denary 0.0.12

A curses-based text editor with syntax highlighting

Editor Documentation

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A modal terminal editor built on curses with a command-driven, event-based architecture and chunked text storage.

Includes syntax highlighting, multi-buffer management, registers and markers, undo/redo history, Git integration, async LSP support, subprocess execution, and HTTP requests.

Installation

Install via pip (Recommended)

If your package is published:

pip install denary

Then run:

denary

Or open a file directly:

denary main.py

---

Install from Source

Clone the repository:

git clone https://gitlab.com/jordaly/editor.git denary
cd denary

Using Poetry:

poetry install
poetry run python -m denary

Or using plain pip:

pip install -e .
denary

Recommended (Better): Alias That Runs Denary Directly

Instead of activating the venv every time, just point the alias to the venv’s binary.

Assume your venv is here:

~/venvs/denary_venv

Edit your ~/.bashrc:

nano ~/.bashrc

Add this line:

alias denary="~/venvs/denary_venv/bin/denary"

Then reload:

source ~/.bashrc

Now you can run:

denary
denary myfile.py

Quick Start

Open a File

denary myfile.py

If the file does not exist, it will be created.

Key Bindings

Arrow & Basic Movement

Shortcut	Action
Right	Move cursor right
Left	Move cursor left
Up	Move cursor up
Down	Move cursor down
PageUp	Page up
PageDown	Page down
Ctrl+Right	Jump right (word/semantic move)
Ctrl+Left	Jump left (word/semantic move)
Ctrl+Up	Scroll / move up (mode dependent)
Ctrl+Down	Scroll / move down (mode dependent)

---

Vim-Style Normal Mode Navigation

Shortcut	Action
h	Move left
j	Move down
k	Move up
l	Move right
0	Jump to start of line
$	Jump to end of line
w / W	Move forward by word
b / B	Move backward by word
e / E	Move to end of word
f / F	Find character forward/backward
g	Go command prefix
G	Go to bottom
H	Jump to top of visible window
L	Jump to bottom of visible window
%	Jump to matching bracket

---

Insert & Editing (Normal Mode)

Shortcut	Action
i	Enter insert mode
a	Append after cursor
A	Append at end of line
o	Insert new line below
O	Insert new line above
x	Delete character
d	Delete (operator)
c	Change (operator)
y	Yank (copy)
p	Paste after
P	Paste before
u	Undo
U	Undo line / extended undo
J	Join lines
>	Indent right
<	Indent left

---

Search & Repeat

Shortcut	Action
/	Search forward
n	Next match
N	Previous match
*****	Search word under cursor

---

Marks & Registers

Shortcut	Action
m	Set marker
'	Jump to marker (linewise)
`	Jump to marker (exact position)
@	Execute macro
q	Start/stop macro recording

---

LSP / Diagnostics (Normal Mode)

Shortcut	Action
K	Show LSP hover / definition
;	LSP-related navigation
Ctrl+D	Diagnostics-related action

(Exact behavior depends on your handler implementations.)

---

Alt-Based Commands

Shortcut	Action
Alt+;	Toggle selection mode
Alt+Right / Alt+.	Indent right
Alt+Left / Alt+,	Indent left
Alt+/	Alternative slash action
Alt+h / Alt+l	Alternative horizontal move
Alt+j / Alt+k	Move lines or cursor
Alt+Up / Alt+Down	Scroll view
Alt+9 / Alt+0	Jump line start/end
Alt+w	File search
Alt+r	Custom action
Alt+i / Alt+o	Punctuation jump
Alt+[	Bracket-related action
Alt+'	Quote-related action

---

Shift Selection

Shortcut	Action
Shift+Right	Expand selection right
Shift+Left	Expand selection left
Shift+Up	Expand selection up
Shift+Down	Expand selection down
Ctrl+Shift+Right	Expand selection by word
Ctrl+Shift+Left	Expand selection by word

