BRIEF

BRIEF
Name	BRIEF
Version	3.11 (1992)
Vendor	UnderWare Solution Systems Borland
Author	David Nanian Michael Strickman
Licence	Commercial
WWW

BRIEF is a flexible full-screen text editor for DOS or OS/2. The product was designed for use with high level languages such as C, Pascal, COBOL, and dBASE.

History

The programmers editor that was for a time in the mid and late 80s more or less a standard in the DOS world, originally developed by UnderWare Corp, then bought by Solution Systems and later taken over by Borland. BRIEF is supposed to stand for "Basic Reconfigurable Interactive Editing Facility" although many contend that is a retronym.

Features

• Context-sensitive online help
• Reconfigurable keyboard
• Supported assemblers:
  • Microsoft Macro Assembler 4.0
  • Phar Lap 386 asm
  • Borland Turbo Assembler
• Supported compilers:
  • Alsys ADA 4.4.2, Janus Ada, Meridian Ada
  • Microsoft BASIC Compiler, QuickBASIC
  • Borland C++
  • Realia, Micro Focus COBOL, mbp Visual COBOL
  • Lahey Fortran F77L 4.10, Fortran F77L-EM/32 4.00
  • Logitech Modula-2, JPI TopSpeed Modula-2
  • Oregon Pascal-2, Microsoft Pascal, Turbo Pascal 4.0
  • Arity Prolog
• Supported third-party packages
  • Microsoft Programmer's Workbench
  • Microsoft Quick Help (QH)
  • PVCS - Polytron Version Control System
  • Sourcerer's Apprentice
  • TLIB - version control package by Burton Software Systems

Syntax highlighting

Built in

Syntax highlighting, automatic indenting, statement completion (template editing), compiler support (compiling from within the editor) and automatic error location for Ada, Basic, C, C++, CBRIEF, Cobol, FORTRAN, Modula-2, Pascal and xBase. Syntax highlighting support for most programming, batch and scripting languages available in the early 90s.

Macro support

• BRIEF has a keyboard recording and macro editing capabilities, keyboard macros can be edited and used on their own or used in the programmable macro modes.
• It also had an "action macro" system, that was basically the same as the keyboard macros but used internal commands and could do some things that the keyboard system could not including build custom controls.
• The LISP like macro language of versions 1 and 2 of BRIEF was still supported.
• CBRIEF is a C like macro language that was introduced in version 3 by popular request, the original remained the main macro language of the package. By versions 3.1 and higher CBRIEF has become the main macro and the software can convert LISP like macros to CBRIEF macros
• REXX is not supported.

Keyboard mappings

• Built in: WordStar and a number of common mini and mainframe editor emulations.
• You can add your own.

Versions

Solution Systems

• 2.0 (1987) - BRIEF macro language
• 2.01 (1988)
• 2.5 (1989) - BRIEF for OS/2
• 3.0 (1990)
• 3.1 (1991) - supported features such as HPFS long file names and OS/2 specific commands and features in the macro language.

Borland

• BRIEF 3.1 (1992)
• BRIEF 3.11 (1992)

Known issues

The Borland version 3.1 for OS/2 from 1991/2 is known to have numerous bugs due to the use of an alpha version Borland compiler, while offering nothing over the SS 3.1 version, either try to get hold of the last bug fixed 3.11 version of the Borland code or the SS 3.1 version which is actually better behaved than either of the Borland versions.

OS/2 editors with BRIEF compatibility features

	Features
Editor	Keyboard mappings	UI
BOXER	x
FlexEdit	x
Microsoft Editor	x
Preditor/2	x	x
RimStar	x

Publications

• Richard Hale Shaw: Brief: Programmer's Editor Harnesses OS/2's Virtual Memory Capabilities - PC Magazine (1989-10-21)

Links

• BRIEF for DOS and OS/2 Version 3.1 Users Guide - 1992