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How would you recommend someone to get started learning about the architecture of Text editors / word processors? I think Monaco from vscode is probably an int

by aloer 5y ago

How would you recommend someone to get started learning about the architecture of Text editors / word processors? I think Monaco from vscode is probably an interesting read but I’ve never looked at such a big open source code base before. Is there something you can recommend to understand better how it works architecturally?

snewman 5y ago
I'd love to have a good answer for you, but I learned the basics all the way back in the '80s. Seems like I've seen references posted occasionally on HN, hopefully someone has a good link.
411111111111111 5y ago
There were a few really interesting blog posts about the architecture choices for the xi editor a few years ago, ending with this https://raphlinus.github.io/xi/2020/06/27/xi-retrospective.html https://raphlinus.github.io/xi/2020/06/27/xi-retrospective.h... But I personally never worked on this kind of problem, I just remember reading these over the years
jkaptur 5y ago
I recommend reading about the internals of CodeMirror and ProseMirror: e.g. https://codemirror.net/1/story.html https://codemirror.net/1/story.html.
imron 5y ago
Here’s a blog post detailing some vscode internals: https://code.visualstudio.com/blogs/2018/03/23/text-buffer-reimplementation https://code.visualstudio.com/blogs/2018/03/23/text-buffer-r...
slmjkdbtl 5y ago
I don't think there's any way better than build a text editor from scratch, you have to understand the exact problem before reading other people's solutions.
sanxiyn 5y ago
There is no substitute to building one yourself, but The Craft of Text Editing book has a lot of accumulated wisdom. It is Emacs-centric, but basics are same. http://www.finseth.com/craft/ http://www.finseth.com/craft/
- rossjudson 5y ago
  One of my first programming projects as a teenager back in terminal-type days was to write my own text editor for the Atari ST. I was super happy with it, and sold three (3) copies of it! That made me very happy at the time. Of course there was that time that I messed with the save/load code and destroyed the text files of one of my customers. Not so happy with that! Saved it by writing a fix system, and that actually led to being hired at that guy's company for my first "real" job. ;)
  - MaanuAir 5y ago
    Former ST user here: out of curiosity, what was that text editor and company?
    - rossjudson 5y ago
      Ahahaha! You said company. ;) It was just me, a teenage kid, selling to people who came through the store I worked at selling computers (the store sold the Atari line). I called it DEdit, because every programmer wants to grab a single letter title.
hnrodey 5y ago
Might this be helpful? I recall seeing this on HN awhile back.

by aloer 5y ago

snewman 5y ago

I'd love to have a good answer for you, but I learned the basics all the way back in the '80s. Seems like I've seen references posted occasionally on HN, hopefully someone has a good link.

411111111111111 5y ago

There were a few really interesting blog posts about the architecture choices for the xi editor a few years ago, ending with this https://raphlinus.github.io/xi/2020/06/27/xi-retrospective.html https://raphlinus.github.io/xi/2020/06/27/xi-retrospective.h... But I personally never worked on this kind of problem, I just remember reading these over the years

jkaptur 5y ago

I recommend reading about the internals of CodeMirror and ProseMirror: e.g. https://codemirror.net/1/story.html https://codemirror.net/1/story.html.

imron 5y ago

Here’s a blog post detailing some vscode internals: https://code.visualstudio.com/blogs/2018/03/23/text-buffer-reimplementation https://code.visualstudio.com/blogs/2018/03/23/text-buffer-r...

slmjkdbtl 5y ago

I don't think there's any way better than build a text editor from scratch, you have to understand the exact problem before reading other people's solutions.

sanxiyn 5y ago

There is no substitute to building one yourself, but The Craft of Text Editing book has a lot of accumulated wisdom. It is Emacs-centric, but basics are same. http://www.finseth.com/craft/ http://www.finseth.com/craft/

rossjudson 5y ago
One of my first programming projects as a teenager back in terminal-type days was to write my own text editor for the Atari ST. I was super happy with it, and sold three (3) copies of it! That made me very happy at the time. Of course there was that time that I messed with the save/load code and destroyed the text files of one of my customers. Not so happy with that! Saved it by writing a fix system, and that actually led to being hired at that guy's company for my first "real" job. ;)
- MaanuAir 5y ago
  Former ST user here: out of curiosity, what was that text editor and company?
  - rossjudson 5y ago
    Ahahaha! You said company. ;) It was just me, a teenage kid, selling to people who came through the store I worked at selling computers (the store sold the Atari line). I called it DEdit, because every programmer wants to grab a single letter title.

hnrodey 5y ago

Might this be helpful? I recall seeing this on HN awhile back.