edit

edit is the text editor provided as an applet for psh, it can be used to quickly edit device configuration, remotely edit scripts (like Lua, Python, etc.) directly on the device with Phoenix-RTOS or simply to take notes.

Once edit command is entered at the psh prompt, hint message will be printed:

Usage: edit <file name>

To start editing a new file, enter file name as an absolute path or a path relative to the file or just its name. The file will be created after saving it with Ctrl+S or ^S. If the file already existed, it will be overwritten. E.g. if the config file already exists, executing the edit config command will start the text editor loading the config file content.

Editing

Just start writing. An asterisk (*) will appear on the status bar, right side, next to the Insert/Replace mode indicator when the file status becomes dirty. To delete a single letter in front of the cursor, use the Backspace key or to delete the character behind the cursor use the Delete key.

You may wish to delete rows one by one to do so use Ctrl+D key, instead of holding Backspace through long line - this feature becomes handy on 9600bps serial connections.

Cursor

psh text editor

When editing move the cursor with the arrow keys: Up, Down, Left and Right. Use Page Up and Page Down to scroll one terminal screen height. To reach the end of the current line, press End or Home to move the cursor to the beginning of the current line.

The current cursor position is shown on the right side of the status bar (for example, [18:8]), indicating the eighteenth row and eighth column.

Tabulator

By default, tab stop is set to 4 characters. To enter \t character press Tab key on your keyboard, the text will be adjusted using current tab stop setting.

Saving or exiting without saving

To exit the editor press Ctrl+Q (indicated as ^Q in the key description bar). When a file is in a dirty state, an appropriate warning will be displayed in the status/message bar when closing the editor to save the file or abandon the changes.

To save your work press Ctrl+S (or as indicated ^S) but if for some reason you decide to quit without saving, press Ctrl+C (or ^C) this will allow you to finish gracefully and abandon your edits.

Insert/replace mode

While editing the text, you can switch between the mode of replacing and inserting characters, to do this press the Insert key, the selected mode will be indicated on the right side of the status bar with the letter I or R.

Refresh screen

Sometimes it is necessary to completely redraw the entire screen of the text editor when the serial connection has been interrupted or disconnected and the editor has not been closed (remains running) or the size of the remote terminal has changed (using serial connections we are not aware of signals like SIGWINCH to automatically handle redraw and get the current dimensions of the remote terminal, you need a special query procedure) in such cases press Ctrl+L (or ^L) this will update the editor screen quickly.

See also

  1. Phoenix-RTOS shell
  2. Phoenix-RTOS Utilities
  3. Table of Contents