---

Misc

Shortcut	Action
Ctrl+A	Select all
Ctrl+P	Previous buffer
Ctrl+X	Cut / special action
Ctrl+O	Open file
Ctrl+I	Jump forward in jump list
Q	Quit variant
PageUp / PageDown	Scroll

Commands

Buffer Actions

Command	Description
h / help	Show help
q	Exit editor
w	Save current buffer
ls	List open buffers
open	Open a file
bufnew	Create new buffer
nbuf / nextbuf / next / n	Next buffer
pbuf / prevbuf / prev / p	Previous buffer
delbuf / d	Delete buffer
ff	File search
ffr	New file search
fb	Buffer picker
ex	File explorer

---

UI & Behavior

Command	Description
themes	Change editor theme
ln	Toggle line numbers
gch	Toggle Git highlight
scrolloff <n>	Set scroll offset

---

Markers

Command	Description
m / marker	Add local/global marker
pm	Pick marker
dm	Delete markers in this buffer
dgm	Delete global markers
dpm	Delete specific marker
dam	Delete all markers

---

Text Utilities

Command	Description
clear_registers	Reset registers
reset_h_matches	Reset highlighting
replace	Replace text
comment	Toggle comment
upper / lower / capitalize	Change case
filetype <type>	Set syntax mode

---

Utilities

Command	Description
align	Align text by a delimiter (e.g. =, :, ,, `
column_edit	Insert, replace, or delete text within column ranges per line
date	Copy date
datetime	Copy current date & time
file_path	Copy current file path
json_format	Format JSON in selection or entire file
number_lines	Add line numbers to each line
rejoin	Split and rejoin selection or entire file using a delimiter
remove_empty_lines	Remove blank or whitespace-only lines
reverse_lines	Reverse the order of lines
shuffle_lines	Randomly shuffle lines
slugify	Convert text to URL-friendly slug format
sort / sort_r	Sort selection or entire file by lines (normal or reverse)
trim / trim_l / trim_r	Trim whitespace (both, left, or right) per line
unique_lines / dedup	Remove duplicate lines (keep first occurrence)
uuid	Copy random UUID
wrap	Wrap text to a specified width
json_format	formats json with indentation

---

Git Commands

Command	Description
git_status	Show Git status
git_diff	Show diff
git_commit_all	Commit all
git_blame	Show blame
git_log	Show history
git_refresh	Refresh state
git_hunk	Show previous version of changed code

---

LSP Commands

Command	Description
lsp_diagnostics	Show buffer diagnostics
lsp_hover	Show hover info
lsp_definition	Go to definition
lsp_refresh	Restart LSP for buffer
lsp_references	References picker
lsp_line_diagnostics	Show diagnostics for current line
lsp_clear_diagnostics	Clear diagnostics
lsp_clear_line_diag / clrld	Clear diagnostics for current line

---

AI Commands

Command	Description
ai	Send a custom instruction to the AI
ai_gen	Generate code at the cursor
ai_review	Review Git diff for issues
ai_commit_message	Generate a commit message from Git diff
ai_get	Retrieve AI result at the cursor
ai_show	Show AI completion picker
ai_remove	Cancel/remove AI completion at the cursor
change_ai_model	Change the active AI model

---

HTTP Request Execution

Select a block and run:

Command	Description
req	Make http request

Request Format

<HTTP_METHOD> <URL>
<Header>: <Value>
<Header>: <Value>

<Optional Body>

Examples

GET:

GET https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/todos/1
Accept: application/json

POST:

POST https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/posts
Content-Type: application/json

{
    "title": "Hello world",
    "body": "Testing request from editor",
    "userId": 1
}

Regex Replacement

Perform regex-based find and replace in the current buffer.

Command	Description
replace	Run a regex search and replace

---

Capture Groups

Parentheses create capture groups that can be reused in the replacement.

