and decrement (--) operators can also be appended or prepended
  to variables within an expression.  Prepended increment/decrement operators
  act before the variable is evaluated.  Appended increment/decrement operators
  act after the variable is evaluated.

4>Logical and Comparison Operators

  Logical operations produce a result of 0 (for false) or 1 (for true).  In a
  logical operation, any non-zero value is recognized to mean true.  The
  logical and comparison operators allowed in the NEdit macro language are
  listed below:

     && logical and
     || logical or
     !  not
     >  greater
     <  less
     >= greater or equal
     <= less or equal
     == equal (integers and/or strings)
     != not equal (integers and/or strings)

4>Character String Operators

  The "operator" for concatenating two strings is the absence of an operator. 
  Adjoining character strings with no operator in between means concatenation:

     d = a b "string" c
     t_print("the value of a is: " a)

  Comparison between character strings is done with the == and != operators,
  (as with integers).  There are a number of useful built-in routines for
  working with character strings, which are listed in the section called 
  "Macro_Subroutines_".

4>Arrays and Array Operators

  Arrays may contain either strings, integers, or other arrays. Arrays are 
  associative, which means that they relate two pieces of information, the key
  and  the value. The key is always a string; if you use an integer it is
  converted to a string.

  To determine if a given key is in an array, use the 'in' keyword.

      if ("6" in x)
          <body>

  If the left side of the in keyword is an array, the result is true if every
  key in the left array is in the right array. Array values are not compared.

  To iterate through all the keys of an array use the 'for' looping construct.
  Keys are not guaranteed in any particular order:

      for (aKey in x)
          <body>

  Elements can be removed from an array using the delete command:

      delete x[3] # deletes element with key 3
      delete x[]  # deletes all elements

  The number of elements in an array can be determined by referencing the
  array with no indices:

      dialog("array x has " x[] " elements", "OK")

  Arrays can be combined with some operators. All the following operators only 
  compare the keys of the arrays.

      result = x + y   (Merge arrays)
      
  The 'result' is a new array containing keys from both x and y. If
  duplicates are present values from y are used.
          
      result = x - y   (Remove keys)

  The 'result' is a new array containing all keys from x that are not in y.
          
      result = x & y   (Common keys)
          
  The 'result' is a new array containing all keys which are in both x and y.
  The values from y are used.
          
      result = x | y   (Unique keys)
      
  The 'result' is a new array containing keys which exist in either x or y, 
  but not both.

  When duplicate keys are encountered using the + and & operators, the values 
  from the array on the right side of the operators are used for the result.
  All  of the above operators are array only, meaning both the left and right
  sides of the operator must be arrays. The results are also arrays.

  Array keys can also contain multiple dimensions:
  
      x[1, 1, 1] = "string"

  These are used in the expected way, e.g.:
  
      for (i = 1; i < 3; i++)
      {
          for (j = 1; j < 3; j++)
          {
              x[i, j] = k++
          }
      }
      
  gives the following array:
  
      x[1, 1] = 0
      x[1, 2] = 1
      x[2, 1] = 2
      x[2, 2] = 3

  Internally all indices are part of one string, separated by the string 
  $sub_sep (ASCII 0x18). The first key in the above example is in fact
  
      ["1" $sub_sep "1"]

  If you need to extract one of the keys, you can use split(), using 
  $sub_sep as the separator.

  You can also check for the existence of multi-dimensional array by 
  looking for $sub_sep in the key.

  Last, you need $sub_sep if you want to use the 'in' keyword.
  
      if ((1,2) in myArray)
      {..}
      
  doesn't work, but
  
      if (("1" $sub_sep "2") in myArray)
      {..}
      
  does work.

3>Looping and Conditionals

  NEdit supports looping constructs: for and while, and conditional statements:
  if and else, with essentially the same syntax as C:

     for (<init>, ...; <condition>; <increment>, ...) <body>

     while (<condition>) <body>

     if (<condition>) <body>

     if (<condition>) <body> else <body>

  <body>, as in C, can be a single statement, or a list of statements enclosed
  in curly braces ({}).  <condition> is an expression which must evaluate to
  true for the statements in <body> to be executed.  for loops may also contain
  initialization statements, <init>, executed once at the beginning of the
  loop, and increment/decrement statements (or any arbitrary statement), which
  are executed at the end of the loop, before the condition is evaluated again.

  Examples:

    for (i=0; i<100; i++)
       j = i * 2

    for (i=0, j=20; i<20; i++, j--) {
       k = i * j
       t_print(i, j, k)
    }

    while (k > 0)
    {
       k = k - 1
       t_print(k)
    }

    for (;;) {
       if (i-- < 1)
           break
    }

  Loops may contain break and continue statements.  A break statement causes an
  exit from the innermost loop, a continue statement transfers control to the
  end of the loop.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Macro Subroutines
-----------------

3>Built in Variables

  These variables are read-only and can not be changed.

**$active_pane**
  Index of the current pane.

**$auto_indent**
  Contains the current preference for auto indent. 
  Can be  "off", "on" or "auto".

**$calltip_ID**
  Equals the ID of the currently displayed calltip, or 0 if no calltip is
  being displayed.

**$cursor**
  Position of the cursor in the current window.

**$column**
  Column number of the cursor position in the current window.

**$display_width**
  Width of the current pane in pixels.

**$em_tab_dist**
  If tab emulation is turned on in the Tabs...
  dialog of the Preferences menu, value is the
  distance between emulated tab stops. If tab
  emulation is turned off, value is -1.

**$empty_array**
  An array with no elements. This can be used to initialize 
  an array to an empty state.

**$file_format**
  Current newline format that the file will be saved with. Can 
  be "unix", "dos" or "macintosh".

**$file_name**
  Name of the file being edited in the current
  window, stripped of directory component.

**$file_path**
  Directory component of file being edited in the current window.

**$font_name**
  Contains the current plain text font name.

**$font_name_bold**
  Contains the current bold text font name.

**$font_name_bold_italic**
  Contains the current bold-italic text font name.

**$font_name_italic**
  Contains the current italic text font name.

**$highlight_syntax**
  Whether syntax highlighting is turned on.

**$incremental_backup**
  Contains 1 if incremental auto saving is on, otherwise 0.

**$incremental_search_line**
  Has a value of 1 if the preference is 
  selected to always show the incremental search line, otherwise 0.

**$language_mode**
  Name of language mode set in the current window.

**$line**
  Line number of the cursor position in the current window.

**$locked**
  True if the file has been locked by the user.

**$make_backup_copy**
  Has a value of 1 if original file is kept in a 
  backup file on save, otherwise 0.

**$max_font_width**
  The maximum font width of all the active styles. 
  Syntax highlighting styles are only considered if syntax highlighting 
  is turned on.

**$min_font_width**
  The minimum font width of all the active styles. 
  Syntax highlighting styles are only considered if syntax highlighting 
  is turned on.

**$modified**
  True if the file in the current window has
  been modified and the modifications have not
  yet been saved.

**$n_display_lines**
  The number of lines visible in the currently active pane.

**$n_panes**
  The number of panes in the current window.

**$overtype_mode**
  True if in Overtype mode.

**$read_only**
  True if the file is read only.

**$selection_start, $selection_end**   
  Beginning and ending positions of the
  primary selection in the current window, or
  -1 if there is no text selected in the current window.

**$selection_left, $selection_right**  
  Left and right character offsets of the rectangular (primary) selection in
  the current window, or -1 if there is no selection or it is not rectangular.

**$server_name**
  Name of the current NEdit server.

**$show_line_numbers**
  Whether line numbers are shown next to the text.

**$show_matching**
  Contains the current preference for showing matching pairs, 
  such as "[]" and "{}" pairs. Can be "off", "delimiter", or "range".

**$match_syntax_based**
  Whether pair matching should use syntax information, if available.

**$statistics_line**
  Has a value of 1 if the statistics line is shown, otherwise 0.

**$sub_sep**
  Contains the value of the array sub-script separation string.

**$tab_dist**
  The distance between tab stops for a
  hardware tab character, as set in the
  Tabs... dialog of the Preferences menu.

**$text_length**
  The length of the text in the current window.

**$top_line**
  The line number of the top line of the currently active pane.

**$use_tabs**
  Whether the user is allowing the NEdit to insert tab characters to maintain
  spacing in tab emulation and rectangular dragging operations. (The setting of
  the "Use tab characters in padding and emulated tabs" button in the Tabs...
  dialog of the Preferences menu.)

**$wrap_margin**
  The right margin in the current window for text wrapping and filling.

**$wrap_text**
  The current wrap text mode. Values are "none", "auto" or "continuous".

**$backlight_string**
  The current value of the window's backlighting specification. This is empty
  if backlighting is turned off. It can be changed through calls to the
  built-in macro function set_backlight_string().


3>Built-in Subroutines

**append_file( string, filename )**
  Appends a string to a named file. Returns 1 on successful write, or 0 if
  unsuccessful.

**beep()**
  Ring the bell.

**calltip( "text_or_key" [, mode [, pos [, position_modifier ...]]] )**
  Pops up a calltip. <pos> is an optional position in the buffer where the tip
  will be displayed.  Passing -1 for <pos> is equivalent to not specifying a 
  position, and it guarantees that the tip will appear on-screen somewhere even
  if the cursor is not.  The upper-left corner of the calltip will appear below
  where the cursor would appear if it were at this position.  <mode> is one of
  "tipText" (default), "tipKey", or "tagKey". "tipText" displays the text as-is,
  "tagKey" uses it as the key to look up a tag, then converts the tag to a
  calltip, and "tipKey" uses it as the key to look up a calltip, then falls back
  to "tagKey" behavior if that fails.  You'll usually use "tipKey" or "tipText".
  Finally, you can modify the placement of the calltip relative to the cursor
  position (or <pos>) with one or more of these optional position modifiers:
  "center" aligns the center of the calltip with the position.  "right" aligns
  the right edge of the calltip with the position.  ("center" and "right" may 
  not both be used.)  "above" places the calltip above the position.  "strict"
  does not allow the calltip to move from its position in order to avoid going 
  off-screen or obscuring the cursor.  Returns the ID of the calltip if it was 
  found and/or displayed correctly, 0 otherwise.

**clipboard_to_string()**  
  Returns the contents of the clipboard as a macro string. Returns empty
  string on error.

**dialog( message, btn_1_label, btn_2_label, ... )**  
  Pop up a dialog for querying and presenting information to the user. First
  argument is a string to show in the message area of the dialog. Up to eight
  additional optional arguments represent labels for buttons to appear along
  the bottom of the dialog. Returns the number of the button pressed (the
  first button is number 1), or 0 if the user closed the dialog via the window
  close box.

**focus_window( window_name )**  
  Sets the window on which subsequent macro commands operate. window_name can
  be either a fully qualified file name, or one of "last" for the last window
  created, or "next" for the next window in the chain from the currently
  focused window (the first window being the one returned from calling
  focus_window("last"). Returns the name of the newly-focused window, or an
  empty string if the requested window was not found.

**get_character( position )**  
  Returns the single character at the position
  indicated by the first argument to the routine from the current window.

**get_range( start, end )**  
  Returns the text between a starting and ending position from the current
  window.

**get_selection()**  
  Returns a string containing the text currently selected by the primary
  selection either from the current window (no keyword), or from anywhere on
  the screen (keyword "any").

**getenv( name )**
  Gets the value of an environment variable.

**kill_calltip( [calltip_ID] )**
  Kills any calltip that is being displayed in the window in which the macro is
  running.  If there is no displayed calltip this does nothing.  If a calltip
  ID is supplied then the calltip is killed only if its ID is calltip_ID.

**length( string )**
  Returns the length of a string

**list_dialog( message, text, btn_1_label, btn_2_label, ... )**  
  Pop up a dialog for prompting the user to choose a line from the given text
  string. The first argument is a message string to be used as a title for the
  fixed text describing the list. The second string provides the list data:
  this is a text string in which list entries are separated by newline
  characters. Up to seven additional optional arguments represent labels for
  buttons to appear along the bottom of the dialog. Returns the line of text
  selected by the user as the function value (without any newline separator) or
  the empty string if none was selected, and number of the button pressed (the
  first button is number 1), in $list_dialog_button. If the user closes the
  dialog via the window close box, the function returns the empty string, and
  $list_dialog_button returns 0.

**max( n1, n2, ... )**
  Returns the maximum value of all of its arguments

**min( n1, n2, ... )**
  Returns the minimum value of all of its arguments

**read_file( filename )**  
  Reads the contents of a text file into a string. On success, returns 1 in
  $read_status, and the contents of the file as a string in the subroutine
  return value. On failure, returns the empty string "" and an 0 $read_status.

**replace_in_string( string, search_for, replace_with [, type, "copy"] )**  
  Replaces all occurrences of a search string in a string with a replacement
  string. Arguments are 1: string to search in, 2: string to search for, 3:
  replacement string.  There are two optional arguments.  One is a search type, 
  either "literal", "case", "word", "caseWord", "regex", or "regexNoCase".  
  The default search type is "literal".  If the optional "copy" argument is
  specified, a copy of the input string is returned when no replacements were
  performed.  By default an empty string ("") will be returned in this case.
  Returns a new string with all of the replacements done.

**replace_range( start, end, string )**  
  Replaces all of the text in the current window between two positions.

**replace_selection( string )**  
  Replaces the primary-selection selected text in the current window.

**replace_substring( string, start, end, replace_with )**  
  Replacing a substring between two positions in a string within another string.

