Hi,

I have used ed in such cases and it did the job. I agree that it is useful
to know this fundamental editor. By the way, it is inacurate to call it
'very simplistic' as the "Editing files unde NetBSD" section does.

Is there an introduction to ed or a 'guide to using ed in an emergency'
that lists the basics. The man page has a lot more information that needed
in such cases.

If there was such a document, it would fit well in miscellaneous
documentation section of the web server where there is a reference to the
ed man page. It might also be useful along side installation documents.

On Fri, 10 Aug 2001, Robert Elz wrote:
> Actually, if "at the mercy of vi" is the correct description (which it
> is for some users), then "at the mercy of /bin/ed" would be better.
> Ed is more merciful (in some sense) than vi is ... how to make a simple
> correction (like deleting the last line and re-typing it) is easy to
> explain to anyone.

> Everyone should get familiar with ed anyway, it is a nice editor, easy
> to use, and the basis of most of the rest of unix tools (everything from
> grep, sed, vi, ... is built from concepts from ed).

-- 
Claude Marinier, Information Technology Group    claude.marinier@dreo.dnd.ca
Defence Research Establishment Ottawa (DREO)    (613) 998-4901  FAX 998-2675
3701 Carling Avenue, Ottawa, Ontario  K1A 0Z4         http://www.dreo.dnd.ca