A program, also known as an
editor, that enables you to create and
edit text files. There are many different types of
editors, but they all fall into two general categories:
line editors: A primitive form of editor that requires you to specify a specific line of text before you can make changes to it.
screen-oriented editors: Also called
full-screen editors, these editors enable you to modify any text that appears on the display screen by moving the cursor to the desired location.
The distinction between editors and
word processors is not clear-cut, but in general, word processors provide many more formatting features. Nowadays, the term editor usually refers to source code editors that include many special features for writing and editing source code.