**search( search_for, start [, search_type, wrap, direction] )**  
  Searches silently in a window without dialogs, beeps, or changes to the
  selection. Arguments are: 1: string to search for, 2: starting position.
  Optional arguments may include the strings: "wrap" to make the search wrap
  around the beginning or end of the string, "backward" or "forward" to change
  the search direction ("forward" is the default), "literal", "case", "word",
  "caseWord", "regex", or "regexNoCase" to change the search  type  (default is
  "literal"). Returns the starting position of the  match, or -1 if nothing
  matched. Also returns the ending position  of the match in $search_end.

**search_string( string, search_for, start [, search_type, direction] )** 

  Built-in macro subroutine for searching a string. Arguments are 1: string to
  search in, 2: string to search for, 3: starting position. Optional arguments
  may include the strings: "wrap" to make the search wrap around the beginning
  or end of the string, "backward" or "forward" to change the search direction
  ("forward" is the default), "literal", "case", "word", "caseWord", "regex",
  or "regexNoCase" to change the search type (default is "literal"). Returns
  the starting position of the match, or -1 if nothing matched. Also returns
  the ending position of the match in $search_end.

**select( start, end )**  
  Selects (with the primary selection) text in the current buffer between a
  starting and ending position.

**select_rectangle( start, end, left, right )**  
  Selects a rectangular area of text between a starting and ending position,
  and confined horizontally to characters displayed between positions "left",
  and "right".

**set_backlight_string( [string] )**
  Applies the given string, which should be in the format of the
  nedit*backlightCharTypes X resource, to the current text window, turning on
  backlighting.  If the value of the string passed is "default", or if no
  parameter is passed, the nedit.backlightCharTypes X resource's own value will
  be used.  If the empty string, "", is passed, backlighting will be turned
  off.

**set_cursor_pos( position )**
  Set the cursor position for the current window.

**shell_command( command, input_string )**  
  Executes a shell command, feeding it input from input_string. On completion,
  output from the command is returned as the function value, and the command's
  exit status is returned in the global variable $shell_cmd_status.

**split(string, separation_string [, search_type])**
  Splits a string using the separator specified. Optionally the search_type
  argument can specify how the separation_string is interpreted. The default 
  is "literal". The returned value is an array with keys beginning at 0.

**string_dialog( message, btn_1_label, btn_2_label, ... )**  
  Pops up a dialog prompting the user to enter information. The first argument
  is a string to show in the message area of the dialog. Up to nine additional
  optional arguments represent labels for buttons to appear along the bottom of
  the dialog. Returns the string entered by the user as the function value,
  and number of the button pressed (the first button is number 1), in
  $string_dialog_button. If the user closes the dialog via the window close
  box, the function returns the empty string, and $string_dialog_button returns
  0.

**string_compare(string1, string2 [, consider-case])**
  Compare two  strings and return 0 if they are equal, -1 if string1 is less
  than  string2 or 1 if string1 is greater than string2. The values for the
  optional consider-case argument is either "case" or "nocase". The default 
  is to do a case sensitive comparison.

**string_to_clipboard( string )**  
  Copy the contents of a macro string to the clipboard.

**substring( string, start, end )**  
  Returns the portion of a string between a starting and ending position.

**t_print( string1, string2, ... )**  
  Writes strings to the terminal (stdout) from which NEdit was started.

**tolower( string )**
  Return an all lower-case version of string.

**toupper( string )**
  Return an all upper-case version of string.

**valid_number( string )**
  Returns 1 if the string can be converted to a number without error
  following the same rules that the implicit conversion would. Otherwise 0.

**write_file( string, filename )**  
  Writes a string (parameter 1) to a file named in parameter 2. Returns 1 on
  successful write, or 0 if unsuccessful.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Range Sets
----------

  The user can define range sets, identified by an alphabetic character.  A
  range set contains ranges, defined by start and end positions in the text
  buffer.  These ranges are adjusted when modifications are made to the text
  buffer: they shuffle around when characters are added or deleted.  However,
  ranges within a set will coalesce if the characters between them are removed,
  or a new range is added to the set which bridges or overlaps others.

  Using range sets allows non-contiguous bits of the text to be identified as a
  group.

  Range sets can be assigned a background color: characters within a range of a
  range set will have the background color of the range set. If more than one
  rangeset includes a given character, its background color will be that of the
  most recently created range set which has a color defined.

  Warnings: A range set is manipulated ONLY through macro routines. Range sets
  can easily become very large, and may exceed the capacity of the running
  process.  Coloring relies on proper color names or specifications (such as
  the "#rrggbb" hexadecimal digit strings), and appropriate hardware support. 
  Behaviours set using rangeset_set_modify_response() are still experimental.


3>Range set read-only variables

  These are set by calls to the range set functions.

**$rangeset_list**
  string of active rangeset letters in reverse order of definition.

**$rangeset_label**
  label of most recently accessed rangeset.

**$rangeset_color**
  color (if any) of most recently accessed rangeset.

**$rangeset_modify_response**
  modify response name of most recently accessed rangeset.

**$rangeset_ranges**
  number of ranges in most recently accessed rangeset.

**$rangeset_range_index**
  most recently accessed range in rangeset (or -1).

**$rangeset_range_start**
  start position of most recently accessed range (or -1).

**$rangeset_range_end**
  end position of most recently accessed range (or -1).

3>Range set functions

**rangeset_defined( r, [index] )**
  Returns true if the range identified by the letter r is defined, false if
  not. If a non-negative index is supplied, this is used to set up the range
  set macro variables for the range specified in the set; if index is greater
  than the value of rangeset_get_count(r), the return value is false.

**rangeset_inverse( r )**
  Changes the range set r so that it contains all ranges not in r. Returns the
  number of entries if successful.

**rangeset_add( r, [start, end] )**
**rangeset_add( r, r0 )**
  Adds to the range set r. The first form adds the range identified by the
  current primary selection to the range set, unless start and end are defined,
  in which case the range they define is added. The second form allows all
  ranges in the range set identified by r0 to be added to the range set r. If r
  has not yet been defined, it will be at this point. Returns the number of
  non-contiguous ranges in r after the addition.

**rangeset_remove( r, [start, end] )**
**rangeset_remove( r, r0 )**
  Removes from the range set r. The first form removes the range identified by
  the current primary selection from the range set, unless start and end are
  defined, in which case the range they define is removed. The second form
  allows all ranges in the range set identified by r0 to be removed from the
  range set r. Returns the number of non-contiguous ranges in r after the
  addition.

**rangeset_forget( r )**
  Deletes all information about the range set identified by r. A subsequent
  call to rangeset_defined(r) will return false.

**rangeset_get_count( r )**
  Returns the number of non-contiguous ranges in the range set r.

**rangeset_select( r, [index] )**
  Selects the region starting at the start of the first range in the range set
  r and ending at the end of the last, unless index is supplied, in which case
  the range in the range set identified by the index will be selected. index
  should satisfy the conditions 0 <= index and index < rangeset_get_count(r).
  Returns true if successful.

**rangeset_includes_pos( r, pos )**
  Returns true if there is a range in the range set r which contains pos.

**rangeset_set_color( r, [color] )**
  Removes the coloring of range set r if no color name is supplied, otherwise
  attempts to apply the color as a background color to the ranges of r. No
  check is made regarding the validity of color: if the color is invalid (a bad
  name, or not supported by the hardware) this has no effect. If r is
  undefined, this function will define it with no ranges.

**rangeset_set_modify_response( r, type )**
  Changes the behaviour of the range set r when modifications to the text
  buffer occur.  type can be one of the following: "maintain" (the default),
  "break", "include", "exclude", "ins_del" or "del_ins". (The differences are
  fairly subtle.)"


Highlighting Information
------------------------

  The user can interrogate the current window to determine the color
  highlighting used on a particular piece of text. The following functions
  provide information on the highlighting pattern against which text at a
  particular position has been matched, its style, color and font attributes
  (whether the font is supposed to be bold and/or italic).

  Some other functions allow macros to access style information given the name
  of a highlighting pattern, or a highlighting style name.

  These macro functions permit macro writers to generate formatted output which
  allows NEdit highlighting to be reproduced. This is suitable for the
  generation of HTML or Postscript output, for example.

3>Highlighting information functions

**get_style( pos )**
  returns an array containing the attributes of the character at position
  "pos". **"style"** (name of the highlight style), **"color"** (name of the
  color), **"rgb"** (the actual screen color expressed in red, green and blue
  hexadecimal values as "#rrggbb"), **"bold"** (true or false) and **"italic"**
  (true or false), **"background"** (name of the background color, if any) and
  **"back_rgb"** (the background color values).

**get_pattern( pos )**
  returns an array containing the attributes of the character at position
  "pos". **"pattern"** (highlight pattern name), **"style"** (highlight style
  name) and **"extension"** (the length in the text which uses the same
  highlighting pattern) 

**highlight_pattern_of_pos( [pos] )**
  ~Deprecated: use get_pattern(pos)["pattern"]~
  returns the pattern name for highlighting used at the position in the text.
  If no position is supplied, the current cursor position will be used.

**highlight_style_of_pos( [pos] )**
  ~Deprecated: use either get_pattern(pos)["style"] or get_style(pos)["style"]~
  returns the name of the highlighting style applied at the given position
  (defaults to the cursor position).

**highlight_color_of_pos( [pos] )**
  ~Deprecated: use get_style(pos)["color"]~
  returns the name of the color used by the highlighting style applied at the
  given position (defaults to the cursor position).

**highlight_color_value_of_pos( [pos] )**
  ~Deprecated: use get_style(pos)["rgb"]~
  returns the value of the color by the highlighting style applied at the given
  position (defaults to the cursor position). This is a hexadecimal formatted
  value, preceded by the "#" sign; each of three pairs of hexadecimal digits
  indicate the color value for the red, green and blue components of the color,
  in the range 0 to 255 (0 - 0xFF), for example "#ffff80" is a light yellow
  color.

**highlight_style_of_pos_is_bold( [pos] )**
  ~Deprecated: use get_style(pos)["bold"]~
  returns true (non-zero) if the highlighting style applied at the given
  position (defaults to the cursor position) uses a bold font.

**highlight_style_of_pos_is_italic( [pos] )**
  ~Deprecated: use get_style(pos)["italic"]~
  returns true (non-zero) if the highlighting style applied at the given
  position (defaults to the cursor position) uses an italic font.

**highlight_pattern_extends_from( [pos] )**
  ~Deprecated: use get_pattern(pos)["extension"]~
  returns the length in the text starting at the given position (defaults to
  the cursor position) which uses the same highlighting pattern as that
  position.
  
**highlight_pattern_style( pat_name )**
  returns the name of the style used by a particular named highlighting
  pattern.

**highlight_style_color( style_name )**
  returns the name of the color used by a particular named highlighting style.

**highlight_style_color_value( style_name )**
  returns the value of the color used by a particular named highlighting style.

**highlight_style_is_bold( style_name )**
  returns true (non-zero) if the particular named highlighting style uses a
  bold font.

**highlight_style_is_italic( style_name )**
  returns true (non-zero) if the particular named highlighting style uses an
  italic font.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Action Routines
---------------

  All of the editing capabilities of NEdit are represented as a special type of
  subroutine, called an action routine, which can be invoked from both macros
  and translation table entries (see "Key_Binding_" in the
  Customizing section of the Help menu).


3>Actions Representing Menu Commands

    File Menu                 Search Menu
    -----------------------   -------------------------
    new()                     find()
    open()                    find_dialog()
    open_dialog()             find_again()
    open_selected()           find_selection()
    close()                   replace()
    save()                    replace_dialog()
    save_as()                 replace_all()
    save_as_dialog()          replace_in_selection()
    revert_to_saved()         replace_again()
    include_file()            goto_line_number()
    include_file_dialog()     goto_line_number_dialog()
    load_macro_file()         goto_selected()
    load_macro_file_dialog()  mark()
    load_tags_file()          mark_dialog()
    load_tags_file_dialog()   goto_mark()
    unload_tags_file()        goto_mark_dialog()
    print()                   goto_matching()
    print_selection()         select_to_matching()
    exit()                    find_definition()

    Edit Menu                 Shell Menu
    -----------------------   -------------------------
    undo()                    filter_selection_dialog()
    redo()                    filter_selection()
    delete()                  execute_command()
    select_all()              execute_command_dialog()
    shift_left()              execute_command_line()
    shift_left_by_tab()       shell_menu_command()
    shift_right()
    shift_right_by_tab()      Macro Menu
    uppercase()               -------------------------
    lowercase()               macro_menu_command()
    fill_paragraph()          repeat_macro()
    control_code_dialog()     repeat_dialog()

                              Windows Menu
                              -------------------------
                              split_window()
                              close_pane()

  An action representing a menu command is named the same as its corresponding
  menu item except that all punctuation is removed, all letters are changed to
  lower case, and spaces are replaced with underscores.  To present a dialog to
  ask the user for input, use the actions with the `_dialog` suffix. Actions
  without the `_dialog` suffix take the information from the routine's
  arguments (see below).  

3>Menu Action Routine Arguments

  Arguments are text strings enclosed in quotes. Below are the menu action
  routines which take arguments.  Optional arguments are enclosed in [].

