Edlin

EDLIN.COM (among several other commands) in IBM PC DOS 1.0

Using EDLIN for typing Japanese with the ATOK 8 input method editor, running on MS-DOS 3.3C for the PC-9800 series

Edlin was created by Tim Paterson in two weeks in 1980, for Seattle Computer Products's 86-DOS (QDOS)[3] based on the CP/M context editor ED,[4][5] itself a distant derivative of the Unix ed line editor.

Microsoft acquired 86-DOS and, after some further development, sold it as MS-DOS, so Edlin was included in v1.0–v5.0 of MS-DOS. From MS-DOS 6 onwards, the only editor included was the new full-screen MS-DOS Editor.

Windows 95, 98 and ME ran on top of an embedded version of DOS, which reports itself as MS-DOS 7. As a successor to MS-DOS 6, this did not include Edlin.

However, Edlin is included in the 32-bit versions of Windows NT[6] and its derivatives—up to and including Windows 10—because the NTVDM's DOS support in those operating systems is based on MS-DOS version 5.0. However, unlike most other external DOS commands, it has not been transformed into a native Win32 program. It also does not support long filenames, which were not added to MS-DOS and MS-Windows until long after Edlin was written.

The FreeDOS version was developed by Gregory Pietsch.[7]

There are only a few commands. The short list can be found by entering a ? at the edlin prompt.

When a file is open, typing L lists the contents (e.g., 1,6L lists lines 1 through 6). Each line is displayed with a line number in front of it.

*1,6L
       1: Edlin: The only text editor in early versions of DOS.
       2:
       3: Back in the day, I remember seeing web pages
       4: branded with a logo at the bottom:
       5: "This page created in edlin."
       6: The things that some people put themselves through. ;-)
*

The currently selected line has a *. To replace the contents of any line, the line number is entered and any text entered replaces the original. While editing a line pressing Ctrl-C cancels any changes. The * marker remains on that line.

Entering I (optionally preceded with a line number) inserts one or more lines before the * line or the line given. When finished entering lines, Ctrl-C returns to the edlin command prompt.

*6I
       6:*(...or similar)
       7:*^C 
 
*7D
*L
       1: Edlin: The only text editor in early versions of DOS.
       2:
       3: Back in the day, I remember seeing web pages
       4: branded with a logo at the bottom:
       5: "This page created in edlin."
       6: (...or similar)
*

i - Inserts lines of text.

D - deletes the specified line, again optionally starting with the number of a line, or a range of lines. E.g.: 2,4d deletes lines 2 through 4. In the above example, line 7 was deleted.

R - is used to replace all occurrences of a piece of text in a given range of lines, for example, to replace a spelling error. Including the ? prompts for each change. E.g.: To replace 'prit' with 'print' and to prompt for each change: ?rprit^Zprint (the ^Z represents pressing CTRL-Z). It is case-sensitive.

S - searches for given text. It is used in the same way as replace, but without the replacement text. A search for 'apple' in the first 20 lines of a file is typed 1,20?sapple (no space, unless that is part of the search) followed by a press of enter. For each match, it asks if it is the correct one, and accepts n or y (or Enter).

P - displays a listing of a range of lines. If no range is specified, P displays the complete file from the * to the end. This is different from L in that P changes the current line to be the last line in the range.

T - transfers another file into the one being edited, with this syntax: [line to insert at]t[full path to file].

W - (write) saves the file.

E - saves the file and quits edlin.

Q - quits edlin without saving.

edlin < script

• List of DOS commands
• ed and ex, similar Unix line editors.
• 86-DOS

• Microsoft Operating System/2 User's Reference (PDF). Microsoft. 1987.

Wikibooks has a book on the topic of: Guide to Windows Commands

• Edlin | Microsoft Docs
• MS-DOS edlin command help
• Open source EDLIN implementation that comes with MS-DOS v2.0