# Example "freewheeling" app that can be modified without being restarted

Running this repo in isolation won't be very helpful. If you haven't yet,
first check out [the driver app](https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/driver.love).
This repo is a template you can copy to create your own live apps that juggle
text editor widgets. The editors support copy/paste, search, infinite undo,
etc. You can't modify editor functionality live (yet?).

[Some reference documentation on how to create your own apps.](reference.md)

This repo is an example of a [Freewheeling App](http://akkartik.name/freewheeling),
designed above all to be easy to run, easy to modify and easy to share.

## Getting started

Install [LÖVE](https://love2d.org). It's just a 5MB download, open-source and
extremely well-behaved. I'll assume below that you can invoke it using the
`love` command, but that might vary depending on your OS.

Run this app from the terminal, [passing its directory to LÖVE](https://love2d.org/wiki/Getting_Started#Running_Games)

## Hacking

To modify it live without restarting the app each time, download [the driver
app](https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/driver.love). Here's an example session
using a fork of this repo:

![making changes without restarting the app](assets/2.gif)

If you run a .love file, your changes will go into the [save directory](https://love2d.org/wiki/love.filesystem.getSaveDirectory).
If you unzip the .love file into a new directory and run the directory
instead, your changes will go straight into the same directory.

## Keyboard shortcuts

Up to you! But within the included editor widget if you use it:

* `ctrl+f` to find patterns within a file
* `ctrl+c` to copy, `ctrl+x` to cut, `ctrl+v` to paste
* `ctrl+z` to undo, `ctrl+y` to redo
* `ctrl+=` to zoom in, `ctrl+-` to zoom out, `ctrl+0` to reset zoom
* `alt+right`/`alt+left` to jump to the next/previous word, respectively
* mouse drag or `shift` + movement to select text, `ctrl+a` to select all

Exclusively tested so far with a US keyboard layout. If
you use a different layout, please let me know if things worked, or if you
found anything amiss: http://akkartik.name/contact

## Known issues

* Both freewheeling apps and the driver for them currently benefit from being
  launched in terminal windows rather than by being clicked on in a desktop
  OS. See [the driver app](https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/driver.love/src/branch/main/README.md)
  for details.

* No support yet for Unicode graphemes spanning multiple codepoints.

* No support yet for right-to-left languages.

* Undo/redo may be sluggish in editor windows containing large files. Large
  files may grow sluggish in other ways.

* If you kill the process, say by force-quitting because things things get
  sluggish, you can lose data.

* Can't scroll while selecting text with mouse.

## Mirrors and Forks

This repo is a fork of [lines.love](http://akkartik.name/lines.html), an
editor for plain text where you can also seamlessly insert line drawings.
Its immediate upstream is [text.love](https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/text.love),
a version without support for line drawings. Updates to it can be downloaded
from the following mirrors:

* https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/template-live-editor
* https://codeberg.org/akkartik/template-live-editor
* https://nest.pijul.com/akkartik/template-live-editor (using the Pijul version control system)

Further forks are encouraged. If you show me your fork, I'll link to it here.

* https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/luaML.love - a "browser" for a Lua-based
  markup language, loosely analogous to HTML except it's all Lua.
* https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/bf.love - a toy environment for working with
  [BF](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brainfuck) programs.
* https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/broadsheet.love - a multi-column paginator that
  uses all available width while remaining readable.
* https://git.sr.ht/~akkartik/crosstable.love - for all-play-all tournaments.

## Feedback

[Most appreciated.](http://akkartik.name/contact)