    **close**( ["prompt" | "save" | "nosave"] )
    
    **execute_command**( shell-command )
    
    **filter_selection**( shell-command )
    
    **find**( search-string [, ~search-direction~] [, ~search-type~] 
       [, ~search-wrap~] )
    
    **find_again**( [~search-direction~] [, ~search-wrap~] )
    
    **find_definition**( [tag-name] )
    
    **find_dialog**( [~search-direction~] [, ~search-type~] 
       [, ~keep-dialog~] )
    
    **find_selection**( [~search-direction~] [, ~search-wrap~] 
       [, ~non-regex-search-type~] )
    
    **goto_line_number**( [~line-number~] [, ~column-number~] )
    
    **goto_mark**( ~mark-letter~ )
    
    **include_file**( ~filename~ )
    
    **load_tags_file**( ~filename~ )
    
    **macro_menu_command**( ~macro-menu-item-name~ )
    
    **mark**( ~mark-letter~ )
    
    **open**( ~filename~ )
    
    **replace**( search-string, replace-string, 
       [, ~search-direction~] [, ~search-type~] [, ~search-wrap~] )
       
    **replace_again**( [~search-direction~] [, ~search-wrap~] )
    
    **replace_dialog**( [~search-direction~] [, ~search-type~]
       [, ~keep-dialog~] )
    
    **replace_in_selection**( search-string, 
       replace-string [, ~search-type~] )
       
    **save_as**( ~filename~ )
    
    **shell_menu_command**( ~shell-menu-item-name~ )
    
    **unload_tags_file**( ~filename~ )

    **----------- Some notes on argument types above -----------**

    ~filename~       Path names are relative to the directory from
                   which NEdit was started. Shell interpreted 
                   wildcards and `~' are not expanded.

    ~keep-dialog~    Either "keep" or "nokeep".

    ~mark-letter~    The mark command limits users to single 
                   letters. Inside of macros, numeric marks are
                   allowed, which won't interfere with marks set
                   by the user.

    ~macro-menu-item-name~
                   Name of the command exactly as specified in 
                   the Macro Menu dialogs.
                    
    ~non-regex-search-type~ 
                   Either "literal", "case", "word", or 
                   "caseWord".

    ~search-direction~
                   Either "forward" or "backward".

    ~search-type~    Either "literal", "case", "word", 
                   "caseWord", "regex", or "regexNoCase".

    ~search-wrap~    Either "wrap" or "nowrap".

    ~shell-menu-item-name~
                   Name of the command exactly as specified in 
                   the Shell Menu dialogs.

3>Window Preferences Actions

**set_auto_indent( "off" | "on" | "smart" )**
  Set auto indent mode for the current window.

**set_em_tab_dist( em-tab-distance )**
  Set the emulated tab size. An em-tab-distance value of 
  0 or -1 translates to no emulated tabs. Em-tab-distance must 
  be smaller than 1000.

**set_fonts( font-name, italic-font-name, bold-font-name, bold-italic-font-name )**
  Set all the fonts used for the current window.

**set_highlight_syntax( [0 | 1] )**
  Set syntax highlighting mode for the current window. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_incremental_backup( [0 | 1] )**
  Set incremental backup mode for the current window. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_incremental_search_line( [0 | 1] )**
  Show or hide the incremental search line for the current window. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_language_mode( language-mode )**
  Set the language mode for the current window. If the language mode is 
  "" or unrecognized, it will be set to Plain.

**set_locked( [0 | 1] )**
  This only affects the locked status of a file, not it's read-only 
  status. Permissions are NOT changed. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_make_backup_copy( [0 | 1] )**
  Set whether backup copies are made during saves for the current window. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_overtype_mode( [0 | 1] )**
  Set overtype mode for the current window. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_show_line_numbers( [0 | 1] )**
  Show or hide line numbers for the current window. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_show_matching( "off" | "delimiter" | "range" )**
  Set show matching (...) mode for the current window.

**set_match_syntax_based( [0 | 1] )**
  Set whether matching should be syntax based for the current window.

**set_statistics_line( [0 | 1] )**
  Show or hide the statistics line for the current window. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_tab_dist( tab-distance )**
  Set the size of hardware tab spacing. Tab-distance must 
  must be a value greater than 0 and no greater than 20.

**set_use_tabs( [0 | 1] )**
  Set whether tabs are used for the current window. 
  A value of 0 turns it off and a value of 1 turns it on. 
  If no parameters are supplied the option is toggled.

**set_wrap_margin( wrap-width )**
  Set the wrap width for text wrapping of the current window. A value
  of 0 means to wrap at window width.

**set_wrap_text( "none" | "auto" | "continuous" )**
  Set wrap text mode for the current window.

3>Keyboard-Only Actions

  In addition to the arguments listed in the call descriptions below, any
  routine involving cursor movement can take the argument "extend", meaning,
  adjust the primary selection to the new cursor position. Routines which take
  the "extend" argument as well as mouse dragging operations for both primary
  and secondary selections can take the optional keyword "rect", meaning, make
  the selection rectangular. Any routine that accepts the "scrollbar" argument
  will move the display but not the cursor or selection. Routines that accept
  the "nobell" argument will fail silently without beeping, when that argument
  is supplied.

**backward_character( ["nobell"] )**
  Moves the cursor one character to the left.

**backward_paragraph(["nobell"] )**
  Moves the cursor to the beginning of the paragraph, or
  if the cursor is already at the beginning of a paragraph, moves the cursor to
  the beginning of the previous paragraph.  Paragraphs are defined as regions
  of text delimited by one or more blank lines.

**backward_word( ["nobell"] )**
  Moves the cursor to the beginning of a word, or, if the
  cursor is already at the beginning of a word, moves the cursor to the
  beginning of the previous word.  Word delimiters are user-settable, and
  defined by the X resource wordDelimiters.

**beginning_of_file( ["scrollbar"] )**
  Moves the cursor to the beginning of the file.

**beginning_of_line( ["absolute"] )** 
  Moves the cursor to the beginning of the line. If
  "absolute" is given, always moves to the absolute beginning of line,
  regardless of the text wrapping mode.

**beginning_of_selection()**
  Moves the cursor to the beginning of the selection
  without disturbing the selection.

**copy_clipboard()**
  Copies the current selection to the clipboard.

**copy_primary()**
  Copies the primary selection to the cursor.

**copy_to()**
  If a secondary selection exists, copies the secondary selection to
  the cursor.  If no secondary selection exists, copies the primary selection
  to the pointer location.

**copy_to_or_end_drag()**
  Completes either a secondary selection operation, or a
  primary drag.  If the user is dragging the mouse to adjust a secondary
  selection, the selection is copied and either inserted at the cursor
  location, or, if pending-delete is on and a primary selection exists in the
  window, replaces the primary selection.  If the user is dragging a block of
  text (primary selection), completes the drag operation and leaves the text at
  it's current location.

**cut_clipboard()**
  Deletes the text in the primary selection and places it in
  the clipboard.

**cut_primary()**
  Copies the primary selection to the cursor and deletes it at
  its original location.

**delete_selection()**
  Deletes the contents of the primary selection.

**delete_next_character( ["nobell"] )**
  If a primary selection exists, deletes its contents. 
  Otherwise, deletes the character following the cursor.

**delete_previous_character( ["nobell"] )**
  If a primary selection exists, deletes its
  contents.  Otherwise, deletes the character before the cursor.

**delete_next_word( ["nobell"] )**
  If a primary selection exists, deletes its contents. 
  Otherwise, deletes the word following the cursor.

**delete_previous_word( ["nobell"] )**
  If a primary selection exists, deletes its contents. 
  Otherwise, deletes the word before the cursor.

**delete_to_start_of_line( ["nobell", "wrap"] )**
  If a primary selection exists, deletes its contents.  Otherwise, deletes the
  characters between the cursor and the start of the line. If "wrap" is
  given, deletes to the previous wrap point or beginning of line, whichever 
  is closest.

**delete_to_end_of_line( ["nobell", "absolute"] )**
  If a primary selection exists, deletes its contents. 
  Otherwise, deletes the characters between the cursor and the end of the line.
  If "absolute" is given, always deletes to the absolute end of line, regardless
  of the text wrapping mode.

**deselect_all()**
  De-selects the primary selection.

**end_of_file( ["scrollbar"] )**
  Moves the cursor to the end of the file.

**end_of_line( ["absolute"] )** 
  Moves the cursor to the end of the line.  If
  "absolute" is given, always moves to the absolute end of line, regardless
  of the text wrapping mode.

**end_of_selection()**
  Moves the cursor to the end of the selection without
  disturbing the selection.

**exchange( ["nobell"] )**
  Exchange the primary and secondary selections.

**extend_adjust()**
  Attached mouse-movement events to begin a selection between
  the cursor and the mouse, or extend the primary selection to the mouse
  position.

**extend_end()**
  Completes a primary drag-selection operation.

**extend_start()**
  Begins a selection between the cursor and the mouse.  A
  drag-selection operation can be started with either extend_start or
  grab_focus.

**focus_pane( [relative-pane] | [positive-index] | [negative-index] )**
  Move the focus to the requested pane.
  Arguments can be specified in the form of a relative-pane 
  ("first", "last", "next", "previous"), a positive-index 
  (numbers greater than 0, 1 is the same as "first") or a
  negative-index (numbers less than 0, -1 is the same as "last").
  
**forward_character()**
  Moves the cursor one character to the right.

**forward_paragraph( ["nobell"] )**
  Moves the cursor to the beginning of the next paragraph. 
  Paragraphs are defined as regions of text delimited by one or more blank
  lines.

**forward_word( ["tail"] ["nobell"] )**
  Moves the cursor to the beginning of the next word.  Word
  delimiters are user-settable, and defined by the X resource wordDelimiters.
  If the "tail" argument is supplied the cursor will be moved to 
  the end of the current word or the end of the next word, if the 
  cursor is between words.

**grab_focus()**
  Moves the cursor to the mouse pointer location, and prepares for
  a possible drag-selection operation (bound to extend_adjust), or multi-click
  operation (a further grab_focus action).  If a second invocation of grab
  focus follows immediately, it selects a whole word, or a third, a whole line.

**insert_string( "string" )**
  If pending delete is on and the cursor is inside the
  selection, replaces the selection with "string".  Otherwise, inserts "string"
  at the cursor location.

**key_select( "direction" [,"nobell"] )**
  Moves the cursor one character in "direction"
  ("left", "right", "up", or "down") and extends the selection.  Same as
  forward/backward-character("extend"), or process-up/down("extend"), for
  compatibility with previous versions.

**move-destination()**
  Moves the cursor to the pointer location without
  disturbing the selection.  (This is an unusual way of working.  We left it in
  for compatibility with previous versions, but if you actually use this
  capability, please send us some mail, otherwise it is likely to disappear in
  the future.

**move_to()**
  If a secondary selection exists, deletes the contents of the
  secondary selection and inserts it at the cursor, or if pending-delete is on
  and there is a primary selection, replaces the primary selection.  If no
  secondary selection exists, moves the primary selection to the pointer
  location, deleting it from its original position.

**move_to_or_end_drag()**
  Completes either a secondary selection operation, or a
  primary drag.  If the user is dragging the mouse to adjust a secondary
  selection, the selection is deleted and either inserted at the cursor
  location, or, if pending-delete is on and a primary selection exists in the
  window, replaces the primary selection.  If the user is dragging a block of
  text (primary selection), completes the drag operation and deletes the text
  from it's current location.

**newline()**
  Inserts a newline character.  If Auto Indent is on, lines up the
  indentation of the cursor with the current line.

**newline_and_indent()**
  Inserts a newline character and lines up the indentation
  of the cursor with the current line, regardless of the setting of Auto
  Indent.

**newline_no_indent()**
  Inserts a newline character, without automatic
  indentation, regardless of the setting of Auto Indent.

**next_page( ["stutter"] ["column"] ["scrollbar"] ["nobell"] )**
  Moves the cursor and scroll forward one page.
  The parameter "stutter" moves the cursor to the bottom of the display,
  unless it is already there, otherwise it will page down.
  The parameter "column" will maintain the preferred column while
  moving the cursor.

**page_left( ["scrollbar"] ["nobell"] )**
  Move the cursor and scroll left one page.

**page_right( ["scrollbar"] ["nobell"] )**
  Move the cursor and scroll right one page.

**paste_clipboard()**
  Insert the contents of the clipboard at the cursor, or if
  pending delete is on, replace the primary selection with the contents of the
  clipboard.

**previous_page( ["stutter"] ["column"] ["scrollbar"] ["nobell"] )**
  Moves the cursor and scroll backward one page.
  The parameter "stutter" moves the cursor to the top of the display,
  unless it is already there, otherwise it will page up.
  The parameter "column" will maintain the preferred column while
  moving the cursor.

**process_bdrag()**
  Same as secondary_or_drag_start for compatibility with previous versions.

**process_cancel()**
  Cancels the current extend_adjust, secondary_adjust, or
  secondary_or_drag_adjust in progress.

**process_down( ["nobell", "absolute"] )**
  Moves the cursor down one line.  If "absolute" is given, always moves to the 
  next line in the text buffer, regardless of wrapping.

**process_return()**
  Same as newline for compatibility with previous versions.

**process_shift_down( ["nobell", "absolute"] )**
  Same as process_down("extend") for compatibility with previous versions.

**process_shift_up( ["nobell", "absolute"] )**
  Same as process_up("extend") for compatibility with previous versions.

**process_tab()**
  If tab emulation is turned on, inserts an emulated tab,
  otherwise inserts a tab character.

**process_up( ["nobell", "absolute"] )**
  Moves the cursor up one line.  If "absolute" is given, always moves to the 
  previous line in the text buffer, regardless of wrapping.

**raise_window([relative-window] | [positive-index] | [negative-index])**
  Raise the current focused window to the front if no argument is supplied.
  Arguments can be specified in the form of a relative-window 
  ("first", "last", "next", "previous"), a positive-index 
  (numbers greater than 0, 1 is the same as "last") or a
  negative-index (numbers less than 0, -1 is the same as "first").
  
