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From: jones@pyrite.cs.uiowa.edu (Douglas W. Jones,201H
MLH,3193350740,3193382879)
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.computers,comp.lang.misc
Subject: Re: Announcing the Bad Languages page
Date: 30 Apr 1997 16:13:25 GMT
Organization: The University of Iowa
Lines: 76
Message-ID: <5k7r35$jlu@flood.weeg.uiowa.edu>
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Xref: delphi.bc.edu alt.folklore.computers:149880 comp.lang.misc:26848

From article ,
by connorbd@cleo.bc.edu (Brian Connors):

> Wondering if there's anything out there worse than Ada? Tired of
> Obfuscated C? Are you bored with traditional, usable programming
> languages?

I once wrote a text editor (for Modcomp computers) that was vaguely
based
on QED, the ancestor of Unix ED, but terser and probably
Turing-complete.

From memory, here is the language.

pattern matching wildcards
        *       - match any number of repeats of the previous character
        .       - match any character
        ^       - match the null character at start of line
        $       - match the null character at end of line

line specifiers
        .       - the current line
        nnn     - make line nnn the current line
        +nnn    - advance nnn lines
        -nnn    - go back nnn lines
        /pat/   - the next line containing pat, a search pattern
        //      - the next line containing most recently used pattern
        \pat\   - the next line backwards containing pat
        \\      - the next line back containing most recently used
pattern

simple commands
        
                - make the indicated line the current line
        i       - enter insert mode (put text before current line)
        a       - enter append mode (put text after current line)
        s/pat/text/
                - substitute text for pattern on the current line once
only
        d       - delete the current line
        d
                - delete the current to the specified line
        p       - print the current line
        p
                - print the current to the specified line
        c       - save the current line in the copy buffer
        c
                - save the current to the specified line in copy buffer
        ic      - insert the copy buffer before the current line
        ac      - insert the copy buffer after the current line
        j       - join current line to next line

compound commands
        g( ... )
                - repeat indicated commands (exit loop if body makes no
edit)
        x       - exit enclosing g
        x
                - exit enclosing g if pattern matches current line
        r       - restart enclosing g (not really useful)
        r
                - restart enclosing g if pattern matches current line

Here's a little exercise that can generate interesting wallpaper:

    g(cicpg(s/x /xX/)g(s/
x/Xx/)g(s/xxx/x_x/)g(s/_xx/__x/)g(s/X/x/)g(s/_/ /))

Apply the above to a line containing this text (vertical bars, spaces
and
tabs all included), and show the output:

        |            x                          x  x |

I should note that I wrote version one of this editor in FORTRAN IV
using
punched cards in the spring or summer of 1974, and that I subsequently
used it to write the software on which my MS thesis was based, and also
to write my MS thesis.  Many others have used it around the MODCOMP
community, but I have no idea if the source code or any documentation
still exists.

                                        Doug Jones
                                        jones@cs.uiowa.edu