README.md

Orbiton is a text editor and a simple IDE with the following goals in mind:

• Minimal annoyance (within the limits of VT100)
• Not be configurable (with the exception of themes) to help users stay focused
• Support for rapid edit-format-compile cycles

Please submit a PR if anything can be improved to help reach these goals.

Orbiton might be a good fit for:

• Writing git commit messages (using EDITOR=o git commit).
• Editing README.md and TODO.md files.
• Writing Markdown and then exporting to HTML or PDF.
• Learning programming languages, like Rust or Zig.
• Editing files deep within larger Go or C++ projects.
• Solving Advent of Code tasks.
• Being placed on a live image for a Linux or BSD distro, since it supports VT100, is small and self-contained, has a built-in log, man page and image viewer, has an optional nano/pico mode, can be used as EDITOR=o visudo and has built-in support for neatly formatting /etc/fstab files.
• Writing any number of words in a distraction-free fullscreen environment (toggle the status bar via the ctrl-o menu to see the word count in the status bar).

Screenshots

Screenshot of the VTE GUI application (that can be found in the gtk3 directory), running the o editor:

Stepping through the assembly instructions of a Rust program by entering debug mode with the ctrl-o menu and then stepping with ctrl-n:

Editing a C source file in og using the "synthwave" theme:

There are also light themes available:

Packaging status

orbiton

Quick start

With Go 1.21, the development version of o can be installed like this:

go install github.com/xyproto/orbiton/v2@latest && mv -i ~/go/bin/orbiton ~/go/bin/o

Adjust the mv flags and the ~/go/bin path as needed. Perhaps go install will have an -o flag in the future.

Alternatively, download and install a release version. For example, for Raspberry Pi 2, 3 or 4 running Linux:

curl -sL 'https://github.com/xyproto/orbiton/releases/download/v2.68.2/orbiton-2.68.2-linux_armv7_static.tar.xz' | tar JxC /tmp && sudo install -Dm755 /tmp/orbiton-2.68.2-linux_armv7_static/o /usr/bin/o && sudo install -Dm644 /tmp/orbiton-2.68.2-linux_armv7_static/o.1.gz /usr/share/man/man1/o.1.gz

Setting o as the default editor executable for git

To set:

git config --global core.editor o

To unset:

git config --global --unset core.editor

Viewing man pages

By setting the MANPAGER environment variable, it's possible to use o for viewing man pages:

export MANPAGER=o

An alternative to viewing man pages in o is to use less:

export MANPAGER='less -s -M +Gg'

Setting up o on OpenSUSE

Install o manually, until an OpenSUSE package exists:

git clone https://github.com/xyproto/orbiton
cd orbiton
make && sudo make install

The following is not strictly needed, but it sets everything up to make full use of o:

Add this to ~/.alias:

alias o=/usr/bin/o

Add this to ~/.profile:

export MANPAGER=/usr/bin/o
export EDITOR=/usr/bin/o

Log out and in again to activate the changes.

Unique features

These features are unique to o, as far as I am aware:

• If the loaded file is read-only, all text will be red by default.
• Smart cursor movement, trying to maintain the X position when moving up and down, across short and long lines.
• Press ctrl-v once to paste one line, press ctrl-v again to paste the rest.
• Press ctrl-c once to copy one line, press ctrl-c again to copy a block of lines (until a blank line).
• Open or close a portal with ctrl-r. When a portal is open, copy lines across files (or within the same file) with ctrl-v.
• Build code with ctrl-space and format code with ctrl-w, for a wide range of programming languages.
• Cycle git rebase keywords with ctrl-w or ctrl-r, when an interactive git rebase session is in progress.
• Jump to a line with ctrl-l. Either enter a number to jump to a line or just press return (or t) to jump to the top. Press ctrl-l and return again (or b) to jump to the bottom. Press c to jump to the center.
• When jumping to a specific line in a file with ctrl-l, jumping to a percentage (like 50%) or a fraction (like 0.5 or .5) is also possible. It is also possible to jump to one of the highlighted letters.
• If tab completion in the terminal went wrong and you are trying to open a main. file that does not exist, but main.cpp and main.o does exists, then main.cpp will be opened.
• Search by pressing ctrl-f, entering text and pressing return. Replace by pressing tab instead of return, then enter the replacement text and press return. Searching for unicode runes on the form u+0000 is also supported.
• Type iferr on a single line in a Go or Odin program and press return to insert a suitable if err != nil { return ... } block, based on koron/iferr.
• Use the built-in Markdown table editor by pressing ctrl-t when the cursor is on a table. This works best for tables that are not too wide.
• Format Markdown tables by moving the cursor to a table and pressing ctrl-w.
• For C-like languages, missing parentheses are added to statements like if, for and while when return is pressed.
• Pressing ctrl-f twice searches for the word under the cursor.
• Lines are highlighted only when the up and down arrow keys are used.
• It can display the name of the function that the cursor is within, in the upper right corner of the screen, for some programming languages.

