Linux: Making yourself a nice editor

You may have noticed that configuring your Linux system is largely a matter of editing various (plain text) files. The RedHat package contains configuration tools that provide an alternative way of doing this, but all the same you'll probably want to edit text files quite a lot, as you get to know the capabilities of your system.

To make life easier you'll want an editor that you're comfortable with, and for people coming to Linux from Windows I strongly recommend NEdit (free software from the folks at Fermi Lab): you'll find that most commands are where you expect them to be, the mouse does what you'd expect it to do, and so on (which is not always the case with more ``hard core'' unix-style editors such as emacs or vi). In addition it has many powerful features that you can discover (or not, as you please) over time.

Now, all X GUI programs (such as NEdit) rely upon some ``library'' of shared code (or ``widget set'') for their basic graphical elements (menus, dialog boxes, etc.). There are many such widget sets for X. NEdit uses the popular Motif libraries, which produce quite a pleasing appearance - but Motif is a commercial product, and quite expensive. Is this a problem? Not really, since an excellent open source clone of Motif is available, called Lesstif.

So here's the plan: If you follow the steps here you will

Download the source code for the Lesstif libraries and the Nedit editor from their respective home sites.
Compile and install the libraries, then compile and install the editor, dynamically linked against your shiny new libraries.
Get experience in some of the basic modes of working with free software, and end up with a very nice editor to play with.
Have the Lesstif libs installed, which means that you can compile further Motif-based apps, such as the very cool audio CD player, xmcd.

(Caveat: I don't know the RedHat CDROM, but it's quite likely that there are rpm's - RedHat pre-made packages - for Lesstif and/or NEdit on the CD, in which case you don't have to do this the ``hard way'' that I'm describing. But you'll learn more this way. And it's not really hard. Your choice.)

Developer tools

Still with me? Good. Then first check your prerequisites. Did you install the ``developer'' series of packages from the RedHat distro? You'll need those, to compile stuff. It's not the case that only people who are actually developing code need the ``developer'' tools; they are needed by anyone who is going to compile source code - and that is just about anyone who's running Linux and who has a modicum of intellectual curiosity. I think the Linux distributions could make this clearer to new users.

If you plan to follow through, it may not be a bad idea to print out this tutorial now.

Download and build Lesstif

Note: You need to be root in order to install software in ``public places'' on your system, as described below. Also note that ``[KEY]'' means press the key marked ``KEY'' - e.g. ``[Tab]'' means press the Tab key.

Now get on the net and point your browser at the Lesstif site. If you want to read about the Lesstif project, see their news and so on, go in the front door at www.lesstif.org. If you'd rather cut to the chase, go straight to the download area at ftp.hungry.com. Look for the latest stable release - as of this writing it was lesstif-0.88.9.tar.gz. You want to save this ``tarball'' to your hard drive. I suggest putting it in /usr/src, a common location for source code packages. (The Lesstif source package is 3133 Kb, but don't despair - if you have a 28.8kbps modem or better it won't take forever to download.)

Now get to the command prompt in an xterm, and issue this sequence of commands:

cd /usr/src
Comment: Change directory to where the package is.
ls -l
Comment: Get a long (``-l'') listing of the files there, to confirm that the package is really in place.
tar xvfz less[Tab]
Comment: Explode the package using the tar command. The ``x'' says to extract files, ``v'' says to be verbose (show what's happening), ``f'' says we're extracting from a file to be named shortly, and ``z'' says that the file is gzipped (compressed with the GNU compression program) and has to be treated accordingly. Note that it's generally not necessary to type filenames in full at the command prompt - here we're using ``tab-completion''. Pressing Tab will cause the shell to complete a filename for you, if what you have typed already is enough to identify a file uniquely. You should see a bunch of file names zipping by as the extraction proceeds.
cd less[Tab]
Comment: Move into the package directory.
ls
Comment: Let's see what's here. Are there any README's or INSTALL's we should look at? (If so, it wouldn't be a bad idea to take a peek at them, using the text file pager, e.g. less REA[Tab].) Is there a file named ``configure'' in there? Goody, that is our friend.
./configure --prefix=/usr/X11R6 --disable-debug
Comment: Here you're using the GNU autoconf routine to set up the code package for correct compilation on your system automagically. The --prefix=... bit arranges things so that the libraries and stuff will be put under /usr/X11R6 when you install them (instead of in the default /usr/local). This is probably the best place to have them, along with your other X libraries. The --disable-debug says not to compile with the ``-g'' flag, which includes debugging symbols. Leave out this bit if you want the debugging symbols included - but most users probably don't need them, and leaving them out makes the files quite a bit smaller. (In general it's a good idea to run ./configure --help first, to read about any special options to the compilation.)
make
Comment: The marvel of ``Makefiles''. This may take a while (about 15 minutes on my P133, but, hey, it's a big, complex chunk of code) so you may want to get a cup of coffee at this point. Provided your system is set up properly the whole set of Lesstif libraries should be built automatically.
make install
Comment: Put everything in place.

