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README for zed

"ZED is a text editor that processes sequential files line by line under
the control of EDITING COMMANDS." -- from the introduction to SPEC.ZED

ZED was the best editor on the now defunct Phoenix mainframe.

Phoenix (February 1973 – September 30, 1995) was an IBM mainframe
computer at Cambridge University's Computer Laboratory.  You can read more
about it at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_(computer)>.

This implementation of ZED was written for my own amusement, and is not
the original, which was written by Phil Hazel in assembly language [1] [2].
Unfortunately, SPEC.ZED isn't complete, and neither is this
implementation.  Perhaps, one day, if the universe collapses, all the
photons will return from the edge and we will be able to reconstruct the
real ZED, as well as raising the dead.

Richard Brooksby (RPTB1) 2011-06-01


REFERENCES

[1] Hazel, P. (1980), Development of the ZED text editor. Software: Practice
and Experience, 10: 57–76. doi: 10.1002/spe.4380100107

[2] private communication, 2011-06-11