Other features and limitations

• The syntax highlighting is instant.
• Opens files quickly.
• Can compile "Hello, World" in many popular programming languages simply by pressing ctrl-space.
• Create, build and run a simple program in C, by running o main.c, pressing ctrl-w and then a double ctrl-space.
• Configuration-free, for better and for worse.
• Can preview .png, .jpg, .jpeg, .gif, .ico, .bmp or .webp images directly in the terminal (using a scaled down version and up to 16 colors).
• The -p flag followed by a filename can be used for just pasting the clipboard to a new file, instead of editing a file.
• ctrl-t can jump between a C++ header and source file, when editing C++ code.
• ctrl-t shows the Markdown table editor, when editing Markdown and the cursor is on a Markdown table.
• Can only edit one file at the time, by design.
• Provides syntax highlighting for Go, Rust, C++, Markdown, Bash and several other languages. There is generic syntax highlighting built-in.
• Will jump to the last visited line when opening a recent file.
• Is provided as a single self-contained executable.
• Loads faster than both vim and emacs, for small files.
• Can render text to PDF either by itself or by using pandoc.
• Tested with alacritty, konsole, st, urxvt, xfce4-terminal, xterm and zutty.
• Tested on Arch Linux, Debian, OpenSUSE, macOS, FreeBSD and OpenBSD.
• Never asks before saving or quitting. Be careful.
• The NO_COLOR environment variable can be set to disable all colors.
• Rainbow parentheses makes lines with many parentheses easier to read.
• Limited to VT100, so hotkeys like ctrl-a and ctrl-e may need to be used instead of Home and End. And for browsing up and down, ctrl-n and ctrl-p may be used.
• Compiles with either go or gccgo.
• Will strip trailing whitespace whenever it can.
• Must be given a filename at start.
• May provide smart indentation.
• Requires that /dev/tty is available.
• xclip for X, wl-clipboard for Wayland or pbcopy for macOS needs to be installed to access the system clipboard.
• May take a line number as the second argument, with an optional + or : prefix.
• If the filename is COMMIT_EDITMSG, the look and feel will be adjusted for git commit messages.
• Supports UTF-8, but some runes may be displayed incorrectly.
• Only UNIX-style line endings are supported (\n).
• Will convert DOS/Windows line endings (\r\n) to UNIX line endings (just \n), whenever possible.
• Will replace non-breaking space (0xc2 0xa0) with a regular space (0x20) whenever possible.
• Will replace annoying tilde (0xcc 0x88) with a regular tilde (~) whenever possible.
• Will replace the greek question mark that looks like a semicolon (0xcd 0xbe) with a regular semicolon (;) whenever possible.
• If interactive rebase is launched with git rebase -i, then either ctrl-w or ctrl-r will cycle the keywords for the current line (fixup, drop, edit etc).
• If the editor executable is renamed to a word starting with r (or have a symlink with that name), the default theme will be red/black.
• If the editor executable is renamed to a word starting with l (or have a symlink with that name), the default theme will be suitable for light backgrounds.
• If the editor executable is renamed to a word starting with s (or have a symlink with that name), the default theme will be the "synthwave" theme.
• Want to quickly convert Markdown to HTML? Try o filename.md, press ctrl-space twice and quit with ctrl-q.
• The default syntax highlighting theme aims to be as pretty as possible with less than 16 colors, but it mainly aims for clarity. It should be easy to spot a keyword, number, string or a stray parenthesis.
• Press ctrl-space or ctrl-t to toggle the check mark in - [ ] TODO item boxes in Markdown.
• Orbiton is written mostly in Orbiton, with some use of NeoVim for the initial development.
• Can load, edit and save gzipped text files or man pages that ends with a .gz extension.
• Can organize imports, for Java and for Kotlin, when formatting code with ctrl-w.
• Has a built-in spellchecker (press ctrl-f and then t to search for a typo, ctrl-n for next match and then ctrl-a to add it and ctrl-i to ignore it).
• Can jump directly to a selection of highlighted letters on the screen, when ctrl-l has been pressed.