**scroll_down(nLines)**
  Scroll the display down (towards the end of the file) by nLines.

**scroll_left( nPixels )**
  Scroll the display left by nPixels.

**scroll_right( nPixels )**
  Scroll the display right by nPixels.

**scroll_up( nLines )**
  Scroll the display up (towards the beginning of the file) by nLines.

**scroll_to_line( lineNum )**
  Scroll to position line number lineNum at the top of
  the pane.  The first line of a file is line 1.

**secondary_adjust()**
  Attached mouse-movement events to extend the secondary
  selection to the mouse position.

**secondary_or_drag_adjust()**
  Attached mouse-movement events to extend the
  secondary selection, or reposition the primary text being dragged.  Takes two
  optional arguments, "copy", and "overlay".  "copy" leaves a copy of the
  dragged text at the site at which the drag began.  "overlay" does the drag in
  overlay mode, meaning the dragged text is laid on top of the existing text,
  obscuring and ultimately deleting it when the drag is complete.

**secondary_or_drag_start()**
  To be attached to a mouse down event.  Begins drag
  selecting a secondary selection, or dragging the contents of the primary
  selection, depending on whether the mouse is pressed inside of an existing
  primary selection.

**secondary_start()**
  To be attached to a mouse down event.  Begin drag selecting
  a secondary selection.

**select_all()**
  Select the entire file.

**self_insert()**
  To be attached to a key-press event, inserts the character
  equivalent of the key pressed.

   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Customizing
===========

Customizing NEdit
-----------------

  NEdit can be customized many different ways.  The most important
  user-settable options are presented in the Preferences menu, including all
  options that users might need to change during an editing session.  Options
  set in the Default Settings sub-menu of the Preferences menu can be preserved
  between sessions by selecting Save Defaults, which writes the changes to the
  preferences file.  See the section titled "Preferences_" for more details.

  User defined commands can be added to NEdit's Shell, Macro, and window
  background menus.  Dialogs for creating items in these menus can be found
  under Customize Menus in the Default Settings sub menu of the Preferences
  menu.

  For users who depend on NEdit every day and want to tune every excruciating
  detail, there are also X resources for tuning a vast number of such details,
  down to the color of each individual button.  See the section "X_Resources_"
  for more information, as well as a list of selected resources.

  The most common reason customizing your X resources for NEdit, however, is
  key binding.  While limited key binding can be done through Preferences
  settings (Preferences -> Default Settings -> Customize Menus), you can really
  only add keys this way, and each key must have a corresponding menu item. 
  Any significant changes to key binding should be made via the Translations
  resource and menu accelerator resources.  The sections titled "Key_Binding_"
  and "X_Resources_" have more information.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Preferences
-----------

  The Preferences menu allows you to set options for both the current editing
  window, and default values for newly created windows and future NEdit
  sessions.  Options in the Preferences menu itself (not in the Default
  Settings sub-menu) take effect immediately and refer to the current window
  only.  Options in the Default Settings sub-menu provide initial settings for
  future windows created using the New or Open commands; options affecting all
  windows are also set here.
  Preferences set in the Default Settings sub-menu can be saved in a file that
  is automatically read by NEdit at startup time, by selecting Save Defaults.

3>Preferences Menu

**Default Settings**
  Menu of initial settings for future windows.  Generally the same as the
  options in the main part of the menu, but apply as defaults for future
  windows created during this NEdit session.  These settings can be saved using
  the Save Defaults command below, to be loaded automatically each time NEdit
  is started.

**Save Defaults**
  Save the default options as set under Default Settings for future NEdit 
  sessions.

**Statistics Line**
  Show the full file name, line number, and length of the file being edited.

**Incremental Search Line**
  Keep the incremental search bar (Search -> Find Incremental) permanently
  displayed at the top of the window.

**Show Line Numbers**
  Display line numbers to the right of the text.

**Language Mode**
  Tells NEdit what language (if any) to assume, for selecting language-specific
  features such as highlight patterns and smart indent macros, and setting
  language specific preferences like word delimiters, tab emulation, and
  auto-indent.  See Features for Programming -> Programming_with_NEdit_ for
  more information.

**Auto Indent**
  Setting Auto Indent "on" maintains a running indent (pressing the Return key
  will line up the cursor with the indent level of the previous line).  If
  smart indent macros are available for the current language mode, smart indent
  can be selected and NEdit will attempt to guess proper language indentation
  for each new line.  See Help -> Features for Programming -> Automatic Indent
  for more information.

**Wrap**
  Choose between two styles of automatic wrapping or none.  Auto Newline wrap,
  wraps text at word boundaries when the cursor reaches the right margin, by
  replacing the space or tab at the last word boundary with a newline
  character.  Continuous Wrap wraps long lines which extend past the right
  margin. Continuous Wrap mode is typically used to produce files where
  newlines are omitted within paragraphs, to make text filling automatic (a
  kind of poor-man's word processor).  Text of this style is common on Macs and
  PCs but is not necessarily supported very well under Unix (except in programs
  which deal with e-mail, for which it is often the format of choice).

**Wrap Margin**
  Set margin for Auto Newline Wrap, Continuous Wrap, and Fill Paragraph.  Lines
  may, be wrapped at the right margin of the window, or the margin can be set
  at a specific column.

**Tabs**
  Set the tab distance (number of characters between tab stops) for tab
  characters, and control tab emulation and use of tab characters in padding
  and emulated tabs.

**Text Font...**
  Change the font(s) used to display text (fonts for menus and dialogs must be
  set using X resources for the text area of the window). See below for more
  information.

**Highlight Syntax**
  If NEdit recognizes the language being edited, and highlighting patterns are
  available for that language, use fonts and colors to enhance viewing of the
  file.  (See Help -> Features for Programming -> Syntax Highlighting for more
  information.

**Make Backup Copy**
  On Save, write a backup copy of the file as it existed before the Save
  command with the extension .bck (Unix only).

**Incremental Backup**
  Periodically make a backup copy of the file being edited under the name
  `~filename` on Unix or `_filename` on VMS (see Crash_Recovery_).

**Show Matching (..)**
  Momentarily highlight matching parenthesis, brackets, and braces, or the
  range between them, when one of these characters is typed, or when the
  insertion cursor is positioned after it. Delimiter only highlights the
  matching delimiter, while Range highlights the whole range of text between
  the matching delimiters.
  
  Optionally, the matching can make use of syntax information if syntax
  highlighting is enabled. Alternatively, the matching is purely character
  based. In general, syntax based matching results in fewer false matches.

**Overtype**
  In overtype mode, new characters entered replace the characters in front of
  the insertion cursor, rather than being inserted before them.

**Read Only**
  Lock the file against accidental modification.  This temporarily prevents the
  file from being modified in this NEdit session. Note that this is different
  from setting the file protection.

3>Preferences -> Default Settings Menu

  Options in the Preferences -> Default Settings menu have the same meaning as
  those in the top-level Preferences menu, except that they apply to future
  NEdit windows and future NEdit sessions if saved with the Save Defaults
  command.  Additional options which appear in this menu are:

**Language Modes**
  Define language recognition information (for determining language mode from
  file name or content) and set language specific preferences.

**Tag Collisions**
  How to react to multiple tags for the same name.  Tags are described in the
  section: Features for Programmers -> Finding Declarations (ctags).  In Show
  All mode, all matching tags are displayed in a dialog.  In Smart mode, if one
  of the matching tags is in the current window, that tag is chosen, without
  displaying the dialog.

**Customize Menus**
  Add/remove items from the Shell, Macro, and window background menus (see
  below).

**Customize Window Title**
  Opens a dialog where the information to be displayed in the windows's title
  field can be defined and tested. The dialog contains a Help button, providing
  further information about the options available.

**Searching**
  Options for controlling the behavior of Find and Replace commands:

  ~Verbose~ - 
  Presents search results in dialog form, asks before wrapping a
  search back around the beginning (or end) of the file 
  (unless Beep On Search Wrap is turned on).

  ~Wrap Around~ - 
  Search and Replace operations wrap around the beginning (or end) of the file.

  ~Beep On Search Wrap~ - 
  Beep when Search and Replace operations wrap around the beginning (or end) of
  the file (only if Wrap Around is turned on).

  ~Keep Dialogs Up~ - 
  Don't pop down Replace and Find boxes after searching.

  ~Default Search Style~ - 
  Initial setting for search type in Find and Replace dialogs.

  ~Default Replace Scope~ - 
  [THIS OPTION IS ONLY PRESENT WHEN NEDIT WAS COMPILED WITH THE 
   -DREPLACE_SCOPE FLAG TO SELECT AN ALTERNATIVE REPLACE DIALOG LAYOUT.]

  Initial setting for the scope in the Replace/Find dialog, when a selection
  exists. It can be either "In Window", "In Selection", or "Smart". "Smart"
  results in "In Window" if the size of the selection is smaller than 1 line,
  and to "In Selection" otherwise.

**Syntax Highlighting**
  Program and configure enhanced text display for new or supported languages
  (See Features for Programming -> Syntax_Highlighting_).

**Append Line Feed on Save**
  Some UNIX tools expect that files end with a line feed. If this option is
  activated, NEdit will append one if required.

**Sort Open Prev. Menu**
  Option to order the File -> Open Previous menu alphabetically, versus in
  order of last access.

**Popups Under Pointer**
  Display pop-up dialogs centered on the current mouse position, as opposed to
  centered on the parent window.  This generally speeds interaction, and is
  essential for users who users who set their window managers so keyboard focus
  follows the mouse.

**Warnings**
  Options for controlling the popping up of warning dialogs:
  
  ~File Modified Externally~ -
  Pop up a warning dialog when files get changed external to NEdit.
  
  ~Check Modified File Contents~ -
  If external file modification warnings are requested, also check the file
  contents iso. only the modification date.

  ~Exit Warnings~ -
  Ask before exiting when two or more files are open in an NEdit session.

**Initial Window Size**
  Default size for new windows.

3>Changing Font(s)

  The font used to display text in NEdit is set under Preferences -> Text Font
  (for the current window), or Preferences -> Default Settings Text Font (for
  future windows).  These dialogs also allow you to set fonts for syntax
  highlighting.  If you don't intend to use syntax highlighting, you can ignore
  most of the dialog, and just set the field labeled Primary Font.

  Unless you are absolutely certain about the types of files that you will be
  editing with NEdit, you should choose a fixed-spacing font.  Many, if not
  most, plain-text files are written expecting to be viewed with fixed
  character spacing, and will look wrong with proportional spacing.  NEdit's
  filling, wrapping, and rectangular operations will also work strangely if you
  choose a proportional font.

  Note that in the font browser (the dialog brought up by the Browse...
  button), the subset of fonts which are shown is narrowed depending on the
  characteristics already selected.  It is therefore important to know that you
  can unselect characteristics from the lists by clicking on the selected items
  a second time.

  Fonts for syntax highlighting should ideally match the primary font in both
  height and spacing.  A mismatch in spacing will result in similar distortions
  as choosing a proportional font: column alignment will sometimes look wrong,
  and rectangular operations, wrapping, and filling will behave strangely.  A
  mismatch in height will cause windows to re-size themselves slightly when
  syntax highlighting is turned on or off, and increase the inter- line spacing
  of the text.  Unfortunately, on some systems it is hard to find sets of fonts
  which match exactly in height.

3>Customizing Menus

  You can add or change items in the Shell, Macro, and window background menus
  under Preferences -> Default Settings -> Customize Menus.  When you choose
  one of these, you will see a dialog with a list of the current
  user-configurable items from the menu on the left.  To change an existing
  item, select it from the list, and its properties will appear in the
  remaining fields of the dialog, where you may change them.  Selecting the
  item "New" from the list allows you to enter new items in the menu.

  Hopefully most of the characteristics are self explanatory, but here are a
  few things to note:

  Accelerator keys are keyboard shortcuts which appear on the right hand side
  of the menus, and allow you avoid pulling down the menu and activate the
  command with a single keystroke.  Enter accelerators by typing the keys
  exactly as you would to activate the command.

  Mnemonics are a single letter which should be part of the menu item name,
  which allow users to traverse and activate menu items by typing keys when the
  menu is pulled down.

  In the Shell Command field of the Shell Commands dialog, the % character
  expands to the name (including directory path) of the file in the window.  To
  include a % character in the command, use %%.

  The Menu Entry field can contain special characters for constructing
  hierarchical sub-menus, and for making items which appear only in certain
  language modes.  The right angle bracket character ">" creates a sub-menu. 
  The name of the item itself should be the last element of the path formed
  from successive sub-menu names joined with ">".  Menu panes are called in to
  existence simply by naming them as part of a Menu Entry name.  To put several
  items in the same sub-menu, repeat the same hierarchical sequence for each. 
  For example, in the Macro Commands dialog, two items with menu entries: a>b>c
  and a>b>d would create a single sub menu under the macro menu called "a",
  which would contain a single sub-menu, b, holding the actual items, c and d:

      +---++---++---+
      |a >||b >||c  |
      +---++---+|d  |
                +---+

  To qualify a menu entry with a language mode, simply add an at-sign "@@" at
  the end of the menu command, followed (no space) by a language mode name.  To
  make a menu item which appears in several language modes, append additional
  @@s and language mode names.  For example, an item with the menu entry:

    Make C Prototypes@@C@@C++

  would appear only in C and C++ language modes, and:

    Make Class Template@@C++

  would appear only in C++ mode.

  Menu items with no qualification appear in all language modes.