If all has gone well, you may now clean up. Assuming you have no further use for the Lesstif source code, do

cd ..
Comment: Go up a level in the directory tree.
rm -rf less[Tab][Enter]
Comment: Remove the source directory. The ``-r'' flag to rm makes the removal recursive (takes out all subdirectories), and the ``f'' forces it (no namby-pamby warnings; we know what we're doing ;^).
rm less[Tab][Enter]
Comment: Now remove the source tarball too.

Download and build NEdit

All right, now let's put those Lesstif libs to work.

Point your browser at the NEdit site. The front door is at fnpspa.fnal.gov; the download area at ftp.fnal.gov. The current version is 5.0.2. From the ftp site get the source code tarball, nedit_source.tar.gz (511 Kb).

Again, save this to /usr/src, and, at the command prompt in that directory, do:

ls tar tvfz ned[Tab] | less
Comment: Let's just take a look inside (``t'' flag instead of ``x'' for tar) this tarball (piping the listing into the pager, less) first. Aha, the files are not all packed into one top-level directory, as with lesstif. Type ``q'' to quit less. If we explode the tarball in /usr/src it will be a bit awkward keeping track of all the files. OK, we'll make a directory for it, move the tarball in there, and work there.

mkdir nedit mv nedit_[Tab] nedit cd nedit tar xvfz n[Tab] ls

This time we've got a README and a Makefile, but no ``configure'' script. OK, let's take a look at README. Hmmm, seems like all we have to do is

make linux_nedit

The NEdit build takes about 5 minutes on a P133. See the little ``-lXm'' on the third last line of the screen output from the make command? That says that nedit has successfully linked with your new Motif (well, Lesstif) library. That was pretty painless.

Now, can we do ``make install''? Oh, ``No rule to make target `install' ''. Well, we'll have to put it in place manually. We remember that the README told us the binaries (executable files) would be in the ``source'' sub-directory. So

cd source ls install -s nedit /usr/local/bin Comment: The ``install'' program will put nedit into /usr/local/bin, a reasonable place for ``home-made'' binaries. The ``-s'' flag means that install will strip the program first, making it a bit smaller.

install -s nc /usr/local/bin
Comment: Likewise the NEdit client program (you may not need this.)

Now what about documentation? We'll want to ensure that the manual pages are available. Weren't there some ``.man'' files back in our top-level nedit directory?

cd .. ls
Comment: Yes. Now let's put them in a suitable place. Corresponding to /usr/local/bin for local binaries is /usr/local/man for manpages. Pages for ordinary user programs generally go in man1, and are given a ``.1'' extension. So:

cp nedit.man /usr/local/man/man1/nedit.1 cp nc.man /usr/local/man/man1/nc.1

...and check them out:

man nedit man nc

Brilliant. Let's also take a peek at nedit.doc. Ah, it seems to be a basic explanation of using the program, somewhat fuller than the manpage. Where might it go? On many Linux systems /usr/doc is the appropriate place. OK, so

mkdir /usr/doc/nedit cp nedit.doc [Esc].
Comment: Eh? Well, in the bash shell, ``[Esc].'' pops onto the current command line the last term from the previous command line. In this case we just made a certain directory, and then immediately wanted to copy a file into it. So [Esc]. is our friend. And while we're at it

cp README [Esc].

Now clean up again:

cd .. rm -rf nedit

Check out your new editor by typing ``nedit'' at the command prompt in an xterm, or ``nedit filename'' to open an existing file. You may want to type an ampersand after such commands for launching GUI programs: ``nedit &''. The ampersand ``backgrounds'' the job, or in other words gives you back the command prompt right away (otherwise the command prompt is ``frozen'' until you exit the GUI program).

If NEdit doesn't come up for you, try typing the full path to the binary:

/usr/local/bin/nedit

If that works, we infer that the program is OK but /usr/local/bin is not included in your PATH. You can fix this temporarily by typing

export PATH=$PATH:/usr/local/bin

You can fix it permanently by putting this line into the file .bashrc in your home directory.

You'll probably want to add NEdit to the menus in your X window setup. If you're using the default RedHat window manager, copy the text below into an editor (e.g. NEdit!), replace ``Group'' with the name of the menu in which you want NEdit to appear, and save the file as /etc/X11/wmconfig/nedit

nedit name "NEdit" nedit description "GUI Editor" nedit group Group nedit exec "/usr/local/bin/nedit &"

Allin Cottrell (cottrell@ricardo.ecn.wfu.edu), November 8, 1998.