Known issues

• Some unicode runes may disrupt the text flow! This is generally not a problem for editing code and configuration files, but is an issue when editing files that contains text in many languages, or using emojis.
• The man page viewer can not display some special characters, such as the long dash (—), just yet.
• Using tmux and resizing the terminal emulator window may trigger text rendering issues. Try pressing esc to redraw the text, or ctrl-f to search for text. Setting TERM correctly might help.
• For some terminal emulators, if o is busy performing an operation, pressing ctrl-s may lock the terminal. Some terminal emulators, like konsole, can be configured to turn off this behavior. Press ctrl-q to unlock the terminal again (together with the unfortunate risk of quitting o). To sidestep this issue, the ctrl-o menu can be used instead, for saving and quitting.
• Using mosh may cause text rendering issues (in both nvim and o).
• Pressing cmd-v, cmd-x and cmd-c on macOS only works when using the og GUI/VTE frontend. For o, ctrl-v, ctrl-x and ctrl-c can be used instead.
• The Markdown table editor does not have scrolling, so the table must fit within the current terminal emulator width and height. Resize the terminal as needed.
• Middle-click pasting (instead of pasting with ctrl-v) will only paste the first character.

Hotkeys

There are pretty few hotkeys to remember:

• ctrl-s - Save.
• ctrl-q - Quit.
• ctrl-r - Open or close a portal. Text can be pasted from the portal into another (or the same) file with ctrl-v. For "git interactive rebase" mode (git rebase -i), this will cycle the rebase keywords instead.
• ctrl-a - Go to start of text, then start of line and then to the previous line.
• ctrl-e - Go to end of line and then to the next line
• ctrl-n - Scroll down 10 lines, or go to the next match if a search is active. Insert a column when in the Markdown table editor.
• ctrl-p - Scroll up 10 lines, or go to the previous match if a search is active. Remove an empty column when in the Markdown table editor.
• ctrl-k - Delete characters to the end of the line, then delete the line.
• ctrl-_ - Jump to a matching parenthesis or bracket, if the cursor is on one, otherwise insert a symbol by typing in a 2-letter digraph.
• ctrl-d - Delete a single character.
• ctrl-t - For C and C++: jump between the current header and source file. For Agda and Ivy, insert a symbol. For Markdown: toggle checkboxes, or launch the table editor if the cursor is over a table. For the rest: record and play back keypresses. Press Esc to clear the current macro.
• ctrl-o - Open a command menu with actions that can be performed.
• ctrl-x - Cut the current line. Press twice to cut a block of text (to the next blank line).
• ctrl-c - Copy one line. Press twice to copy a block of text.
• ctrl-v - Paste one trimmed line. Press twice to paste multiple untrimmed lines.
• ctrl-space - Build program, render to PDF or export to man page (see table below). For Markdown: toggle checkboxes, or double press to export to HTML.
• ctrl-j - Join lines (or jump to the bookmark, if set).
• ctrl-u - Undo (ctrl-z is also possible, but may background the application).
• ctrl-l - Jump to a specific line number or percentage. Press return to jump to the top. If at the top, press return to jump to the bottom. Press one of the highlighted on-screen letters to jump to that location.
• ctrl-f - Search for a string. The search wraps around and is case sensitive. Press tab instead of return to search and replace. To find typos, search for the letter t, then press ctrl-n for the next word, ctrl-a to add it or ctrl-i to ignore it.
• ctrl-b - Jump back after jumping to a definition with ctrl-g. Toggle a bookmark for the current line, or if set: jump to a bookmark on a different line.
• ctrl-w - Format the current file (see the table below), or cycle git rebase keywords. For Markdown, format the table under the cursor.
• ctrl-g - Jump to definition, for some programming languages (experimental feature), or toggle the status bar.
• ctrl-\ - Comment in or out a block of code.
• ctrl-~ - Jump to a matching parenthesis or bracket.
• esc - Redraw everything and clear the last search.