  If a menu item is followed by the single language qualification "@@*", that
  item will appear only if there are no applicable language-specific items of
  the same name in the same submenu.  For example, if you have the following
  three entries in the same menu:

    Make Prototypes@@C@@C++
    Make Prototypes@@Java
    Make Prototypes@@*

  The first will be available when the language mode is C or C++, the second
  when the language mode is Java, and for all other language modes (including
  the "Plain" non-language mode).  If the entry:

    Make Prototypes

  also exists, this will always appear, meaning that the menu will always have
  two "Make Prototypes" entries, whatever the language mode.

3>The NEdit Preferences File

  The NEdit saved preferences file is an X resource file, and its contents can
  be moved into another X resource file (see X_Resources_).  One reason for
  doing so would be to attach server specific preferences, such as a default
  font to a particular X server.  Another reason for moving preferences into the
  X resource file would be to keep preferences menu options and resource
  settable options together in one place.
  Though the files are the same format, additional resources should not be added
  to the preference file since NEdit modifies this file by overwriting it
  completely.  Note also that the contents of the preference file take
  precedence over the values of X resources.
  Using Save Defaults after moving the contents of your preference file to your
  .Xdefaults file will re-create the preference file, interfering with the
  options that you have moved.
  The location of NEdit's preferences file depends on your environment:
  
* The default place for the file is '$HOME/.nedit/nedit.rc',
* if the variable $NEDIT_HOME is set in your environment it is located at '$NEDIT_HOME/nedit.rc',
* you may also use old-style run control files; in this case, the preferences are stored in $HOME/.nedit.

  (For VMS, the file is in '$NEDIT_HOME/nedit.rc' if $NEDIT_HOME is set, in
  'SYS$LOGIN:.nedit' otherwise.)

3>Sharing Customizations with Other NEdit Users

  If you have written macro or shell menu commands, highlight patterns, or
  smart-indent macros that you want to share with other NEdit users, you can
  make a file which they can load into their NEdit environment.

  To load such a file, start NEdit with the command:

     nedit -import <file>

  In the new NEdit session, verify that the imported patterns or macros do what
  you want, then select Preferences -> Save Defaults.  Saving incorporates the
  changes into the nedit preferences file, so the next time you run NEdit, you
  will not have to import the distribution file.

  Loading a customization file is automated, but creating one is not.  To
  produce a file to be imported by other users, you must make a copy of your own
  NEdit configuration file, and edit it, by hand, to remove everything but the
  few items of interest to the recipient.  Leave only the individual
  resource(s), and within those resources, only the particular macro, pattern,
  style, etc, that you wish to exchange.

  For example, to share a highlighting pattern set, you would include the
  patterns, any new styles you added, and language mode information only if the
  patterns are intended to support a new language rather than updating an
  existing one. For example:

     nedit.highlightPatterns:\
          My Language:1:0{\n\
                  Comment:"#":"$"::Comment::\n\
                  Loop Header:"^[ \\t]*loop:":::Loop::\n\
          }
     nedit.languageModes: My Language:.my::::::
     nedit.styles: Loop:blue:Bold

  Resources are in the format of X resource files, but the format of text
  within multiple-item resources like highlight patterns, language modes,
  macros, styles, etc., are private to NEdit.  Each resource is a string which
  ends at the first newline character not escaped with \, so you must be
  careful about how you treat ends of lines.  While you can generally just cut
  and paste indented sections, if something which was originally in the middle
  of a resource string is now at the end, you must remove the \ line
  continuation character(s) so it will not join the next line into the
  resource.  Conversely, if something which was originally at the end of a
  resource is now in the middle, you'll have to add continuation character(s)
  to make sure that the resource string is properly continued from beginning to
  end, and possibly newline character(s) (\n) to make sure that it is properly
  separated from the next item.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

X Resources
-----------

  NEdit has additional options to those provided in the Preferences menu which
  are set using X resources.  Like most other X programs, NEdit can be
  customized to vastly unnecessary proportions, from initial window positions
  down to the font and shadow colors of each individual button (A complete
  discussion of how to do this is left to books on the X Windows System).  Key
  binding (see "Key_Binding_" is one of the most useful of these resource
  settable options.

  X resources are usually specified in a file called .Xdefaults or .Xresources
  in your home directory (on VMS this is sys$login:decw$xdefaults.dat).  On
  some systems, this file is read and its information attached to the X server
  (your screen) when you start X.  On other systems, the .Xdefaults file is
  read each time you run an X program.  When X resource values are attached to
  the X server, changes to the resource file are not available to application
  programs until you either run the xrdb program with the appropriate file as
  input, or re-start the X server.

3>Selected X Resource Names

  The following are selected NEdit resource names and default values for NEdit
  options not settable via the Preferences menu (for preference resource names,
  see your NEdit preference file):

**nedit.tagFile**: (not defined) 

  This can be the name of a file, or multiple files separated by a colon (:)
  character, of the type produced by Exuberant Ctags or the Unix ctags
  command, which NEdit will load at startup time (see ctag_support_ ). The tag
  file provides a database from which NEdit can automatically open files
  containing the definition of a particular subroutine or data type.

**nedit.alwaysCheckRelativeTagsSpecs: True**

  When this resource is set to True, and there are tag files specified (with
  the nedit.tagFile resource, see above) as relative paths, NEdit will evaluate
  these tag value paths whenever a file is opened. All accessible tag files
  will be loaded at this time. When this resource value is False, relative path
  tag specifications will only be evaluated at NEdit startup time.

**nedit.shell**: /bin/csh 
  
  (Unix systems only) The Unix shell (command interpreter) to use for executing
  commands from the Shell menu

**nedit.wordDelimiters**: .,/\\`'!@@#%^&*()-=+{}[]":;<>?

  The characters, in addition to blanks and tabs, which mark the boundaries
  between words for the move-by-word (Ctrl+Arrow) and select-word (double
  click) commands.  Note that this default value may be overridden by the
  setting in Preferences -> Default Settings -> Language Modes....

**nedit.remapDeleteKey**: False
  
  Setting this resource to True forcibly maps the delete key to backspace. This
  can be helpful on systems where the bindings have become tangled, and in
  environments which mix systems with PC style keyboards and systems with DEC
  and Macintosh keyboards.  Theoretically, these bindings should be made using
  the standard X/Motif mechanisms, outside of NEdit.  In practice, some
  environments where users access several different systems remotely, can be
  very hard to configure. If you've given up and are using a backspace key
  halfway off the keyboard because you can't figure out the bindings, set this
  to True.
  
**nedit.typingHidesPointer**: False
  
  Setting this resource to True causes the mouse pointer to be hidden when you
  type in the text area. As soon as the mouse pointer is moved, it will 
  reappear.  This is useful to stop the mouse pointer from obscuring text.
  
**nedit.overrideDefaultVirtualKeyBindings**: Auto

  Motif uses a virtual key binding mechanism that shares the bindings between
  different Motif applications. When a first Motif application is started, it
  installs some default virtual key bindings and any other Motif application 
  that runs afterwards, simply reuses them. Obviously, if the first
  application installs an invalid set, all others applications may have 
  problems.
  
  In the past, NEdit has been the victim of invalid bindings installed by other 
  applications several times. Through this resource, NEdit can be instructed
  to ignore the bindings installed by other applications, and use its own
  private bindings. By default, NEdit tries to detect invalid bindings
  and ignore them automatically (Auto). Optionally, NEdit can be told to
  always keep the installed bindings (Never), or to always override them
  (Always).

**nedit.stdOpenDialog**: False
  
  Setting this resource to True restores the standard Motif style of Open
  dialog.  NEdit file open dialogs are missing a text field at the bottom of
  the dialog, where the file name can be entered as a string.  The field is
  removed in NEdit to encourage users to type file names in the list, a
  non-standard, but much faster method for finding files.

**nedit.bgMenuButton**: @~Shift@~Ctrl@~Meta@~Alt<Btn3Down>
  
  Specification for mouse button / key combination to post the background menu
  (in the form of an X translation table event specification).  The event
  specification should be as specific as possible, since it will override less
  specific translation table entries.

**nedit.maxPrevOpenFiles**: 30
  
  Number of files listed in the Open Previous sub-menu of the File menu.
  Setting this to zero disables the Open Previous menu item and maintenance of
  the NEdit file history file.

**nedit.printCommand**: (system specific)
  
  Command used by the print dialog to print a file, such as, lp, lpr, etc..
  The command must be capable of accepting input via stdin (standard input).

**nedit.printCopiesOption**: (system specific)
  
  Option name used to specify multiple copies to the print command.  If the
  option should be separated from its argument by a space, leave a trailing
  space. If blank, no "Number of Copies" item will appear in the print dialog.

**nedit.printQueueOption**: (system specific)
  
  Option name used to specify a print queue to the print command.  If the
  option should be separated from its argument by a space, leave a trailing
  space. If blank, no "Queue" item will appear in the print dialog.

**nedit.printNameOption**: (system specific)
  
  Option name used to specify a job name to the print command.  If the option
  should be separated from its argument by a space, leave a trailing space. If
  blank, no job or file name will be attached to the print job or banner page.

**nedit.printHostOption**: (system specific)
  
  Option name used to specify a host name to the print command.  If the option
  should be separated from its argument by a space, leave a trailing space. If
  blank, no "Host" item will appear in the print dialog.

**nedit.printDefaultQueue**: (system specific)
  
  The name of the default print queue.  Used only to display in the print
  dialog, and has no effect on printing.

**nedit.visualID**: Best

  If your screen supports multiple visuals (color mapping models), this
  resource allows you to manually choose among them.  The default value of
  "Best" chooses the deepest (most colors) visual available. Since NEdit does
  not depend on the specific characteristics of any given color model, Best
  probably IS the best choice for everyone, and the only reason for setting
  this resource would be to patch around some kind of X server problem. The
  resource may also be set to "Default", which chooses the screen's default
  visual (often a color-mapped, PseudoColor, visual for compatibility with
  older X applications).  It may also be set to a numeric visual-id value (use
  xdpyinfo to see the list of visuals supported by your display), or a visual
  class name: PseudoColor, DirectColor, TrueColor, etc..

  If you are running under a themed environment (like KDE or CDE) that places
  its colors in a shallow visual, and you'd rather have that color scheme
  instead of more colors available, then you may need set the visual to
  "Default" so that NEdit doesn't choose one with more colors.  (The reason
  for this is: if the "best" visual is not the server's default, then NEdit
  cannot use the colors provided by your environment.  NEdit will fall back to
  its own default color scheme.)

**nedit.installColormap**: False

  Force the installation of a private colormap.  If you have a humble 8-bit
  color display, and netscape is hogging all of the color cells, you may want
  to try turning this on.  On most systems, this will result in colors flashing
  wildly when you switch between NEdit and other applications.  But a few
  systems (SGI) have hardware support for multiple simultaneous colormaps, and
  applications with installed colormaps are well behaved.

**nedit.findReplaceUsesSelection**: False

  Controls if the Find and Replace dialogs are automatically loaded with the
  contents of the primary selection.

**nedit.stickyCaseSenseButton**: True

  Controls if the "Case Sensitive" buttons in the Find and Replace dialogs and
  the incremental search bar maintain a separate state for literal and regular
  expression searches. Moreover, when set to True, by default literal searches
  are case insensitive and regular expression searches are case sensitive. When
  set to False, the "Case Sensitive" buttons are independent of the "Regular
  Expression" toggle.

**nedit.printDefaultHost**: (system specific)
  
  The node name of the default print host.  Used only to display in the print
  dialog, and has no effect on printing.

**nedit.multiClickTime**: (system specific)
  
  Maximum time in milliseconds allowed between mouse clicks within double and
  triple click actions.

**nedit@*scrollBarPlacement**: BOTTOM_LEFT
  
  How scroll bars are placed in NEdit windows, as well as various lists and
  text fields in the program. Other choices are: BOTTOM_RIGHT, TOP_LEFT, or
  TOP_RIGHT.

**nedit@*text.autoWrapPastedText**: False
  
  When Auto Newline Wrap is turned on, apply automatic wrapping (which
  normally only applies to typed text) to pasted text as well.

**nedit@*text.foreground**: black
  
  Foreground color of the text editing area of the NEdit window.

**nedit@*text.background**: white
  
  Background color of the text editing area of the NEdit window.

**nedit@*text.selectForeground**: black
  
  Foreground (text) color for selections in the text editing area of the NEdit
  window.

**nedit@*text.selectBackground**: gray80
  
  Color for selections in the text editing area of the NEdit window.

**nedit@*text.highlightForeground**: white
  
  Foreground (text) color for highlights (parenthesis flashing) in the text
  editing area of the NEdit window.

**nedit@*text.highlightBackground**: red
  
  Color for highlights (parenthesis flashing) in the text editing area of the
  NEdit window.

**nedit@*text.cursorForeground**: black
  
  Color for text cursor in the text editing area of the NEdit window.

**nedit@*text.lineNumForeground**: gray47
  
  Color for displaying line numbers in the NEdit window.

**nedit@*text.heavyCursor**: False
  
  For monitors with poor resolution or users who have difficulty seeing the
  cursor, makes the cursor in the text editing area of the window heavier and
  darker.

**nedit@*text.cursorVPadding**: 0
  
  Number of lines to keep the cursor away from the top or bottom line of the 
  window.  Keyboard operations that would cause the cursor to get closer than
  this distance cause the window to scroll up or down instead, except at the 
  beginning of the file.  Mouse operations are not affected.

**nedit@*text.blinkRate**: 500
  
  Blink rate of the text insertion cursor in milliseconds.  Set to zero to stop
  blinking.

**nedit@*text.Translations**:
  
  Modifies key bindings (see below).

