Systems & CLI · Advanced
Build a Text Editor
Write a terminal text editor in about 1000 lines of C with raw-mode input, VT100 screen rendering, syntax highlighting, and incremental search.
You build a full-screen terminal text editor from scratch in C, with no curses library, talking directly to the terminal using raw mode and VT100 escape sequences. You manage an in-memory array of text rows, handle cursor movement and scrolling, open and save files, and add a status bar, incremental search, and language-aware syntax highlighting. It is worth building because it demystifies how editors like vim render and respond instantly, while teaching you precise control of terminal I/O, escape codes, and a non-trivial data structure for editable text. The result is a genuinely useful program and a portfolio piece that proves you can write substantial systems code without leaning on a framework.
What you build
- Enters terminal raw mode by tweaking termios flags
- Renders the screen with VT100 escape sequences and double buffering
- Stores and edits text as a dynamic array of rows
- Supports cursor movement, scrolling, and line wrapping
- Opens, edits, and saves files to disk with a dirty flag
- Provides incremental search with match highlighting
- Applies syntax highlighting for keywords, strings, and comments
What it teaches
- Terminal raw mode and termios configuration
- VT100 escape sequences and cursor control
- Designing an editable text buffer data structure
- Append-buffer rendering to avoid flicker
- Incremental search and state machines for highlighting
- Disciplined C in a single, readable codebase
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Take it further
- Add multiple buffers and a way to switch between open files.
- Support UTF-8 and tab rendering with proper column widths.
- Add undo and redo with an edit-history stack.