Build and format

• Press ctrl-space to build or export the current file.
• Press ctrl-w to format the current file, in an opinionated way. If the current file is empty, a "Hello, World!" template will be inserted, for some file extensions.
• If a build or export returns an error code and the status message is not specific enough, the last called command can be run from the command line with $(o -l), to get more details. o -l can be used to preview the command.

Programming language	File extensions	Jump to error	Build command	Format command
Ada	.adb, .gpr, .ads, .ada	WIP	WIP	WIP
Agda	.agda	Yes	agda -c $filename	N/A
ALGOL 68	.a68	WIP	a68g --compile $filename	WIP
Assembly	.asm, .s, .S, .inc	Yes	yasm -f elf64 -o $output.o $filename	N/A
C	.c, .h	Yes	gcc $filename -o $output	clang-format -i --style=WebKit $filename
C++	.cpp, .cc, .cxx, .h, .hpp, .h++, .c++	Yes	g++ $filename -o $output	clang-format -i --style=WebKit $filename
C#	.cs	Yes	dotnet build $filename	astyle --mode=cs $filename
C3	.c3	Yes	c3c compile -o $output $filename	c3fmt --rewrite $filename
Clojure	.clj, .cljs, .clojure	WIP	lein compile $filename	WIP
Crystal	.cr	Yes	crystal build $filename --release	crystal tool format $filename
CSS	.css	WIP	No	prettier --tab-width 2 -w $filename
D	.d	Yes	dmd $filename -of$output	WIP
Dart	.dart	Yes	dart compile exe --output $output $filename	dart format $filename
Erlang	.erl	Yes	erlc $filename	WIP
Fortran77, Fortran90	.f, .f90	Yes	gfortran -o $output $filename	WIP
Garnet	.gt	WIP	garnetc -o $output $filename	WIP
GLSL	.glsl, .vert, .frag	WIP	glslangValidator -V -o $output $filename	WIP
Go	.go	Yes	go build $filename	goimports -w $filename
Hare	.ha	Yes	hare build $filename	N/A
Haskell	.hs	Yes	ghc -dynamic $filename	brittany --write-mode=inplace $filename
HTML	.html	WIP	No	tidy -m $filename
Ivy	.ivy	WIP	WIP	N/A
Java	.java	Yes	javac + jar, see details below	google-java-format -a -i $filename
JavaScript	.js	WIP	No	prettier --tab-width 4 -w $filename
Jakt	.jakt	WIP	jakt $filename	WIP
Just	justfile, .justfile	No	No	just --unstable --fmt -f $filename
Kotlin	.kt, .kts	Yes	kotlinc $filename -include-runtime -d $output.jar	ktlint -F $filename
Kotlin Native	.kt, .kts	Yes	kotlinc-native -nowarn -opt -Xallocator=mimalloc -produce program -linker-option --as-needed $filename -o $output	ktlint -F $filename
Lua	.lua	Yes	luac -o $output.luac $filename	lua-format -i --no-keep-simple-function-one-line --column-limit=120 --indent-width=2 --no-use-tab $filename
Markdown	.md	WIP	No	prettier --write $filename
Nim	.nim	WIP	nim c -o:$output $filename	WIP
Objective-C	.m	Yes	clang $filename -o $output	clang-format -i --style=WebKit $filename
Odin	.odin	Yes	odin build $filename	N/A
Objective Pascal	.pas, .pp, .lpr	Yes	fpc $filename	WIP
OCaml	.ml	WIP	No	ocamlformat $filename
Perl	.pl	Yes	perl $filename	/usr/bin/vendor_perl/perltidy -se -b -i=2 -ole=unix -bt=2 -pt=2 -sbt=2 -ce $filename
Python	.py	Yes	python -m py_compile $filename	black $filename
Ruby	.rb	No	No	rubocop -A $filename
Rust (with Cargo.toml)	.rs	Yes	cargo build	rustfmt $filename
Rust	.rs	Yes	rustc $filename	rustfmt $filename
Scala	.scala	Yes	scalac $filename && jar cfe $output MainClass *.class	scalafmt $filename
Shell	.sh, PKGBUILD, APKBUILD	WIP	makepkg	shfmt -s -w -i 2 -bn -ci -sr -kp $filename
Standard ML	.sml, .fun, .mlb, .cm	Yes	mlton $filename	WIP
Swift	.swift	WIP	WIP	WIP
TypeScript	.ts	WIP	No	prettier --tab-width 4 -w $filename
V	.v	Yes	v build $filename	v fmt $filename
XML	.xml	WIP	No	tidy -w 80 -q -i -utf8 --show-errors 0 --show-warnings no --tidy-mark no -xml -m $filename
Zig	.zig	Yes	zig build-exe $filename	zig fmt $filename

