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good text editor for DOS
- Thread starter mdanh2002
- Start date
Thanks. Let me try it out.
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.
One of the good things about MS-DOS editor is that it handles both Windows and Linux line breaks just fine. Too bad Microsoft never updates it to support long file names and removes it in 64-bit of Windows.
I still can't get used to Vim and Emacs. Too counter-intuitive for me - it's easy to get confused between command mode and edit mode. On Linux/Unix, my favorite editor is still Nano
If there's a need to make complicated changes, I download the file to my computer, edit using a modern GUI editor, and upload it back 
kgober
Veteran Member
I still can't get used to Vim and Emacs. Too counter-intuitive for me - it's easy to get confused between command mode and edit mode. On Linux/Unix, my favorite editor is still Nano
vi and emacs make more sense when you use them on a terminal that has no function keys, no cursor movement keys, and no numeric keypad. Try to imagine making an editor for a video terminal that has only typewriter keys plus an Enter key, a Control key and an Escape key. Those are the design constraints that vi and emacs had to work within.
DeathAdderSF
Experienced Member
I use vDosPlus on my 64-bit Windows to run MS-DOS Editor. It's more convenient than using DOSBox.
Stone
10k Member
I agree that it's very nice and has a much better default font than DOSBox but I don't see it being any more convenient. I use ProGammaX as a DOSBox frontend and it makes everything a one click operation which is about convenient as it gets.
8008guy
Veteran Member
vi
Saves me frm the pain of too much thnkng.
Saves me frm the pain of too much thnkng.
bttr
Member
Just in case: "The SemWare® Editor is now freeware." So one can download the 1997 DOS version 2.50e for free.
Also available are (free) versions for Windows and Linux.
Interesting, I’ve never heard of SemWare. Looks like it was a nice text-only editor.
- Alex
- Alex
Agent Orange
Veteran Member
PC Tools is pretty good.
PC Tools 4.x
PC Tools, from Central Point Software, is a system and disk utility suite similar to the Norton Utilities. Central Point also produced a similar set of tools for the Apple Macintosh known as MacTools. Central Point Backup, bundled as part of PC-Tools, was also offered as a standalone product.
winworldpc.com
Nice, thanks! Our family used its predecessor QEdit (or Q.EXE as I think of it) as our primary text editor when we first got a PC, but once we got MS-DOS 5 I think I just started using its EDIT because I was familiar with it from using QuickBASIC. I didn't use much of QEdit's power but it seems like it could do a lot for something that was only around 50KB in size!
I used lots of other parts of PC Tools, but I don't know that I ever used its editor. Would I be correct in guessing that it wasn't very powerful, but it was easy to use?
Twospruces
Veteran Member
I expected to see Norton Edit in the list, but I guess I will recommend.
rlauzon
Experienced Member
I used Edwin a lot back in the 2-disk-drive days. I liked it because it used the Turbo Pascal-like commands (Wordstar?) that I was familiar with and it was small and fast.
Today, for my MS-DOS machines, I use Norton Edit.
Today, for my MS-DOS machines, I use Norton Edit.
Chuck(G)
25k Member
There's also the Joe editor for DOS. It's available in many OS flavors. I don't know what the minimum practical system configuration is, but I do use it on DOS, Win32 and Linux.