Software:Brief (text editor)
 Screenshot of a sample Brief session | |
| Original author(s) | UnderWare, Inc. |
|---|---|
| Developer(s) | Borland International |
| Initial release | 1985 |
| Stable release | 4.5
/ May 16, 2013 |
| Operating system | MS-DOS, OS/2, Windows |
| Platform | x86 |
| Type | Text editor |
| License | Freemium |
| Website | www |
Brief (stylized BRIEF or B.R.I.E.F., a backronym for Basic Reconfigurable Interactive Editing Facility), is a once-popular programmer's text editor in the 1980s and early 1990s. It was originally released for MS-DOS, then IBM OS/2 and Microsoft Windows. The Brief interface and functionality live on, including via the SourceForge GRIEF editor.[1]
History
Brief was designed and developed by UnderWare Inc,[2] a company founded in Providence, Rhode Island by David Nanian and Michael Strickman,[3] and was published by Solution Systems. UnderWare moved to Boston, Massachusetts in 1985. Solution Systems released version 2.1 in 1988.[4]
In 1990, UnderWare sold Brief to Solution Systems, which released version 3.1.[5]
Solution Systems advertised the $195 Brief as a "Program Editing Breakthrough! / Get 20% More Done".[6] In 1990 Solutions Systems brought in Eric Perkins as technical architect and team lead to port the OS/2 version of Brief to the Windows platform as quickly as possible. The end result was to sell the Solution System assets to the highest bidder. Within 6 months, the team of Eric Perkins, Blake Nelson and Jeff Simpson worked closely with David Nanian and Mike Strickman and ported Brief OS/2 to Windows using an MVC architecture. It was this version that was demonstrated at Spring Comdex 1991 to Borland and others, with Borland later purchasing Brief and the full suite of software tools from Solutions Systems.[5]
Solution Systems closed permanently after the sale to Borland. Brief is no longer sold by Borland.
Features
The original product features contain:
Brief for Windows features
- All the features of Brief for DOS and OS/2
- The first programmer's editor to make use of the Windows WYSIWYG environment
- Color coding of language constructs
- Multitask within Windows environment
- Full use of Windows memory for caching all files and macros
- Ability to spawn off compiles to a DOS box without leaving the editor
Popularity
Both the Brief interface and its functionality had a following, and they live on via SourceForge's GRIEF.[1]
Clones
Some Vim and Emacs packages provide Brief functionality. There was more than one program written to provide Brief-like functionality:
Emulators
The Brief keyboard layout became popular and was implemented in or emulated by other editors, such as Lugaru Epsilon, by providing a remapping of the keyboard shortcuts and editor behavior; dBase, an early DOS-day database, also copied this keyboard mapping.[9] [10]
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 "GRIEF: BRIEF clone". https://sourceforge.net/projects/grief/. Retrieved 2014-10-01.
- ↑ William Zachmann (August 17, 1987). "Underware's handy Brief". Computerworld.
- ↑ Mark Malamad (June 26, 1984). "This 'Underware' is not for wearing". Akron Beacon Journal (Akron, Ohio). https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/153687217/.
- ↑ "Solutions Systems: Brief editor, version 2.1". Computerworld. September 12, 1988.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 "About BRIEF Text Editor". http://christopoulos.users.sourceforge.net/cbrief/brief.php. "In 1990, UnderWare sold BRIEF to Solution Systems .. which released version 3.1 .. a year later sold BRIEF to Borland."
- ↑ "Program Editing Breakthrough!". BYTE: 326. March 1983. https://archive.org/stream/byte-magazine-1985-03-rescan/1985_03_BYTE_10-03_Bargain_Computing#page/n339/mode/2up. Retrieved 19 March 2016.
- ↑ "Brief Editor, an incomplete rewrite, ver: 4.50". http://www.briefeditor.com. Retrieved 2008-07-08.
- ↑ "CRiSP: Brief Compatible Programmers Text Editor". Crisp, Inc. Vital, Inc. http://www.crisp.com/. Retrieved 2012-05-14.
- ↑ "Brief Editor keyboard mappings". http://www.dbase.com/help/Developer_Guide/IDH_KB_BRIEFKEYS.htm.
- ↑ "brief-keyboard". https://www.lugaru.com/man/brief-keyboard.html.
- ↑ "Visual Studio » BRIEF keyboard emulation implemented in VS2010 AddIn (downloadable project)". Mark McGinty. 7 April 2012. http://deprecatethis.blogspot.com/2012/04/visual-studio-brief-keyboard-emulation.html.
- ↑ "Text Editor Emulation". Microsoft. http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms937343.aspx.
- ↑ "GNU ELPA - crisp". GNU ELPA Packages. https://elpa.gnu.org/packages/crisp.html.
- ↑ "GNU ELPA - brief". GNU ELPA Packages. https://elpa.gnu.org/packages/brief.html.
- ↑ Sander, Jon (2018-08-16). "The Past Comes Around Again". https://irreal.org/blog/?p=7414.
External links
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