Copyright © 2004 Marc Kerbiquet
Abstract
Code Browser is a folding and outlining editor for Linux and Windows.Table of Contents
List of Tables
Table of Contents
Code Browser is a text editor that allows you to structure your source code like an hyper-text document: the source code can be cut into pages independently of the file structure. A page can be referenced using links or can be nested into another page. It gives a better visibilty on large projects and makes navigation easier.
For a quick start, open samples/tutorial.c with the application.
The application supports two independent features:
A loaded file can be displayed in zero, one or more windows.
Usually, a text editor has only one window per file. When you want to open a file that is already opened, it just brings its window to front. With Code Browser, a file is loaded only once but several windows can be opened on it.
The command from the menu opens a file in a new window. If this file is already loaded, it is not reloaded.
The command from the menu shows all loaded files and allows to open or re-open a file in a new window.
Use the command from the menu to close the active window. This command does not unload any file. That's why it never asks for save confirmation. Confirmations occur only when exiting.
Use the command from the menu to create an exact copy of the active window: the new window will have the same layouts that display the same folders in panes.
A file can be reloaded when it is modified by another application. The reload.mode in options can change the behavior when an external file change is detected:
Sometimes some windows could unexpectedly disapear while reloading. But don't worry, the file has been reloaded and you can re-open a window on it with the command from the menu. It happens only with windows displaying sub-folders and where changes occured on a parent folder.
A folder is a group of lines collapsed into one single line. A folder can include sub-folders. By default, folder lines are displayed in blue. Folders can be used only with a language having a comment directive.
The command from the menu opens the folder creation dialog. Enter a name and an identifier. Use \t to put tabs in the name. The identifier is needed only if you want to reference this folder (i.e. creating a link to it).
Any text selected before is moved into the newly created folder. This feature helps to structure an existing flat file.
When the caret is on a folder, you can use the command from the menu to modify its name and identifier.
The command is also available from the contextual menu.
When the caret is on a folder, you can use the command (ALT-Right) from the menu to edit its content.
This command is also available by double-clicking on the line.
A link is a reference to a folder either in the same file or in an other file. This concept is similar to links in HTML documents. It can be useful to add links to related items (related functions, definitions of classes, ...).
A link is similar to a folder: the command follows the link instead of opening a folder. Properties are edited in the same way.
By default, link lines are displayed in green.
The syntax for the path is:
<filename>[#<folder-path>]
Where <filename> is the filename with path relative to the current file. The path separators are '/' even on Windows platform, not '\' in order to have platform independent files. <folder-path> is optional, it is the path in the file to reach the target folder. The path separators are also '/' between folders.
Each window can show one or more panes: each one displays the content of the folder or link selected by its predecessor. The layout of the active window can be changed using the menu.
There is 3 classes of layouts.
Can be arranged horizontally or vertically. The second pane displays a preview of the line selected by the first pane.
This is more complex layouts, there is several 'list' panes arranged in a row or a column and a 'text' pane at the bottom or the right.
A folder is displayed in a list pane if it contains only links, sub-folders and comments but no text, otherwise it is displayed in the text pane.
Display one folder and a tree view of the file. Sub-folders can be reached directly with this tree. Links are also expanded in the tree.
The layout can be customized for each configuration. So it is possible to open a file in a new window with a layout depending on the file type. There is two attributes in the general section of preferences: 'layout' and 'tree.view'. These attributes can be overridden for each configuration. See the user-preferences file for more information.
There is an unlimited undo stack for each loaded file.
You must be careful since a window can display several files and several windows can display the same file: may cancel a change made in another window if the focus is in the wrong pane. Anyway an operation can always be undone with the command.
Code Browser has two types of search: iterative-find and find-all. Find-all searches all occurrences of a string and displays a list of links to matching lines. The two modes does not support same features:
Table of Contents
The editor uses two configuration files:
For each configuration file, the program first searches in the program folder, then in the home folder.
Use the command from the menu to edit the preferences.
If there is no preference file in the home folder, the file is loaded from the program folder and is immediately renamed with the home folder, so it will be saved to the right location. If the directory does not exist, it will be created automatically.
An edit scheme allows to customize auto indentation, tabulations and word wrapping.
Each edit scheme is defined as follow:
def name auto.indentation = (true|false) expand.tabulation = (true|false) tabulation.size = size word.wrap = (true|false) end
Customized tools can be launched from the 'Tools' menu. To add new tools, edit the 'tools' section from the options. Each tool is defined as follow:
def name caption = caption command = command name arguments = list of arguments directory = initial directory save.all = (true|false) show.window = (true|false) end
The name identifies the tool but it is not used yet.
Table 2.1. Variables in Arguments
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| FilePath | The full name of the current file |
| FileDir | The directory of the current file |
| FileName | The filename without directory and without extension |
| FileNameExt | The filename with extension but without directory |
| CurText | The current selection or the word under the caret. This value will be empty if the selection contains new lines. |
When a tool is run, its output is parsed. If a line is recognized as an error or warning message, it will appear in the output window as a link. The editor recognizes two syntaxes:
filename:line:message filename(line):message
If the file is not an absolute path, the directory specified in tool is used. If there is no directory specified, the current working directory of the editor is used instead.
If you want to edit the language file, either copy languages.cb-config in your home folder, or backup it before re-installing a new version.
Table 2.2. Attributes for a Language Definition
| Name | Description |
|---|---|
| colorizer |
The name of the colorizer function.
It can be one of:
Only the generic colorize function uses all of the following attributes. |
| line.comment | The beginning of a comment line. This attribute is used for folding as well as for colorization. |
| line.comment.2 | The beginning of an alternative comment line. This attribute is used for colorization only. |
| open.comment | The beginning of a comment block. This attribute is used for folding as well as for colorization. |
| close.comment | The end of a comment block |
| open.comment.2 | The beginning of an alternative comment block |
| close.comment.2 | The end of an alternative comment block |
| preprocessor | The preprocessor characters (e.g. '#') |
| hexa.prefix | The hexadecimal prefix (e.g. '0x') |
| string.delimiter | The delimiter character for strings |
| string.escape.char | The escape character inside strings |
| regex.delimiter | The delimiter character for regex (e.g. '/' in Ruby) |
| regex.escape.char | The escape character inside a regex (e.g. '\' in Ruby) |
| char.delimiter | The delimiter character for characters |
| char.escape.char | The escape character inside characters |
| char.prefix | The prefix character for chars (e.g. '$' in Smalltalk) |
| escape.char | The escape character |
| ignore.case | 'true' if keywords are not case sensitive |
| words.1 | First class of words |
| words.2 | Second class of words |
| words.3 | Third class of words |
| words.4 | Fourth class of words |
| chars.1 | First class of chars |
| chars.2 | Second class of chars |
| chars.3 | Third class of chars |
| chars.4 | Fourth class of chars |
Table of Contents
This is a various collection of tips to better use the potential of the program.
There is no bookmark, but you can use an alternate window to remember a position:
Code Browser does not handle projects, but it is easy to create a file to access all files of a project: just create a file project.cbi and then add links to the source files.