**nedit@*foreground**: black
  
  Default foreground color for menus, dialogs, scroll bars, etc..

**nedit@*background**: #b3b3b3
  
  Default background color for menus, dialogs, scroll bars, etc..

**nedit@*fontList**: helvetica medium 12 points
  
  Default font for menus, dialogs, scroll bars, etc..

**nedit.helpFont**: helvetica medium 12 points

  Font used for displaying online help.
  
**nedit.boldHelpFont**: helvetica bold 12 points

  Bold font for online help.
  
**nedit.italicHelpFont**: helvetica italic 12 points

  Italic font for online help.
  
**nedit.fixedHelpFont**: courier medium 12 points

  Fixed font for online help.
  
**nedit.boldFixedHelpFont**: courier bold 12 points

  Fixed bold for online help.
  
**nedit.italicFixedHelpFont**: courier italic 12 points

  Fixed italic font for online help.
  
**nedit.h1HelpFont**: helvetica bold 14 points

  Font for level-1 titles in help text.
  
**nedit.h2HelpFont**: helvetica bold italic 12 points

  Font for level-2 titles in help text.
  
**nedit.h3HelpFont**: courier bold 12 points

  Font for level-3 titles in help text.

**nedit.helpLinkFont**: helvetica medium 12 points

  Font for hyperlinks in the help text

**nedit.helpLinkColor**: #009900

  Color for hyperlinks in the help text
  
**nedit.backlightCharTypes**:  0-8,10-31,127:red;9:#dedede;32-126,160-255:#f0f0f0;128-159:orange

  A string specifying character classes as ranges of ASCII values followed by
  the color to be used as their background colors.  The format is:

  low[-high]{,low[-high]}:color{;low-high{,low[-high]}:color}

  where low and high are ASCII values.

  For example:
    32-255:#f0f0f0;1-31,127:red;128-159:orange;9-13:#e5e5e5

  The macro built-in function set_backlight_string() allows these strings to be
  set for a particular window.

**nc.autoStart**: True 

  Whether the nc program should automatically start an NEdit server (without
  prompting the user) if an appropriate server is not found.

**nc.serverCommand**: nedit -server

  Command used by the nc program to start an NEdit server.

**nc.timeOut**: 10

  Basic time-out period used in communication with an NEdit server (seconds).

   ----------------------------------------------------------------------
  ~The following are Selected widget names (to which you may append~
  ~.background, .foreground, .fontList, etc., to change colors, fonts~
  ~ and other characteristics):~

**nedit@*statsAreaForm**

  Statistics line and incremental search bar.  To get consistent results across
  the entire stats line and the incremental search bar, use '*' rather than '.'
  to separate the resource name.  For example, to set the foreground color of
  both components use:  
    nedit*statsAreaForm*foreground
  instead of:
    nedit*statsAreaForm.foreground

**nedit@*menuBar**

  Top-of-window menu-bar.

**nedit@*textHorScrollBar**

  Horizontal scroll bar.

**nedit@*textVertScrollBar**

  Vertical scroll bar.
  
**nedit@*calltip**

  Calltip pop-ups.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Key Binding
-----------

  There are several ways to change key bindings in NEdit.  The easiest way to
  add a new key binding in NEdit is to define a macro in Preferences -> Default
  Settings -> Customize Menus -> Macro Menu.  However, if you want to change
  existing bindings or add a significant number of new key bindings you will
  need to do so via X resources.

  Before reading this section, you must understand how to set X resources (see
  the help section "X_Resources_").  Since setting X resources is tricky, it is
  also helpful when working on key-binding, to set some easier-to-verify
  resource at the same time, as a simple check that the NEdit program is
  actually seeing your changes.  The appres program is also very helpful in
  checking that the resource settings that you make, actually reach the program
  for which they are intended in the correct form.

3>Key Binding in General

  Keyboard commands are associated with editor action routines through two
  separate mechanisms in NEdit.  Commands which appear in pull-down menus have
  individual resources designating a keyboard equivalent to the menu command,
  called an accelerator key.  Commands which do not have an associated menu
  item are bound to keys via the X toolkit translation mechanism.  The methods
  for changing these two kinds of bindings are quite different.

3>Key Binding Via Translations

  The most general way to bind actions to keys in NEdit is to use the
  translation table associated with the text widget.  To add a binding to Alt+Y
  to insert the string "Hi!", for example, add lines similar to the following
  to your X resource file:

    NEdit*text.Translations: #override \n\
      Alt<Key>y: insert_string("Hi!") \n

  The Help topic "Action_Routines_" lists the actions available to be bound.

  Translation tables map key and mouse presses, window operations, and other
  kinds of events, to actions. The syntax for translation tables is
  simplified here, so you may need to refer to a book on the X window system
  for more detailed information.

  Note that accelerator resources (discussed below) override translations, and
  that most Ctrl+letter and Alt+letter combinations are already bound to an
  accelerator key.  To use one of these combinations from a translation table,
  therefore, you must first un-bind the original menu accelerator.

  A resource for changing a translation table consists of a keyword; #override,
  #augment, or #replace; followed by lines (separated by newline characters)
  pairing events with actions.  Events begin with modifiers, like Ctrl, Shift,
  or Alt, followed by the event type in <>.  BtnDown, Btn1Down, Btn2Down,
  Btn1Up, Key, KeyUp are valid event types.  For key presses, the event type is
  followed by the name of the key.  You can specify a combination of events,
  such as a sequence of key presses, by separating them with commas.  The other
  half of the event/action pair is a set of actions.  These are separated from
  the event specification by a colon and from each other by spaces.  Actions
  are names followed by parentheses, optionally containing one or more
  parameters separated by comas.

3>Changing Menu Accelerator Keys

  The menu shortcut keys shown at the right of NEdit menu items can also be
  changed via X resources.  Each menu item has two resources associated with
  it, accelerator, the event to trigger the menu item; and acceleratorText, the
  string shown in the menu.  The form of the accelerator resource is the same
  as events for translation table entries discussed above, though multiple keys
  and other subtleties are not allowed.  The resource name for a menu is the
  title in lower case, followed by "Menu", the resource name of menu item is
  the name in lower case, run together, with words separated by caps, and all
  punctuation removed.  For example, to change Cut to Ctrl+X, you would add the
  following to your .Xdefaults file:

      nedit*editMenu.cut.accelerator: Ctrl<Key>x
      nedit*editMenu.cut.acceleratorText: Ctrl+X

  Accelerator keys with optional shift key modifiers, like Find..., have an
  additional accelerator resource with Shift appended to the name.  For
  example:

      nedit*searchMenu.find.acceleratorText: [Shift]Alt+F
      nedit*searchMenu.find.accelerator: Alt<Key>f
      nedit*searchMenu.findShift.accelerator: Shift Alt<Key>f
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Highlighting Patterns
---------------------

3>Writing Syntax Highlighting Patterns

  Patterns are the mechanism by which language syntax highlighting is
  implemented in NEdit (see Syntax_Highlighting_ under the heading of Features
  for Programming). To create syntax highlighting patterns for a new
  language, or to modify existing patterns, select "Recognition Patterns" from
  "Syntax Highlighting" sub-section of the "Default Settings" sub-menu of the
  "Preferences" menu.

  First, a word of caution.  As with regular expression matching in general, it
  is quite possible to write patterns which are so inefficient that they
  essentially lock up the editor as they recursively re-examine the entire
  contents of the file thousands of times.  With the multiplicity of patterns,
  the possibility of a lock-up is significantly increased in syntax
  highlighting.  When working on highlighting patterns, be sure to save your
  work frequently.

  NEdit's syntax highlighting is unusual in that it works in real-time (as you
  type), and yet is completely programmable using standard regular expression
  notation.  Other syntax highlighting editors usually fall either into the
  category of fully programmable but unable to keep up in real-time, or
  real-time but limited programmability.  The additional burden that NEdit
  places on pattern writers in order to achieve this speed/flexibility mix, is
  to force them to state self-imposed limitations on the amount of context that
  patterns may examine when re-parsing after a change.  While the "Pattern
  Context Requirements" heading is near the end of this section, it is not
  optional, and must be understood before making any any serious effort at
  pattern writing.

  In its simplest form, a highlight pattern consists of a regular expression to
  match, along with a style representing the font an color for displaying any
  text which matches that expression.  To bold the word, "highlight", wherever
  it appears the text, the regular expression simply would be the word
  "highlight".  The style (selected from the menu under the heading of
  "Highlight Style") determines how the text will be drawn.  To bold the text,
  either select an existing style, such as "Keyword", which bolds text, or
  create a new style and select it under Highlight Style.

  The full range of regular expression capabilities can be applied in such a
  pattern, with the single caveat that the expression must conclusively match
  or not match, within the pre-defined context distance (as discussed below
  under Pattern Context Requirements).

  To match longer ranges of text, particularly any constructs which exceed the
  requested context, you must use a pattern which highlights text between a
  starting and ending regular expression match.  To do so, select "Highlight
  text between starting and ending REs" under "Matching", and enter both a
  starting and ending regular expression.  For example, to highlight everything
  between double quotes, you would enter a double quote character in both the
  starting and ending regular expression fields.  Patterns with both a
  beginning and ending expression span all characters between the two
  expressions, including newlines.

  Again, the limitation for automatic parsing to operate properly is that both
  expressions must match within the context distance stated for the pattern
  set.

  With the ability to span large distances, comes the responsibility to recover
  when things go wrong.  Remember that syntax highlighting is called upon to
  parse incorrect or incomplete syntax as often as correct syntax.  To stop a
  pattern short of matching its end expression, you can specify an error
  expression, which stops the pattern from gobbling up more than it should. 
  For example, if the text between double quotes shouldn't contain newlines,
  the error expression might be "$".  As with both starting and ending
  expressions, error expressions must also match within the requested context
  distance.

4>Coloring Sub-Expressions

  It is also possible to color areas of text within a regular expression
  match.  A pattern of this type associates a style with sub-expressions
  references of the parent pattern (as used in regular expression substitution
  patterns, see the NEdit Help menu item on Regular_Expressions_). 
  Sub-expressions of both the starting and ending patterns may be colored.  For
  example, if the parent pattern has a starting expression "\<", and end
  expression "\>", (for highlighting all of the text contained within angle
  brackets), a sub-pattern using "&" in both the starting and ending expression
  fields could color the brackets differently from the intervening text.  A
  quick shortcut to typing in pattern names in the Parent Pattern field is to
  use the middle mouse button to drag them from the Patterns list.

4>Hierarchical Patterns

  A hierarchical sub-pattern, is identical to a top level pattern, but is
  invoked only between the beginning and ending expression matches of its
  parent pattern.  Like the sub-expression coloring patterns discussed above,
  it is associated with a parent pattern using the Parent Pattern field in the
  pattern specification.  Pattern names can be dragged from the pattern list
  with the middle mouse button to the Parent Pattern field.

  After the start expression of the parent pattern matches, the syntax
  highlighting parser searches for either the parent's end pattern or a
  matching sub-pattern.  When a sub-pattern matches, control is not returned to
  the parent pattern until the entire sub-pattern has been parsed, regardless
  of whether the parent's end pattern appears in the text matched by the
  sub-pattern.

  The most common use for this capability is for coloring sub-structure of
  language constructs (smaller patterns embedded in larger patterns). 
  Hierarchical patterns can also simplify parsing by having sub-patterns "hide"
  special syntax from parent patterns, such as special escape sequences or
  internal comments.

  There is no depth limit in nesting hierarchical sub-patterns, but beyond the
  third level of nesting, automatic re-parsing will sometimes have to re-parse
  more than the requested context distance to guarantee a correct parse (which
  can slow down the maximum rate at which the user can type if large sections
  of text are matched only by deeply nested patterns).

  While this is obviously not a complete hierarchical language parser it is
  still useful in many text coloring situations.  As a pattern writer, your
  goal is not to completely cover the language syntax, but to generate
  colorings that are useful to the programmer.  Simpler patterns are usually
  more efficient and also more robust when applied to incorrect code.

4>Deferred (Pass-2) Parsing

  NEdit does pattern matching for syntax highlighting in two passes.  The first
  pass is applied to the entire file when syntax highlighting is first turned
  on, and to new ranges of text when they are initially read or pasted in.  The
  second pass is applied only as needed when text is exposed (scrolled in to
  view).

  If you have a particularly complex set of patterns, and parsing is beginning
  to add a noticeable delay to opening files or operations which change large
  regions of text, you can defer some of that parsing from startup time, to
  when it is actually needed for viewing the text.  Deferred parsing can only
  be used with single expression patterns, or begin/end patterns which match
  entirely within the requested context distance.  To defer the parsing of a
  pattern to when the text is exposed, click on the Pass-2 pattern type button
  in the highlight patterns dialog.

  Sometimes a pattern can't be deferred, not because of context requirements,
  but because it must run concurrently with pass-1 (non-deferred) patterns.  If
  they didn't run concurrently, a pass-1 pattern might incorrectly match some
  of the characters which would normally be hidden inside of a sequence matched
  by the deferred pattern.  For example, C has character constants enclosed in
  single quotes.  These typically do not cross line boundaries, meaning they
  can be parsed entirely within the context distance of the C pattern set and
  should be good candidates for deferred parsing.  However, they can't be
  deferred because they can contain sequences of characters which can trigger
  pass-one patterns. Specifically, the sequence, '\"', contains a double quote
  character, which would be matched by the string pattern and interpreted as
  introducing a string.