/etc/fstab, JSON and HTML files are also supported, and can be formatted with ctrl-w.

• o will try to jump to the location where the error is and otherwise display Success.
• For regular text files, ctrl-w will word wrap the lines to a length of 99.
• If kotlinc-native is not available, this build command will be used instead: kotlinc $filename -include-runtime -d $name.jar

CXX can be downloaded here: GitHub project page for CXX.

File type	File extensions	Build or export command
AsciiDoc	.adoc	asciidoctor -b manpage (writes to out.1)
scdoc	.scd, .scdoc	scdoc (writes to out.1)
Markdown	.md	pandoc -N --toc -V geometry:a4paper (writes to $filename.pdf)

Debug support for C and C++

This is a brand new feature and needs more testing.

• If gdb is installed, it's possible to select "Debug mode" from the ctrl-o menu and then build and step through a program with ctrl-space, or set a breakpoint with ctrl-b and continue with ctrl-space.
• Messages printed to stdout are displayed as a status message when that line is reached.
• An indication of which line the program is at has not yet been added, and is a work in progress.
• There are status messages indicating when the debug session is started and ended.

Markdown table editor

While in the Markdown table editor:

• Cells can be typed into.
• The arrow keys can be used to move around.
• tab can be used to go to the next cell, or insert new cells if the last cell is reached.
• return can be used to either jump to the blank cell below or to insert a new row below.
• backspace can be used to delete letters, but also for deleting the current row if it is empty.
• ctrl-n can be used to insert a new column to the right.
• ctrl-d can be used to delete the current column (if all cells in the column are empty).
• esc or ctrl-t can be used to close the Markdown table editor.
• ctrl-s can be used to save.

Themes

Themes can be selected with the ctrl-o menu. The theme menu also lists the theme names, which can be specified in the O_THEME environment variable.

The O_THEME environment variable is an exception to the claim that o is configuration-free, but it is completely optional.

For using ie. the Synthwave theme, the /usr/bin/sw symlink to /usr/bin/o can be used, or this can be added to ~/.profile:

export O_THEME=synthwave

Inserting a symbol

• To insert a symbol, like æ, just press ctrl-_ and type in ae. To insert µ, type in My.
• These are the same digraphs as ViM uses.
• For a full overview of digraphs, see digraphs.txt.

Manual installation on Linux

git clone https://github.com/xyproto/orbiton
cd orbiton
make && sudo make install

And optionally:

make gui && sudo make gui-install

It is also possible to install the symlinks that are suggested further down in this document.

