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good text editor for DOS

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mdanh2002

Experienced Member
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Sep 7, 2011
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Hi,

I am looking for a simple DOS text editor that can run on a 80386 with support for macros, to be used as a simple assembler IDE for the A86/TASM assemblers. By macros, I meant allowing user to add custom menus that can call the assembler/linker and run the compiled program from within the IDE.

I have tried many DOS-based editors, but can't seem to find what I need. Most of them allow user to add fancy macros to automate the editor (e.g. copy/paste text or insert new lines), but not for running third party programs.

Any suggestion is appreciated. Thanks.
 
I would suggest Semware Editor Pro for DOS. You can add menu's, execute commands etc. Not sure if the free trial version has all that stuff in it (macro compiler, etc that allows you to do all the good stuff).

https://www.semware.com/
 
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If you're working on individual modules or completely self-contained programs, I have a strange but useful suggestion for you: Turbo Pascal 7. Its IDE lets you create shell-out macros, and if you install Borland Pascal 7 and say "yes" to everything during the install, you'll get an IDE that lets you edit .asm, hit a key to shell out to TASM 3.2, and will then return to the line that had an error along with a complete list of warnings and errors with the ability to jump to each line in the source. You don't have to write a single line of Pascal, it just works. The IDE editor uses Wordstar bindings and cannot be reconfigured.

If you need a 100% ASM project IDE with a functional "make" and linker, then TP7 can't do that; it only works for editing single .asm files and assembling them to .obj files. However, because you're on a 386, you should go looking through simtel and other shareware repositories and archives, as I remember several "ASM IDE" programs out there. Most of them required a 386, so I've never used them in my personal work (which is limited to 8086).

I did an editor shootout many years ago but my focus was on editing speed on slow systems, not programmer's editors. That said, you might find something useful there, and you might also want to check out the Aurora editor which is ludicrously flexible.
 
I usually don't recommend QEDIT because it has no undo facility. The very best you can do is restore all changes you made to a line, but if you've moved off that line, you're out of luck.
 
Trixter said:
I usually don't recommend QEDIT because it has no undo facility. The very best you can do is restore all changes you made to a line, but if you've moved off that line, you're out of luck.
Click to expand...

Back when I used to use qedit regularly most programs had no undo feature. You learned good programming habits such as commenting out blocks of code and testing before you deleted it and also to do regular saves.
 
DaveL said:
I called that "inline version control"! :p
Click to expand...

QEdit interface looks like Turbo Pascal 5.0 IDE to me. I hate that "Restore Line" feature - it is useless once the cursor moves out of the line.

As for commenting out unused codes, I usually don't do that unless it's only for 1-2 lines for testing purposes.

I tried Semware Editor Pro and Aurora but apparently there's no option to add a custom menu, only for recording macros to automate the editors.
 
mdanh2002 said:
I tried Semware Editor Pro and Aurora but apparently there's no option to add a custom menu, only for recording macros to automate the editors.
Click to expand...

there is. its in the macro scripts. you have to actually write it. take a look at mac\compile.s in semware edit thats its invoke editor and parse errors script,
 
If it's simple you're after, you might also consider Dave Dunfield's DDSIDE that he supplied with his Micro-C package. Just don't expect too many bells and whistles.
I don't believe he supplied source code for it, but it wouldn't take much effort to reproduce - using the included Windowing library.
Then you could customize it exactly to your needs.
 
David_M said:
You learned good programming habits such as commenting out blocks of code and testing before you deleted it and also to do regular saves.
Click to expand...

Or impromptu version control, such as PROG01, PROG02, PROG03, etc.

The OP might be able to find something by searching shareware archives for "Programmer's editor", although these were typically commercial products, such as Brief, or Lugaru's Epsilon.
 
How about Pearl?


Pearl: Programmer's Editor
Pearl is a programmer's text
editor with full editable
macros, full search and
replace functions, search for
matching bracket compile,
and run facilities.
Pearl is language independant.
Supports user-definable fonts
giving a choice of display lines
between 25 and 50 depending upon
monitor.
 
I use "MS-DOS Editor" (edit.com) that comes right along with DOS. Always have, always will. I even use it to hand-code my websites, making sure to include its name in the "generator" tag of the HTML. ;)
 
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