4>Pattern Context Requirements

  The context requirements of a pattern set state how much additional text
  around any change must be examined to guarantee that the patterns will match
  what they are intended to match.  Context requirements are a promise by NEdit
  to the pattern writer, that the regular expressions in his/her patterns will
  be matched against at least <line context> lines and <character context>
  characters, around any modified text.  Combining line and character
  requirements guarantee that both will be met.

  Automatic re-parsing happens on EVERY KEYSTROKE, so the amount of context
  which must be examined is very critical to typing efficiency.  The more
  complicated your patterns, the more critical the context becomes.  To cover
  all of the keywords in a typical language, without affecting the maximum rate
  at which users can enter text, you may be limited to just a few lines and/or
  a few hundred characters of context.

  The default context distance is 1 line, with no minimum character
  requirement.  There are several benefits to sticking with this default.  One
  is simply that it is easy to understand and to comply with.  Regular
  expression notation is designed around single line matching.  To span lines
  in a regular expression, you must explicitly mention the newline character
  "\n", and matches which are restricted to a single line are virtually immune
  to lock-ups.  Also, if you can code your patterns to work within a single
  line of context, without an additional character-range context requirement,
  the parser can take advantage the fact that patterns don't cross line
  boundaries, and nearly double its efficiency over a one-line and 1-character
  context requirement.  (In a single line context, you are allowed to match
  newlines, but only as the first and/or last character.)
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Smart Indent Macros
-------------------

  Smart indent macros can be written for any language, but are usually more
  difficult to write than highlighting patterns.  A good place to start, of
  course, is to look at the existing macros for C and C++.

  Smart indent macros for a language mode consist of standard NEdit macro
  language code attached to any or all of the following three activation
  conditions: 1) When smart indent is first turned on for a text window
  containing code of the language, 2) When a newline is typed and smart indent
  is expected, 3) after any character is typed.  To attach macro code to any of
  these code "hooks", enter it in the appropriate section in the Preferences ->
  Default Settings -> Auto Indent -> Program Smart Indent dialog.

  Typically most of the code should go in the initialization section, because
  that is the appropriate place for subroutine definitions, and smart indent
  macros are complicated enough that you are not likely to want to write them
  as one monolithic run of code.  You may also put code in the Common/Shared
  Initialization section (accessible through the button in the upper left
  corner of the dialog).  Unfortunately, since the C/C++ macros also reside in
  the common/shared section, when you add code there, you run some risk of
  missing out on future upgrades to these macros, because your changes will
  override the built-in defaults.

  The newline macro is invoked after the user types a newline, but before the
  newline is entered in the buffer.  It takes a single argument ($1) which is
  the position at which the newline will be inserted.  It must return the
  number of characters of indentation the line should have, or -1.  A return
  value of -1 means to do a standard auto-indent.  You must supply a newline
  macro, but the code: "return -1" (auto-indent), or "return 0" (no indent) is
  sufficient.

  The type-in macro takes two arguments.  $1 is the insert position, and $2 is
  the character just inserted, and does not return a value.  You can do just
  about anything here, but keep in mind that this macro is executed for every
  keystroke typed, so if you try to get too fancy, you may degrade performance.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

NEdit Command Line
------------------

.. ? help !!#ifndef VMS
   **nedit** [-**read**] [-**create**] [-**line** n | +n] [-**server**]
      [-**do** command] [-**tags** file] [-**tabs** n] [-**wrap**]
      [-**nowrap**] [-**autowrap**] [-**autoindent**] [-**noautoindent**]
      [-**autosave**] [-**noautosave**] [-**rows** n] [-**columns** n]
      [-**font** font] [-**lm** languagemode] [-**geometry** geometry]
      [-**iconic**] [-**noiconic**] [-**display** [host]:server[.screen]
      [-**xrm** resourcestring] [-**svrname** name] [-**import** file]
      [-**background** color] [-**foreground** color] [-**V**|-**version**]
      [--] [file...]

**-read**
  Open the file Read Only regardless of the actual file protection.

**-create**
  Don't warn about file creation when a file doesn't exist.

**-line n (or +n)**
  Go to line number n

**-server**
  Designate this session as an NEdit server, for processing commands from the
  nc program.  nc can be used to interface NEdit to code development
  environments, mailers, etc., or just as a quick way to open files from the
  shell command line without starting a new NEdit session.

**-do command**
  Execute an NEdit macro or action. On each file following the -do argument on
  the command line.  -do is particularly useful from the nc program, where nc
  -do can remotely execute commands in an NEdit -server session.

**-tags file**
  Load a file of directions for finding definitions of program subroutines and
  data objects.  The file must be of the format gen- erated by Exuberant Ctags,
  or the standard Unix ctags command.

**-tabs n**
  Set tab stops every n characters.

**-wrap, -nowrap**
  Wrap long lines at the right edge of the window rather than continuing them
  past it.  (Continuous Wrap mode)

**-autowrap, -noautowrap**
  Wrap long lines when the cursor reaches the right edge of the window by
  inserting newlines at word boundaries.  (Auto Newline Wrap mode)

**-autoindent, -noautoindent**
  Maintain a running indent.

**-autosave, -noautosave**
  Maintain a backup copy of the file being edited under the name '~filename'. 

**-rows n**
  Default height in characters for an editing window.

**-columns n**
  Default width in characters for an editing window.

**-font font (or -fn font)**
  Font for text being edited (Font for menus and dialogs can be set with -xrm
  "*fontList:font").

**-lm languagemode**
  Initial language mode used for editing succeeding files.

**-geometry geometry (or -g geometry)**
  The initial size and/or location of editor windows.  The argument geometry
  has the form:

   [<width>x<height>][+|-][<xoffset>[+|-]<yoffset>]

  where <width> and <height> are the desired width and height of the window,
  and <xoffset> and <yoffset> are the distance from the edge of the screen to
  the window, + for top or left, - for bottom or right.  -geometry can be
  specified for individual files on the command line.

**-iconic, -noiconic**
  Initial window state for succeeding files.

**-display [host]:server[.screen]**
  The name of the X server to use.  host specifies the machine, server
  specifies the display server number, and screen specifies the screen number. 
  host or screen can be omitted and default to the local machine, and screen 0.

**-background color (or -bg color)**
  Background color. (background color for text can be set separately with 
  -xrm "nedit*text.background: color").

**-foreground color (or -fg color)**
  Foreground color. (foreground color for text can be set separately with -xrm
  "nedit*text.foreground: color").

**-xrm resourcestring** 
  Set the value of an X resource to override a default
  value (see "Customizing_NEdit_").

**-svrname name**
  When starting NEdit in server mode, name the server, such that it responds to
  requests only when nc is given a corresponding -svrname argument.  By naming
  servers, you can run several simultaneously, and direct files and commands
  specifically to any one.

**-import file**
  Loads an additional preferences file on top of the existing defaults saved in
  your preferences file.  To incorporate macros, language modes, and highlight
  patterns and styles written by other users, run NEdit with -import <file>,
  then re-save your preference file with Preferences -> Save Defaults.

**-version**
  Prints out the NEdit version information. The -V option is synonymous.
  
**--**
  Treats all subsequent arguments as file names, even if they start with a
  dash. This is so NEdit can access files that begin with the dash character.

.. ? help~
!!#else
..
..   This documentation for VMS NEdit usage should only appear in the
..   generated help code, not in any of the printed documentation.
..   Reasoning is that VMS usage is diminishing and there is a desire
..   to not clutter up the printed documentation here.
..
  NEDIT [filespec[,...]]

  The following qualifiers are accepted:

**/read**
  Open the file Read Only regardless of the actual file protection.

**/create**
  Don't warn about file creation when a file doesn't exist.

**/line=n**
  Go to line #n

**/server** 
  Designate this session as an NEdit server for processing commands from the nc
  program. The nc program can be used to interface NEdit to code development
  environments, mailers, etc., or just as a quick way to open files from the
  shell command line without starting a new NEdit session.

**/do=command**
  Execute an NEdit action routine. on each file following the /do argument on
  the command line.  /do is particularly useful from the nc program, where nc
  /do can remotely execute commands in an nedit /server session.

**/tags=file**
  Load a file of directions for finding definitions of program subroutines and
  data objects.  The file must be of the format generated by the Unix ctags
  command.

**/wrap, /nowrap**
  Wrap long lines at the right edge of the window rather than continuing them
  past it.  (Continuous Wrap mode)

**/autowrap, /noautowrap**
  Wrap long lines when the cursor reaches the right edge of the window by
  inserting newlines at word boundaries.  (Auto Newline Wrap mode)

**/autoindent, /noautoindent**
  Maintain a running indent.

**/autosave, /noautosave**
  Maintain a backup copy of the file being edited under the name '_filename'.

**/rows=n**
  Default width in characters for an editing window.

**/columns=n**
  Default height in characters for an editing window.

**/font=font (or /fn=font)**
  Font for text being edited (Font for menus and dialogs can be set with 
  /xrm="*fontList:font").

**/display [host]:server[.screen]**
  The name of the X server to use.  host specifies the machine, server
  specifies the display server number, and screen specifies the screen number. 
  host or screen can be omitted and default to the local machine, and screen 0.

**/geometry=geometry (or /g=geometry)**
  The initial size and/or location of editor windows. The argument geometry
  has the form:

    [<width>x<height>][+|-][<xoffset>[+|-]<yoffset>]

  where <width> and <height> are the desired width and height of the window,
  and <xoffset> and <yoffset> are the distance from the edge of the screen to
  the window, + for top or left, - for bottom or right.

**/background=color (or /bg=color)**

  Background color. (background color for text can be set separately with 
  /xrm="nedit*text:background color").

**/foreground=color (or /fg=color)**
  Foreground color. (foreground color for text can be set separately with
  /xrm="nedit*text:foreground color").

**/xrm=resourcestring**
  Set the value of an X resource to override a default value 
  (see Customizing NEdit).

**/svrname=name**
  When starting nedit in server mode, name the server, such that it responds to
  requests only when nc is given a corresponding -svrname argument.  By naming
  servers, you can run several simultaneously, and direct files and commands
  specifically to any one.

**/import=file**
  Loads an additional preferences file on top of the existing defaults saved in
  your .nedit file.  To incorporate macros, language modes, and highlight
  patterns and styles written by other users, run nedit with /import=<file>,
  then re-save your .nedit file with Preferences -> Save Defaults.

  Unix-style command lines (but not file names) are also acceptable:

    nedit -rows 20 -wrap file1.c file2.c

  is equivalent to:

    nedit /rows=20/wrap file1.c, file2.c",
!!#endif /* VMS */    
.. ~ help
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Client/Server Mode
------------------

  NEdit can be operated on its own, or as a two-part client/server
  application.  Client/server mode is useful for integrating NEdit with
  software development environments, mailers, and other programs; or just as a
  quick way to open files from the shell command line without starting a new
  NEdit session.

  To run NEdit in server mode, type:

      nedit -server

  NEdit can also be started in server mode via the Nedit Client (nc) program
  when no servers are available.

  The nc program, which is distributed along with NEdit,
  sends commands to an nedit server to open files, select lines, or execute
  editor actions.  It accepts a limited set of the nedit command line options:
  -read, -create, -line (or +n), -do, and a list of file names.  Listing a file
  on the nc command line means, open it if it is not already open and bring the
  window to the front.  -read and -create affect only newly opened files, but
  -line and -do can also be used on files which are already open 
  (See  "NEdit_Command_Line_" for more information).

  In typical Unix style, arguments affect the files which follow them on the
  command line, for example:

      incorrect:   nc file.c -line 25
      correct:     nc -line 25 file.c

  -read, -create, and -line affect all of the files which follow them on the
  command line.  The -do macro is executed only once, on the next file on the
  line.  -do without a file following it on the command line, executes the
  macro on the first available window (presumably when you give a -do command
  without a corresponding file or window, you intend it to do something
  independent of the window in which it happens to execute).

  nc also accepts one command line option of its own, -noask (or -ask), which
  instructs it whether to automatically start a server if one is not
  available.  This is also settable via the X resource, nc.autoStart 
  (See "X_Resources_" section).

  Sometimes it is useful to have more than one NEdit server running, for
  example to keep mail and programming work separate.  The option, -svrname, to
  both nedit and nc, allows you to start, and communicate with, separate named
  servers.  A named server responds only to requests with the corresponding
  -svrname argument.  If you use ClearCase and are within a ClearCase view, the
  server name will default to the name of the view (based on the value of the
  CLEARCASE_ROOT environment variable).

  Communication between nc and nedit is through the X display. So as long as X
  windows is set up and working properly, nc will work properly as well. 
  nc uses the DISPLAY environment variable, the machine name and your user name
  to find the appropriate server, meaning, if you have several machines sharing
  a common file system, nc will not be able to find a server that is running on
  a machine with a different host name, even though it may be perfectly
  appropriate for editing a given file.

  The command which nc uses to start an nedit server is settable via the X
  resource nc.serverCommand, by default, "nedit -server".
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Crash Recovery
--------------

  If a system crash, network failure, X server crash, or program error should
  happen while you are editing a file, you can still recover most of your
  work.  NEdit maintains a backup file which it updates periodically (every 8
  editing operations or 80 characters typed).  This file has the same name
  as the file that you are editing, but with the character `~' (tilde) on Unix
  or `_' (underscore) on VMS prefixed to the name.  To recover a file after a
  crash, simply rename the file to remove the tilde or underscore character,
  replacing the older version of the file.  (Because several of the Unix shells
  consider the tilde to be a special character, you may have to prefix the
  character with a `\' (backslash) when you move or delete an NEdit backup
  file.)