OpenBSD installation instructions

Install dependencies (use doas if needed):

add_pkg git gmake go vte3

Build both the editor o and the GUI frontend og:

gmake CXX="clang++ -w" o og

Install both executables, a man page, an icon and a desktop shortcut file (use doas if needed`):

PREFIX=/usr/local gmake install og-install

Just building and installing o also works:

gmake
doas gmake install

It is also possible to install the symlinks that are suggested further down in this document.

Dependencies

C++

• For building code with ctrl-space, cxx must be installed.
• For formatting code with ctrl-w, clang-format must be installed.

Go

• For building code with ctrl-space, The go compiler must be installed.
• For formatting code with ctrl-w, goimports must be installed.

Zig

• For building and formatting Zig code, only the zig command is needed.

V

• For building and formatting V code, only the v command is needed.

Rust

• For building code with ctrl-space, Cargo.toml must exist and cargo must be installed.
• For formatting code with ctrl-w, rustfmt must be installed.

Haskell

• For building the current file with ctrl-space, the ghc compiler must be installed.
• For formatting code with ctrl-w, brittany must be installed.

Python

• ctrl-space only checks the syntax, without executing. This only requires python to be available.
• For formatting the code with ctrl-w, black must be installed.

Crystal

• For building and formatting Crystal code, only the crystal command is needed.

Kotlin

• For building code with ctrl-space, kotlinc must be installed. A .jar file is created if the compilation succeeded.
• For formatting code with ctrl-w, ktlint must be installed.

Java

• For building code with ctrl-space, javac and jar must be installed. A .jar file is created if the compilation succeeded.
• For formatting code with ctrl-w, google-java-format must be installed.

Scala

• For building code with ctrl-space, scalac and jar must be installed. A .jar file is created if the compilation succeeded.
• The jar file can be executed with java -jar main.jar. Use scalac -d main.jar MyFile.scala if you want to produce a jar that can be executed with scala main.jar.
• For formatting code with ctrl-w, scalafmt must be installed.

D

• For building code with ctrl-space, gdc must be available.

JSON

• The JSON formatter is built-in. Note that for some files it may reorganize items in an undesirable order, so don't save the file if the result is unexpected.

fstab

• Formatting fstab files (usually /etc/fstab) is a built-in feature. Just press ctrl-w. If you need a standalone utility, fstabfmt is available.

JavaScript

• For formatting JavaScript code with , prettier must be installed.

Java

Since kotlinc $filename -include-runtime -d builds to a .jar, I though I should do the same for Java. The idea is to easily compile a single or a small collection of .java files, where one of the files has a main function.

If you know about an easier way to build a .jar file from *.java, without using something like gradle, please let me know by submitting a pull request. This is pretty verbose...

javaFiles=$(find . -type f -name '*.java')
for f in $javaFiles; do
  grep -q 'static void main' "$f" && mainJavaFile="$f"
done
className=$(grep -oP '(?<=class )[A-Z]+[a-z,A-Z,0-9]*' "$mainJavaFile" | head -1)
packageName=$(grep -oP '(?<=package )[a-z,A-Z,0-9,.]*' "$mainJavaFile" | head -1)
if [[ $packageName != "" ]]; then
  packageName="$packageName."
fi
mkdir -p _o_build/META-INF
javac -d _o_build $javaFiles
cd _o_build
echo "Main-Class: $packageName$className" > META-INF/MANIFEST.MF
classFiles=$(find . -type f -name '*.class')
jar cmf META-INF/MANIFEST.MF ../main.jar $classFiles
cd ..
rm -rf _o_build

Scala

For Scala, this is the code that is used to produce a main.jar file that can be run directly with java -jar main.jar:

#!/bin/sh
scalaFiles=$(find . -type f -name '*.scala')
for f in $scalaFiles; do
  grep -q 'def main' "$f" && mainScalaFile="$f"
  grep -q ' extends App ' "$f" && mainScalaFile="$f"
done
objectName=$(grep -oP '(?<=object )[A-Z]+[a-z,A-Z,0-9]*' "$mainScalaFile" | head -1);
packageName=$(grep -oP '(?<=package )[a-z,A-Z,0-9,.]*' "$mainScalaFile" | head -1);
if [[ $packageName != "" ]]; then
  packageName="$packageName."
fi
mkdir -p _o_build/META-INF
scalac -d _o_build $scalaFiles
cd _o_build
echo -e "Main-Class: $packageName$objectName\nClass-Path: /usr/share/scala/lib/scala-library.jar" > META-INF/MANIFEST.MF
classFiles=$(find . -type f -name '*.class')
jar cmf META-INF/MANIFEST.MF ../main.jar $classFiles
cd ..
rm -rf _o_build

• If /usr/share/scala/lib/scala-library.jar is not found scalac -d run_with_scala.jar is used instead.
• If scala-library.jar was not found, then the resulting jar file will need scala to run.

Agda

ctrl-t brings up a menu with a selection of special symbols.

There are also these shortcuts:

• Insert ⊤ by pressing ctrl-t and then t.
• Insert ℕ by pressing ctrl-t and then n.

Updating PKGBUILD files

When editing PKGBUILD files, it is possible to press ctrl-o and select Call Guessica to update the pkgver= and source= fields, by a combination of guesswork and online searching. This functionality depends on the Guessica package update utility being installed, and will only work for some PKGBUILD files.

List of optional runtime dependencies

• a68g - for compiling ALGOL 68 code
• agda - for compiling Agda code
• asciidoctor - for writing man pages
• astyle - for formatting C# code
• black - for formatting Python code
• brittany - for formatting Haskell code
• cargo - for compiling Rust
• clang - for formatting C++ code with clang-format
• clojure - for compiling Clojure
• crystal - for compiling Crystal
• cxx - for compiling C++
• fpc - for compiling Object Pascal
• g++ - for compiling C++ code
• gdc - for compiling D code
• ghc - for compiling Haskell code
• go - for compiling Go code
• go-tools - for formatting Go code and handling imports with goimports
• google-java-format - for formatting Java code
• jad - decompile .class files on the fly when opening them with o
• java-environment - for compiling Java code and creating .jar files with javac and jar
• kotlin - for compiling Kotlin
• ktlint - for formatting Kotlin code
• lua - for compiling Lua to bytecode
• lua-format - for formatting Lua code
• mlton - for compiling Standard ML
• mono - for compiling C# code
• ocaml - for compiling and formatting OCaml code
• odin - for compiling Odin
• pandoc - for exporting Markdown to PDF
• prettier - for formatting JavaScript, TypeScript and CSS
• python - for compiling Python to bytecode
• rustc - for compiling Rust
• rustfmt - for formatting Rust
• scala - for compiling Scala
• sdoc - for writing man pages
• tidy - for formatting XML
• v - for compiling and formatting V code
• zig - for compiling and formatting Zig code

Size

• The o executable is 1.5M when built with GCC 12 (for 64-bit Linux) and compressed with upx.
• This isn't as small as e3, an editor written in assembly (which is 234k), but it's reasonably lean.

One way of building with gccgo and upx (in the v2 directory):

go build -mod=vendor -gccgoflags '-Os -s' -o o && upx --best --lzma o

If the o executable is built with go instead, the size can be 8.7M, or just 2.8M when packed with upx:

go build -mod=vendor -ldflags='-s -w' -trimpath -o o && upx --best --lzma o

Jumping to a specific line when opening a file

These four ways of opening file.txt at line 7 are supported:

• o file.txt 7
• o file.txt +7
• o file.txt:7
• o file.txt+7

This also means that filenames containing + or :, and then followed by a number, are not supported.