Syntax	Meaning
\0	Entire match
\1	First group
\2	Second group
\3	Third group

Example

Find

(\w+)\s+(\w+)

Replace

\2 \1

Result

hello world → world hello

---

Named Capture Groups

Groups can also be named.

(?P<name>pattern)

Named groups are referenced in the replacement using:

\g<name>

Example

Find

(?P<first>\w+)\s+(?P<last>\w+)

Replace

\g<last> \g<first>

Result

john doe → doe john

---

Case Transformations

The replacement string supports case modifiers.

Syntax	Effect
\U	Uppercase until \E
\L	Lowercase until \E
\u	Uppercase next character
\l	Lowercase next character
\E	End transformation

Example

Find

select

Replace

\U\0\E

Result

select → SELECT

---

Word Boundaries

\b matches the boundary between a word and a non-word character.

Example

Find

\bselect\b

Matches

select

Does not match

selected

---

Example: SQL Keyword Formatting

Find

\b(select|from|where|join|group\s+by|order\s+by)\b

Replace

\U\0\E

Result

select name from users where id = 1
↓
SELECT name FROM users WHERE id = 1

Configuration

Denary loads its configuration from a platform-specific directory.

Config Location

Linux

~/.config/denary/init.py

macOS

~/Library/Application Support/denary/init.py

Windows (WSL recommended)

~/.config/denary/init.py

If the file does not exist, create it manually.

Example:

mkdir -p ~/.config/denary
nano ~/.config/denary/init.py

---

LSP Configuration

The init.py file allows you to:

• Configure Language Servers (LSPs)
• Map file extensions to language identifiers
• Provide custom initialization settings

Denary expects two dictionaries:

LSP_CONFIG = {}
EXT_TO_LANG = {}

---

Example Configuration

LSP_CONFIG

LSP_CONFIG = {
    "python": {
        "cmd": [
            "/home/user/.config/denary/pylsp_venv/bin/python",
            "-m",
            "pylsp",
        ],
        "settings": {
            "pylsp": {
                "plugins": {
                    "flake8": {"enabled": True, "maxLineLength": 100},
                    "pyflakes": {"enabled": False},
                    "pycodestyle": {"enabled": False},
                }
            },
        },
    },

    "javascript": {
        "cmd": [
            "/home/user/.config/denary/ts_server/node_modules/.bin/typescript-language-server",
            "--stdio",
        ],
    },

    "c": {
        "cmd": [
            "/home/user/.config/denary/clangd_venv/bin/clangd",
            "--all-scopes-completion",
            "--clang-tidy",
            "--offset-encoding=utf-8",
        ],
    },

    "csharp": {
        "cmd": [
            "mono",
            "/home/user/.config/denary/omnisharp/OmniSharp.exe",
            "--languageserver",
        ],
    },

    "sql": {
        "cmd": [
            "/home/user/go/bin/sqls",
        ],
    },
}

---

EXT_TO_LANG

This maps file extensions to language keys defined in LSP_CONFIG.

EXT_TO_LANG = {
    ".py": "python",
    ".c": "c",
    ".h": "c",
    ".cpp": "c",
    ".js": "javascript",
    ".ts": "javascript",
    ".jsx": "javascript",
    ".tsx": "javascript",
    ".cs": "csharp",
    ".sql": "sql",
}

---

How It Works

1. You open a file:

   denary main.py
   

2. Denary checks the file extension (.py)

3. It maps it using EXT_TO_LANG

4. It loads the corresponding LSP from LSP_CONFIG

5. The language server is started using the cmd array

---

Recommended Structure for LSP Tools

It is recommended to keep all LSP-related tools inside:

~/.config/denary/

Example layout:

~/.config/denary/
├── init.py
├── pylsp_venv/
├── clangd_venv/
├── ts_server/
└── omnisharp/

This keeps your setup portable and isolated.

---

Important Notes

• cmd must be a list (not a string)
• Paths must be absolute
• The language key in EXT_TO_LANG must exist in LSP_CONFIG
• If an extension is not mapped, no LSP will be started