🚀 go-pugleaf

rnelson@wsuaix.csc.wsu.edu (roger nelson;S23487) writes:

:>Does any editor allow the user to manipulate truly arbitrary blocks of
:>text? Vi prefers whole lines of text, some editors permit rectangular
:>blocks of text, but I have yet to see one that enables me to work with
:>arbitrary blocks.
:
:In what editing situation would this be at all useful?

Screenpainting for an Ascii-graphics logo/intro screen/data input mask,
and so on.

:How would you paste the block: concatenating the lines or
:preserving the orientation of the characters in the polygon?

If I recall correctly, what happened in the "screenpainting" program
that I used that had this feature was that arbitrary blocks (including
holes and disjoint pieces) could be overlaid onto different places
of the screen, and their contents could be filled with repetititions
of one character (typically all-blanks, all-asterisks, and so on)
and/or similarly manipulated as to screen-attributes (colour/highlight/
blink).  It was most definitely NOT a general-purpose editor, and I
don't even recall its name, but it WOULD (very) occasionally come in
handy.
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