Editor Command Summary
Inserts text after the specified line.
Text is inserted until a line containing
only a full stop and a newline is encountered.
If the command is followed immediately by a colon,
then whatever text follows the colon is inserted without entering
“append” mode.
The current line pointer is left at the last line inserted.
Deletes the lines specified and inserts text to replace them.
Text is inserted until a line containing only a full stop and a
newline is encountered.
If the command is followed immediately by a colon, then
whatever text follows the colon is inserted without entering
“append” mode.
The current line pointer is left at the last line inserted.
Deletes all lines between the specified lines, inclusive.
The current line pointer is, by default, left at the line
after the last one deleted.
See the ‘od’ option for a full description.
See also the ‘u’ command for information on how to
undo a deletion.
| none | e[x][!] [!][file] | Enter |
Loads the specified file into the buffer and prepares for editing.
Automatically invoked if a filename is specified as an argument
on the command line used to invoke the editor.
The current line pointer is positioned at the first line in the buffer.
An error message is generated if the editing buffer contains text
that has not been saved.
The enter command may be resubmitted after the error message, in which
case it will be obeyed.
The “enter now” command ‘e!’ may be used
to avoid the error message.
If the file being read in contains <TAB> characters,
se
will normally treat them as “unprintable”, and they will
not appear as expected.
In order to expand <TAB> characters into the correct number of spaces,
use the ‘ex’ command.
Alternatively, see the discussion of the ‘ox’ option.
If the filename begins with a ‘!’, it is
assumed to be a Shell command.
The command's Standard Output is read into the buffer.
Print or change the remembered file name.
If a name is given, the remembered file name is set to that value;
otherwise, the remembered file name is redisplayed.
| 1,$ | g/pat/command | Global on pattern |
Performs the given command on all lines in the specified range that
match the given pattern.
Provides access to online documentation on the Screen Editor.
“Stuff” represents the name of the topic on which
help is required.
Typing ‘h’ alone will display the initial help directory;
from there it is possible to locate the topic of interest.
Inserts text before the specified line.
Text is inserted until a line containing only a
full stop and a newline is encountered.
If the command is immediately followed by a colon, then whatever
text follows is inserted without entering “append” mode.
The current line pointer is left at the last line inserted.
The specified lines are joined into a single line.
You may specify in “stuff” what is to replace the newlines that
previously separated the lines.
The default is a single blank.
Thus ‘j’ is equivalent to ‘j/ /’.
In general,
se
will supply trailing delimiters for you.
So ‘j/’ is the same as ‘j//’,
i.e. replace the newline(s) with nothing (delete them).
The specified lines are marked with 'm' which
may be any single character other than a newline. If 'm' is not
present, the lines are marked with the default name of blank.
The current line pointer is never changed.
The name of the current machine
is displayed on the status line.
This is so that one can tell what machine he is using from
within the editor.
This is particularly useful for installations with many
machines that can run the editor, where the user can switch
back and forth between them, and become confused as to where
he is at a given moment.
In fact, it is even more useful when a windowing system such as
X-Windows is being used, because several
se
screens are usually visible, all running on different hosts.
Moves the specified block of lines after <line>.
<Line> may not be omitted.
The current line pointer is left at the last line moved.
If ‘m’ is present, the last line in the
specified range is marked with it and all other lines having that
mark name are given the default mark name of blank.
If ‘m’ is not present,
the names of all lines in the range are cleared.
Editing options may be queried or set.
“Stuff” determines which options are affected.
See the
se
options reference section.
As much as possible of the range is displayed, always
including the last line; if no range is given, the previous
page is displayed.
The current line pointer is left at the last line in the range.
Exit from the editor.
An error message is generated if the editing buffer contains text
that has not been saved.
The quit command may be resubmitted after the error message, in which
case it will be obeyed.
The “quit now” command ‘q!’ may be used
to avoid the error message.
Insert the contents of the given file after the specified line.
The current line pointer is left at the last line read.
See the discussion of the ‘e’ command and the ‘ox’
option for information on <TAB> characters.
If the filename begins with a ‘!’, it is
assumed to be a Shell command.
The command's Standard Output is read into the buffer.
| .,. | s[/pat/sub[/][g]] | Substitute |
Substitutes ‘sub’ for each occurrence of the pattern ‘pat’.
