4 ms·

Geniunely curious, how projects like these get approved in an org at the scale of Microsoft? Is this like a side project by some devs or part of some product ro

Geniunely curious, how projects like these get approved in an org at the scale of Microsoft? Is this like a side project by some devs or part of some product roadmap? How did they convince the leadership to spend time on this?

dark-star 1y ago
As they explained, they needed a text editor that works in a command line (for Windows Core server installs), works across SSH (because for a while now Windows included an SSH Server so you can completely manage it through SSH), and can be used by non-vi-experienced Windows administrators (i.e. a modeless editor).
- llarsson 1y ago
  Telling people to use nano would of course have been next to impossible. Much easier to rewrite a DOS-era editor in Rust, naturally.
  - dark-star 1y ago
    does nano support mouse usage? It doesn't seem to work for me (but maybe it just needs to be enabled somewhere) I guess they thought that inheriting 25 years of C code was more trouble than designing a new editor from scratch. But you'd have to ask the devs why they decided to go down that route
    - Elfener 1y ago
      > does nano support mouse usage? Yes, but you have to put `set mouse` into your nanorc.
  - red_admiral 1y ago
    This way gets coolness points, HN headlines, makes the programmers who wrote it happy, and probably is a contribution to making a couple of autistic people feel included. Rust + EDITOR.COM is kind of like remaking/remastering an old video game.
  - oersted 1y ago
    micro would have been an even better choice, the UX is impressively close to something like Sublime Text for a TUI, and very comfortable for those not used to modal editors.
    - aembleton 1y ago
      This is the first time I've heard of micro. More info here: https://micro-editor.github.io/ https://micro-editor.github.io/
    - subjectsigma 1y ago
      I like micro and use it occasionally. I like this even more. I booted up the editor and instantly thought “it would be nice if there was a clickable buffer list right about…” and then realized my mouse was hovering over it. My next instant thought was that micro should have implemented this feature a long time ago
    - mixmastamyk 1y ago
      It doesn’t have a menu for windows devs, and is supposed to be small and light. Two strikes against.
  - nmeofthestate 1y ago
    nano's great but the shortcuts are a bit oddball, from the perspective of a Windows guy.
  - Kwpolska 1y ago
    > rewrite This is not a rewrite. Maybe it’s slightly inspired by the old thing, especially with having GUI-style clickable menus (something not seen often in terminal editors), but it’s much more modern.
    - dark-star 1y ago
      I still see it as rewrite even if you only use the original as inspiration. But that's just semantics
      - dmd 1y ago
        If they hadn’t called it “edit” you wouldn’t have thought of it as a rewrite.
      - TiredOfLife 1y ago
        It's no semantics. It's just a lie
    - Gormo 1y ago
      It does seem "modern" in the sense that it is incredibly limited in functionality (EDIT.COM from DOS is much more full-featured) and deviates from well-established UI conventions. CUA-style menubars aren't that uncommon in textmode editors. Midnight Commander's editor has traditional menubars with much more extensive functionality, as does jedsoft.org's Jed editor. Both of these also support mouse input on the TTY console via GPM, not just within a graphical terminal.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - JdeBP 1y ago
    The developer actually explained, on Hacker News just over a month ago, some of the engineering choices that ruled out nano. * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44034961 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44034961
zamalek 1y ago
A text editor is an obvious target for copilot integration.
sublimefire 1y ago
Each group needs to do something and they come up with the ideas. Sometimes it is driven by various leaders, e.g. “use copilot”. Sometimes it is an idea from some hackerdayz event which gets expanded. Sometimes this is driven in research units where you have a bunch of technical people twiddling their thumbs. Sometimes this is an idea that goes through deep analysis and multiple semesters before it gets funding. Look at the amount of contributors here. This project was probably some strategic investment. It did not come to existence overnight.

dark-star 1y ago

As they explained, they needed a text editor that works in a command line (for Windows Core server installs), works across SSH (because for a while now Windows included an SSH Server so you can completely manage it through SSH), and can be used by non-vi-experienced Windows administrators (i.e. a modeless editor).

llarsson 1y ago
Telling people to use nano would of course have been next to impossible. Much easier to rewrite a DOS-era editor in Rust, naturally.
- dark-star 1y ago
  does nano support mouse usage? It doesn't seem to work for me (but maybe it just needs to be enabled somewhere) I guess they thought that inheriting 25 years of C code was more trouble than designing a new editor from scratch. But you'd have to ask the devs why they decided to go down that route
  - Elfener 1y ago
    > does nano support mouse usage? Yes, but you have to put `set mouse` into your nanorc.
- red_admiral 1y ago
  This way gets coolness points, HN headlines, makes the programmers who wrote it happy, and probably is a contribution to making a couple of autistic people feel included. Rust + EDITOR.COM is kind of like remaking/remastering an old video game.
- oersted 1y ago
  micro would have been an even better choice, the UX is impressively close to something like Sublime Text for a TUI, and very comfortable for those not used to modal editors.
  - aembleton 1y ago
    This is the first time I've heard of micro. More info here: https://micro-editor.github.io/ https://micro-editor.github.io/
  - subjectsigma 1y ago
    I like micro and use it occasionally. I like this even more. I booted up the editor and instantly thought “it would be nice if there was a clickable buffer list right about…” and then realized my mouse was hovering over it. My next instant thought was that micro should have implemented this feature a long time ago
  - mixmastamyk 1y ago
    It doesn’t have a menu for windows devs, and is supposed to be small and light. Two strikes against.
- nmeofthestate 1y ago
  nano's great but the shortcuts are a bit oddball, from the perspective of a Windows guy.
- Kwpolska 1y ago
  > rewrite This is not a rewrite. Maybe it’s slightly inspired by the old thing, especially with having GUI-style clickable menus (something not seen often in terminal editors), but it’s much more modern.
  - dark-star 1y ago
    I still see it as rewrite even if you only use the original as inspiration. But that's just semantics
    - dmd 1y ago
      If they hadn’t called it “edit” you wouldn’t have thought of it as a rewrite.
    - TiredOfLife 1y ago
      It's no semantics. It's just a lie
  - Gormo 1y ago
    It does seem "modern" in the sense that it is incredibly limited in functionality (EDIT.COM from DOS is much more full-featured) and deviates from well-established UI conventions. CUA-style menubars aren't that uncommon in textmode editors. Midnight Commander's editor has traditional menubars with much more extensive functionality, as does jedsoft.org's Jed editor. Both of these also support mouse input on the TTY console via GPM, not just within a graphical terminal.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- JdeBP 1y ago
  The developer actually explained, on Hacker News just over a month ago, some of the engineering choices that ruled out nano. * https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44034961 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44034961

zamalek 1y ago

A text editor is an obvious target for copilot integration.

sublimefire 1y ago

Each group needs to do something and they come up with the ideas. Sometimes it is driven by various leaders, e.g. “use copilot”. Sometimes it is an idea from some hackerdayz event which gets expanded. Sometimes this is driven in research units where you have a bunch of technical people twiddling their thumbs. Sometimes this is an idea that goes through deep analysis and multiple semesters before it gets funding. Look at the amount of contributors here. This project was probably some strategic investment. It did not come to existence overnight.