Aurora's IDE Editor


The Aurora IDE features a powerful built-in editor based on the Scintilla editor. The built-in editor has many of the features of standard text editors with the addition of syntax coloring. With syntax coloring every statement or function that is a built in component of Aurora is highlighted in a user selectable color. This makes your code more readable and easier to find errors.

Open a new program by selecting File and choosing New, then choose Aurora Source File from the main menu bar and type in the following program statements in the new editor window:

/*
first_one.src
This is my very first program using the Aurora IDE and Compiler
Compile this program to run in a console window.
*/
global sub main() 
{
string text = "This is my first program";
// this is a single line variable declaration and assignment
// don't forget to have a semi-colon ";" at the end of each
statement
writeln ("\n\n"+text+"\n\n");
writeln ("This short program was written in Aurora\n\n");
return;
}

Notice the green coloring designates comment lines/text. Comments are ignored by the compiler and are useful in documenting your program. Also notice the blue coloring of the Aurora keywords/commands. If you make a mistake and misspell a program statement you will immediately know due to its lack of color. These colors may be changed by the user by selecting File->Editor Options from the main menu.

Notice that 'cls()' and 'writeln' are not colored. These statements are not Aurora keywords, but are subroutines/functions which come from libraries which the compiler automatically includes upon compiling and linking.


Now that we have some text in the editor we can explain some of the key stroke commands the editor responds to. For your convenience, most of these keystrokes or combinations of keystrokes are the same as found in word processors and other text editors. See the Table below.

Editor Keystroke Combinations

Keystroke Combination

Action

<Page-Up>

Move up one page/screen

<Page-Down>

Move down one page/screen

<Up Arrow>

Move up one line

<Down Arrow>

Move down one line

<Left Arrow>

Move left one character

<Right Arrow>

Move right one character

<Home>

Moves the cursor to the beginning of the current line

<End>

Moves the cursor to the beginning of the current line

<Esc>

Cancels current command/dialog

<Del>

Deletes one character to the right of the cursor

<Backspace>

Deletes one character to the left of the cursor

<Ins>

Toggles editor between character insert and overwrite modes

<Tab>

Shifts text to the right over one Tab

<CTRL>+<Tab>

Shifts text to the left over one Tab (de-Tab)

<CTRL>+<Home>

Moves the cursor to the beginning of the document

<CTRL>+<End>

Moves the cursor to the beginning of the document

<CTRL>+A

Selects all text in document

<CTRL>+C

Copies selected text to clipboard

<CTRL>+D

Open the Dialog Form Tool

<CTRL>+F

Opens Find dialog

<CTRL>+H

Open Find & Replace dialog

<CTRL>+L

Deletes entire line of text

<CTRL>+N

Creates new Aurora source edit window

<CTRL>+O

Opens Open File dialog

<CTRL>+P

Opens Print dialog

<CTRL>+S

Saves file

<CTRL>+V

Pastes contents of clipboard

<CTRL>+X

Indents text

<CTRL>+Y

Redo last edit

<CTRL>+Z

Undo last edit

<F3>

Find next

<F4>

Execute the current build

<F5>

Compiles the currently viewed source

<F8>

Build single file executable

<CTRL>+<F8>

Compiles current project or source file and executes

There are other shortcuts available for use. Explore the main menu of the IDE to determine shortcuts to commonly used menu options.


Use of the Mouse

The mouse may be used to select, copy or cut and paste text as well as perform a number of other tasks. To select text for copying and cutting place the mouse cursor (I-Beam) over the first character of the text to select. Press the left mouse button down and ‘drag’ the cursor over the text to select. If you drag past the confines of the window it will automatically scroll allowing the continued selection of text until the beginning or the end of the document

If any key is pressed when text is selected then the selected portion will be replaced with the new text. The selected portion can also be deleted by pressing the <Delete> key.


Using the Keyboard to Select Text

Text may also be selected using the keyboard by holding the SHIFT key down and pressing one of <HOME>, <END>, <PAGEUP>, <PAGEDOWN>, or the arrow keys. Text may also be selected from the current cursor position to the position clicked with the left mouse button by holding down the SHIFT key.


Saving the file

To save the current program to file select File > Save from the main menu bar. The default extension for an Aurora source file is '.SRC' or '.src' and should not be changed to anything else. For include files the default extension is .INC


Editor options

You can modify many of the default characteristics of the text editor by opening the editor options dialog. Select the File menu and choose Editor Options... Syntax coloring, tab widths, number of undo/redo levels, line numbering and font used for text display is all user selectable. A mono-spaced, or fixed font is recommended for programming use. Some True Type fonts do not display line numbers well.