  Example, to recover the file called "help.c" on Unix type the command:

      mv \~help.c help.c

  A minor caveat, is that if the file you were editing was in MS DOS format,
  the backup file will be in Unix format, and you will need to open the backup
  file in NEdit and change the file format back to MS DOS via the Save As...
  dialog (or use the Unix unix2dos command outside of NEdit).
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Version
-------
.. ! help~

|>version<|
|>date<|

.. ~ help
..
.. There is build time versioning information that is handled specially
.. inside help.c for this section. It needs to have a '%s' string
.. made available for it to appear in the on-line help.
..
.. ? help %s
..
.. ======================================================================
.. The policy for credit so far is this:
..
.. You get "written by" credit if you have contributed significant
.. code or effort to the project.
..
.. You get a syntax/indent credit if your pattern is compiled into the
.. binary.
.. ======================================================================

  NEdit was written by Mark Edel, Joy Kyriakopulos, Christopher Conrad,
  Jim Clark, Arnulfo Zepeda-Navratil, Suresh Ravoor, Tony Balinski, Max
  Vohlken, Yunliang Yu, Donna Reid, Arne Førlie, Eddy De Greef, Steve
  LoBasso, Alexander Mai, Scott Tringali, Thorsten Haude, Steve Haehn,
  and Andrew Hood.

  The regular expression matching routines used in NEdit are adapted (with
  permission) from original code written by Henry Spencer at the
  University of Toronto.

  Syntax highlighting patterns and smart indent macros were contributed by:
  Simon T. MacDonald,  Maurice Leysens, Matt Majka, Alfred Smeenk,
  Alain Fargues, Christopher Conrad, Scott Markinson, Konrad Bernloehr,
  Ivan Herman, Patrice Venant, Christian Denat, Philippe Couton,
  Max Vohlken, Markus Schwarzenberg, Himanshu Gohel, Steven C. Kapp,
  Michael Turomsha, John Fieber, Chris Ross, Nathaniel Gray, Joachim Lous,
  Mike Duigou, Seak Teng-Fong, Joor Loohuis, Mark Jones,
  and Niek van den Berg.

  NEdit sources, executables, additional documentation, and contributed
  software are available from the NEdit web site at http://www.nedit.org_.

  This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
  modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License
  as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2
  of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

  This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
  but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
  MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the
  GNU General Public License in the Help section "Distribution_Policy_" 
  for more details.
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Distribution Policy
-------------------

  GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE

  Version 2, June 1991

  Copyright (C) 1989, 1991 Free Software Foundation, Inc. 675 Mass Ave,
  Cambridge, MA 02139, USA. Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute
  verbatim copies of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.

  Preamble

  The licenses for most software are designed to take away your freedom to
  share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public License is intended
  to guarantee your freedom to share and change free software--to make sure the
  software is free for all its users. This General Public License applies to
  most of the Free Software Foundation's software and to any other program
  whose authors commit to using it. (Some other Free Software Foundation
  software is covered by the GNU Library General Public License instead.) You
  can apply it to your programs, too.

  When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not price. Our
  General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom
  to distribute copies of free software (and charge for this service if you
  wish), that you receive source code or can get it if you want it, that you
  can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs; and that
  you know you can do these things.

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  GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND
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  END OF TERMS AND CONDITIONS
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Mailing Lists
-------------

  There are two separate mailing lists for nedit users, and one for developers.
  Users may post to the developer mailing list to report defects and communicate
  with the nedit developers.  Remember that nedit is entirely a volunteer
  effort, so please ask questions first to the discussion list, and do your
  share to answer other users questions as well.

    discuss@@nedit.org_
    
  General discussion, questions and answers among NEdit users and developers.

    announce@@nedit.org_

  A low-volume mailing list for announcing new versions.

    develop@@nedit.org_

  Communication among and with NEdit developers.  
  Developers should also subscribe to the discuss list.

  To subscribe, send mail to <majordomo@@nedit.org> with one or more of the 
  following in the body of the message:

    subscribe announce
    subscribe discuss
    subscribe develop
   ----------------------------------------------------------------------

Problems/Defects
----------------

3>Solutions to Common Problems

  For a much more comprehensive list of common problems and solutions, see the
  NEdit FAQ.  The latest version of the FAQ can always be found on the NEdit
  web site at:

      http://www.nedit.org_.

  **P: No files are shown in the "Files" list in the Open... dialog.**

  S: When you use the "Filter" field, include the file specification or a
  complete directory specification, including the trailing "/" on Unix.  
  (See Help in the Open... dialog).

  **P: Find Again and Replace Again don't continue in the same direction as the original Find or Replace.**

  S: Find Again and Replace Again don't use the direction of the original
  search.  The Shift key controls the direction: Ctrl+G means forward,
  Shift+Ctrl+G means backward.

  **P: Preferences specified in the Preferences menu don't seem to get saved when I select Save Defaults.**

  S: NEdit has two kinds of preferences: 1) per-window preferences, in the
  Preferences menu, and 2) default settings for preferences in newly created
  windows, in the Default Settings sub-menu of the Preferences menu. 
  Per-window preferences are not saved by Save Defaults, only Default
  Settings.

  **P: Columns and indentation don't line up.**

  S: NEdit is using a proportional width font.  Set the font to a fixed style
  (see Preferences menu).

  **P: NEdit performs poorly on very large files.**

  S: Turn off Incremental Backup.  With Incremental Backup on, NEdit
  periodically writes a full copy of the file to disk.

  **P: Commands added to the Shell Commands menu (Unix only) don't output anything until they are finished executing.**

  S: If the command output is directed to a dialog, or the input is from a
  selection, output is collected together and held until the command
  completes.  De-select both of the options and the output will be shown
  incrementally as the command executes.

  **P: Dialogs don't automatically get keyboard focus when they pop up.**

  S: Most X Window managers allow you to choose between two categories of
  keyboard focus models: pointer focus, and explicit focus.  Pointer focus
  means that as you move the mouse around the screen, the window under the
  mouse automatically gets the keyboard focus.  NEdit users who use this
  focus model should set "Popups Under Pointer" in the Default Settings sub
  menu of the preferences menu in NEdit.  Users with the explicit focus
  model, in some cases, may have problems with certain dialogs, such as Find
  and Replace.  In MWM this is caused by the mwm resource startupKeyFocus
  being set to False (generally a bad choice for explicit focus users). 
  NCDwm users should use the focus model "click" instead of "explicit",
  again, unless you have set it that way to correct specific problems, this
  is the appropriate setting for most explicit focus users.

  **P: The Backspace key doesn't work, or deletes forward rather than backward.**

  S: While this is an X/Motif binding problem, and should be solved outside of
  NEdit in the Motif virtual binding layer (or possibly xmodmap or
  translations), NEdit provides an out.  If you set the resource:
  nedit.remapDeleteKey to True, NEdit will forcibly map the delete key to
  backspace.  The default setting of this resource recently changed, so
  users who have been depending on this remapping will now have to set it
  explicitly (or fix their bindings).

  **P: NEdit crashes when I try to paste text in to a text field in a dialog (like Find or Replace) on my SunOS system.**

  S: On many SunOS systems, you have to set up an nls directory before various
  inter-client communication features of Motif will function properly. 
  There are instructions in README.sun in /pub/v5_0_2/individual/README.sun on 
  ftp.nedit.org, as well as a tar file containing a complete nls 
  directory: ftp://ftp.nedit.org/pub/v5_0_2/nls.tar. 
  README.sun contains directions for setting up an nls directory, which
  is required by Motif for handling copy and paste to Motif text fields. 

3>Known Defects

  Below is the list of known defects which affect NEdit. The defects your copy
  of NEdit will exhibit depend on which system you are running and with which
  Motif libraries it was built. Note that there are now Motif 1.2 and/or 2.0
  libraries available on ALL supported platforms, and as you can see below
  there are far fewer defects in Motif 1.2, so it is in your best interest to
  upgrade your system.

4>All Versions

**DEFECT**
  Operations between rectangular selections on overlapping lines do nothing.
  
~Work Around~
  None.  These operations are very complicated and rarely used.

**DEFECT**
  Cut and Paste menu items fail, or possibly crash, 
  for very large (multi-megabyte) selections.
  
~Work Around~
  Use selection copy (middle mouse button click) 
  for transferring larger quantities of data. 
  Cut and Paste save the copied text in server 
  memory, which is usually limited.

3>Reporting Defects

  Submit bugs through the web at:
  
    http://sf.net/tracker/?func=add&group_id=11005&atid=111005

  Please include the first few lines from Help > Version, which identifes
  NEdit's version and other system attributes important for diagnosing your
  problem.
  
  The NEdit developers subscribe to both discuss@@nedit.org and
  develop@@nedit.org, either of which may be used for reporting defects.  If
  you're not sure, or you think the report might be of interest to the general
  NEdit user community, send the report to discuss@@nedit.org_.  If it's
  something obvious and boring, like we misspelled "anemometer" in the on-line
  help, send it to develop@@nedit.org_.  If you don't want to subscribe to the
  Mailing_Lists_, please add a note to your mail about cc'ing you on responses.

  $$

.. Hyperlinks for this document  ==============================================

.. _discuss@@nedit.org   mailto:discuss@@nedit.org
.. _announce@@nedit.org  mailto:announce@@nedit.org
.. _develop@@nedit.org   mailto:develop@@nedit.org
.. _http://www.nedit.org http://www.nedit.org
.. _ctag_support         #ctags
.. _Alternation          #alternation

.. =============================================================================

.. Below is what is used to guide the generation of 'C'-Motif menus.
.. Indentation is SIGNIFICANT in the "Menu" directive lines below. It
.. is used to determine under which menu element another item will belong.
.. The number of spaces indented is not significant, but items to be placed
.. in the same menu panel MUST line up at the same indent level.
.. ALL nodes of this menu "tree" should have help name qualifiers.
.. These are used to produce the internal lists used by NEdit help code.

.. By default, the first character of the menu element will be used as a
.. menu mneumonic key. To use another character in the menu element for this
.. purpose, surround the character with underscores (eg. I w_a_nt 'a').

.. The menu title MUST match the one found in the actual help text (sans
.. special mneumonic key character marking). The help text title may include
.. underlines (for spaces) when it is a hyperlink target.

.. The Help-name is used to generate various data structure names. For
.. instance, the 'start' help name will be used to generate the HelpTopic
.. enumeration value HELP_START and the character array htxt_start which
.. holds the actual help text used in the menu dialogs. Consequently, these
.. names need to be unique and contain only the characters that a 'C'
.. compiler can digest.

.. Menu separator lines use a dash (-) character for the Menu Title. They
.. should also have a unique Help-name.

.. A numerical value following the Help-name (separated from the name by
.. a comma and/or spaces) is part of a menu element hiding scheme implemented
.. in buildHelpMenu (found in 'menu.c'). When the number matches the hideIt
.. value found in the procedure, that element will effectively become invisible.
.. This mechanism was created for particular menu features that are not
.. available to all incarnations of NEdit (in this case, the VMS version).

.. A "Help" directive is used for all other text used as NEdit help, but
.. does not show up in the Help menu.

..       Menu Title                         # Help-name
.. ------------------------------------------------------------
.. Menu: Getting Started                    # start
.. Menu: Basic Operation                    # basicOp
.. Menu:   Selecting Text                   # select
.. Menu:   Finding and Replacing Text       # search
.. Menu:   Cut and Paste                    # clipboard
.. Menu:   Using the Mouse                  # mouse
.. Menu:   Keyboard Shortcuts               # keyboard
.. Menu:   S_h_ifting and Filling           # fill
.. Menu:   F_i_le Format                    # format

.. Menu: Features for Programming           # features
.. Menu:   Programming with NEdit           # programmer
.. Menu:   Tabs/Emulated Tabs               # tabs
.. Menu:   Auto/Smart Indent                # indent
.. Menu:   Syntax Highlighting              # syntax
.. Menu:   Finding Declarations (ctags)     # tags
.. Menu:   Calltips                         # calltips

.. Menu: Regular Expressions                # regex
.. Menu:   Basic Regular Expression Syntax  # basicSyntax
.. Menu:   Metacharacters                   # escapeSequences
.. Menu:   Parenthetical Constructs         # parenConstructs
.. Menu:   Advanced Topics                  # advancedTopics
.. Menu:   Example Regular Expressions      # examples

.. Menu: Macro/Shell Extensions             # extensions
.. Menu:   Shell Commands and Filters       # shell, 1
.. Menu:   Learn/Replay                     # learn
.. Menu:   Macro Language                   # macro_lang
.. Menu:   M_a_cro Subroutines              # macro_subrs
.. Menu:   Range Sets                       # rangeset
.. Menu:   Highlighting Information         # hiliteInfo
.. Menu:   Action Routines                  # actions

.. Menu: Customizing                        # customizing
.. Menu:   Customizing NEdit                # customize
.. Menu:   Preferences                      # preferences
.. Menu:   X Resources                      # resources
.. Menu:   Key Binding                      # binding
.. Menu:   Highlighting Patterns            # patterns
.. Menu:   Smart Indent Macros              # smart_indent

.. Menu: NEdit Command Line                 # command_line
.. Menu: Client/Server Mode                 # server
.. Menu: Cr_a_sh Recovery                   # recovery
.. Menu: ---------------------------------- # separator1
.. Menu: Version                            # version
.. Menu: Distribution Policy                # distribution
.. Menu: Mailing _L_ists                    # mailing_list
.. Menu: Problems/Defects                   # defects
.. ------------------------------------------------------------
.. Help: Tabs Dialog                        # tabs_dialog
.. Help: Customize Window Title Dialog      # custom_title_dialog