Flags

• -f can be used to open a file, regardless of if there are any locks. It can also be used for overwriting files together with -p.
• -c FILENAME can be used to copy the contents of the given file to the clipboard and then exit.
• -p FILENAME can be used to paste the contents of the clipboard to the given FILENAME (if it does not already exist) and then exit.
• -n can be used to avoid writing lockfiles, build files, location history, search history and the game highscore to $XDG_CACHE_DIR/cache/o or ~/.cache/o. Not recommended.
• -m can be used to open a file as read-only, but monitor it for changes.
• --help can be used to get a quick overview of the supported keybindings.
• --version will print the current version and then exit.

Spinner

When loading files that are large or from a slow disk, an animated spinner will appear. The loading operation can be interrupted by pressing esc, q or ctrl-q.

Find and open

This shell function works in zsh and bash and may be useful for both searching for and opening a file at the given line number (works best if there is only one matching file, if not it will open several files in succession):

fo() { find . -type f -wholename "*$1" -exec o {} $2 \;; }

If too many files are found, it is possible to stop opening them by selecting Stop parent and quit without saving from the ctrl-o menu, which will quit the editor and also kill the parent find process.

Example use:

fo somefile.cpp 123

Pandoc

When using pandoc to export from Markdown to PDF:

• If the PAPERSIZE environment variable is set to ie. a4 or letter, it will be respected when exporting from Markdown to PDF using pandoc, at the press of ctrl-space.
• The --pdf-engine=xelatex and --listings flags are used, so xelatex and the listings package needs to be available. A standard installation of LaTeX and Pandoc should provide both.
• Render to PDF with pandoc will only appear on the ctrl-o menu when editing a Markdown file and pandoc is installed.

Easter eggs

• Press the Konami code keys while in the ctrl-o menu to start a silly little game about feeding creatures with pellets before they are eaten. Alternatively, create a symlink for starting it directly, ie.: ln -sf /usr/bin/o /usr/bin/feedgame.
• Press right, down, left or left, down, right in rapid succession followed by either down to save or up to save and quit. The only purpose of this unusual shortcut is to help avoid the painful Emacs pinky.

Included executables

• o - for terminal emulators that supports at least VT100
• og - for the VTE GUI (optional)

Recommended symlinks

# For starting o with the Light theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/o /usr/bin/li
# For starting o with the Red/Black theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/o /usr/bin/redblack
# For starting o with the Synthwave theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/o /usr/bin/sw
# For starting o with the Blue Edit theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/o /usr/bin/edi
# For starting o with the Light VS theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/o /usr/bin/vs

# For starting the GUI version of o with the Light theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/og /usr/bin/lig
# For starting the GUI version of o with the Red/Black theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/og /usr/bin/redblackg
# For starting the GUI version of o with the Synthwave theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/og /usr/bin/swg
# For starting the GUI version of o with the Blue Edit theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/og /usr/bin/edg
# For starting the GUI version of o with the Light VS theme
ln -sf /usr/bin/og /usr/bin/vg

The GUI/VTE frontend og

Build:

make gui

Install (use sudo or doas, if needed):

make gui-install

Spellchecker

• Press ctrl-f to search, and then type in t and press return to search for the next typo.
• If a typo is found, press ctrl-a to (temporarily) add it to the dictionary or ctrl-i to (temporarily) ignore it.
• The spellchecker uses a fixed English word list and does not store lists of custom words anywhere, yet.
• When in Nano mode (when o is launched by a symlink or executable named nan or nano), ctrl-t searches for the next typo.
• The spellchecker is an experimental feature.

The built-in spellchecker uses a list of words from this project that is licensed under this MIT license:

MIT License, Copyright (c) Sindre Sorhus <[email protected]> (sindresorhus.com)
Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software. THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.

Moby Dick Workout

• Orbiton passes the Moby Dick Workout here on my machine.
• Please create an issue if it is even a little bit slow on your machine (as long as your machine is at least as fast as a Raspberry Pi 3).

Terminal settings

Konsole

• Untick the Flow control option in the profile settings, to ensure that ctrl-s will never freeze the terminal.

About the name

• An orbiton is a quasiparticle.

License scan

Stars

General info

• Version: 2.68.2
• License: 3-clause BSD
• Author: Alexander F. Rødseth <[email protected]>