Viewing and Editing Files

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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, all the files are 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 that you want to use is included in the system path, you only have to give the editor's file name:

EXTEDITOR myeditor.exe

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

EXTEDITOR C:\...\...\myeditor.exe

In this path, spaces are permitted!

If you want to make your choice permanent, 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.

 

Opening a File

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

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

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

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

 

If you have opened a file that Hypatia writes to, close the file in the editor or close the editor before you continue working with Hypatia!

Files that Hypatia only reads (for instance script files) can remain open, but you always have to close the editor before you exit Hypatia.

 

Short EDIT Commands

EDIT without a file name opens the result file hy (same as EDIT hy).

EDIN opens the recent input line file hyin, if it has already been created (same as EDIT hyin).

EDINI opens the configuration file hy.ini (same as EDIT hy.ini).

EDLOG opens the log file hy.log, if it has already been created (same as EDIT hy.log).

 

EDNOTES opens the file notes.txt which you can use for your own notes (same as EDIT notes.txt). If the file does not already exist, you can create it.

 

Creating a File

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, cannot contain the characters: ? * ( ) \ / | < > and must not begin with $ or @.

File names will be converted to 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, edit and (using "Save As" in the editor) copy files, but not delete or rename them.

 

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