Editing Files

On this page:

External Editor, Opening a File, Short EDIT Commands, Creating a File, List of Files.

External Editor

You can view and edit any of Hypatia's files with any text editor of your choice, they are all in plain text format.

Hypatia's EDIT command lets you open or create a file with the help of an external editor.

By default, this editor is notepad.exe which is included with Windows.

If you prefer to use a different editor, you can change it with the EXTEDITOR command.

If the folder with the editor you want to use is included in the system path, you only have to give its name:

EXTEDITOR myeditor.exe

If it is not included, you have to include the full path:

EXTEDITOR c:\...\...\myeditor.exe

In this path, spaces are permitted!

If you want to make your choice permanent, you have to add the line EXTEDITOR ... to the file hy.ini.

Note that the EDIT command is only for your convenience, you can always open all of Hypatia's files with any text editor.

EDIT filename opens the specified file in the external editor, where you can view or edit it.

If file name has an extension, you have to include it. By default, no extension is assumed.

If the files does not exist, you will be asked whether you want to create it (see "Creating a File" below).

It is safe to edit Hypatia's files, if you know what you are doing.

Close the file in the editor or close the editor before you continue to work with Hypatia! (It depends on the editor what happens if you don't.)

EDIT without a file name opens the result file hy.

EDIN opens the recent input line file hyin, if it has already been created.

EDINI opens the configuration file hy.ini.

EDLOG opens the log file hy.log, if it has already been created.

EDNOTES gives you quick access to a file notes.txt which you can use for your own notes. If the file does not already exist, you can create it.

We will talk about all this later, but files that you can create can be script files, data files, or "insert files".

EDIT filename lets you create a new file in Hypatia's program folder, if the file with the specified name does not already exist.

Hypatia will respond with:

File ... does not exist. Create? (Y/N or Enter/Esc)

Press the Y or ENTER key to create the file and open it in the external editor, or press the N or ESC key to abort.

File names can not contain spaces. All file names will be written in lower case characters.

No file extension is assumed. If you want your file to have one, you need to include it with the file name.

Technical note: Hypatia creates the file before it calls the external editor to open it.

List of Files

The command FILES shows a list of all files in Hypatia's program folder.

Hypatia's own files hy.exe, hy.ini, hy, hyin, hy.log and also notes.txt are shown first, the rest in alphabetical order.

From within Hypatia you can create and edit files, but not delete or rename them.