If the optional ‘g’ is specified, all occurrences in
each line are changed; otherwise, only the first occurrence is changed.
The current line pointer is left at the last line in the
range in which a substitution was made.
The trailing slash may be omitted with no ill effect.
Thus ‘s/junk/stuff’ is entirely equivalent
to ‘s/junk/stuff/’.
If you type an ‘s’ by itself,
without a pattern and replacement string,
se
will behave as though you had typed
‘s//%/’,
i.e. substitute the previous replacement pattern
for the previous search pattern.
| .,. | y[/from/to[/]] | translYterate |
The range of characters specified by ‘from’ is
transliterated into the range of characters specified by ‘to’.
The last line in the range becomes the new current line.
Again, if you leave off the trailing delimiter,
se
will put it in for you.
In addition, like the ‘s’ command,
both the ‘from’ and ‘to’ parts are saved;
‘y//%/’
will perform the same transliteration as the last one, and
‘y’
is the same as
‘y//%/’.
The
‘%’
is special if it is the only character in the ‘to’ part,
otherwise it is treated as a literal
‘%’.
The specified range of lines is replaced by
the last range of lines deleted.
If the ‘d’ is used,
the restored text is inserted after the last line in the specified range.
The current line pointer is set at the last line that was restored.
“Overlay mode” is entered and the control characters may
be used to modify text anywhere in the buffer.
A control-V may be used to quit overlay mode.
A control-F may be used to restore the current line to its
original state and terminate the command.
See the
se
control character reference for a full description of
cursor-key editing in “overlay mode”.
| 1,$ | w[!][>|+][q] [!][file] | Write |
Writes the portion of the buffer specified to the named file.
The current line pointer is not changed.
If ‘+’ or ‘>’ are given,
the portion of the buffer is appended to the file;
otherwise the portion of the buffer replaces the file.
If ‘!’ is present, an existing file specified
in the command is overwritten without comment.
If ‘filename’ is not present, the specified lines will be
written to the current file name as shown on the status line.
If the ‘q’ is present,
se
quits immediately after writing the file (unless the write failed).
This is a convenient shorthand.
If the filename begins with a ‘!’, it
is assumed to be a Shell command.
The contents of the buffer are piped into the command's
Standard Input.
| 1,$ | x/pat/command | eXclude on pattern |
Performs the command on all lines in the given range that do not match
the specified pattern.
Contrast with the ‘g’ command.
Makes a copy of all the lines in the
given range, and inserts the copies after <line>.
As with the ‘m’ command, <line> may not be omitted.
The current line pointer is set to the new copy of the last
line in the range.
| .,. | zb<left>[,<right>][<char>] | draw Box |
A box is drawn using the given <char>
(blank by default, allowing erasure of a previously-drawn box).
Line numbers are used to specify top and bottom row positions of the box.
<Left> and <right> specify left and right column positions of the box.
If second line number is omitted, the box degenerates to a horizontal
line.
If right-hand column is omitted, the box degenerates to a vertical line.
The version number of
se
is displayed on the status line,
together with the type of video driver, the operating system,
the pattern-matching characters (SWT or VI) and the type of
buffer organisation.
This information is often useful when reporting problems with
se.
The number of the specified line is displayed on the status line.
The current line pointer is not changed.
| 1,$ | ~mcommand | Exclude on markname |
Similar to the ‘x’ prefix except that ‘command’
is performed for all lines in the range that do not have the
mark name ‘m’.
| 1,$ | 'mcommand | Global on markname |
Similar to the ‘g’ prefix except that ‘command’
is performed for all lines in the range that have the
mark name ‘m’.
The next screenful of the buffer is displayed and the current line
pointer is placed at the top of the window.
| none | ![!|<Shell_command>] | Shell Escape |
If present, the shell command is passed to the shell to
be executed.
Otherwise, an interactive shell is created.
For a command,
se
asks you to type a newline before redrawing the screen,
but for an interactive shell,
se
will redraw the screen immediately.
If the shell command is a ‘!’,
then the ‘!’ is replaced with the text of the
previous shell command.
An unescaped ‘%’ in the shell command
will be replaced with the current saved file name.
If the shell command is expanded,
se
will echo it first, and then execute it.
The
se
editor only accepts commands in upper case when absolute
line numbers are turned on.
This is because upper case letters are used
to represent lines on the screen when in relative line number mode.