6.4.3 The Edit menu

The ”Edit” menu contains entries for accessing the clipboard, and undoing or redoing editing actions. Most of these functions have shortcut keys associated with them.

Undo

(ALT-BKSP) Reverses the effect of the last editing action. The editing actions are stored in a buffer. Selecting this mechanism will move backwards through this buffer, i.e. multiple undo levels are possible. However, any selections that may have been made are not reproduced.

Redo

Repeats the last action that was just undone with Undo. Redo can redo multiple undone actions.

Cut

(Shift-DEL) Deletes the selected text from the window and copies it to the clipboard. Any previous clipboard contents are lost. The new clipboard contents are available for pasting elsewhere.

Copy

(Ctrl-INS) Copies the current selection to the clipboard. Any previous clipboard contents are lost. The new clipboard contents are available for pasting elsewhere.

Paste

(Shift-INS) Inserts the current clipboard contents in the text at the cursor position. The clipboard contents remain as they were.

Clear

(Ctrl-DEL) Clears (i.e. deletes) the current selection.

Select All

Selects all text in the current window. The selected text can then be cut or copied to the clipboard.

Unselect

undo the selection.

Show clipboard

Opens a window in which the current clipboard contents are shown.

When running an IDE under Windows, the ”Edit” menu has two additional entries. The IDE maintains a separate clipboard which does not share its contents with the Windows clipboard. To access the Windows clipboard, the following two entries are also present:

Copy to Windows

Copy the selection to the Windows clipboard.

Paste from Windows

Insert the contents of the Windows clipboard (if it contains text) in the edit window at the current cursor position.