A text editor or viewer with folding based on indentation

Question

I'm trying to get a better understanding of the *.dsl files as disassembled by the iasl program. Those files looks like:

/*
 * a comment
 */
Stuff
{
    More Stuff
    {
        Beer (a, b) // another comment
    }
    Hmm (mmm)
    {
        Package (0x04)
        {
            0xFFFF
        },

        Package (0x04)
        {
            0xFFFF
        }
    }
    Meh (x, y)
}

This syntax should be really easy for a text viewer / editor. Since I'm just viewing these files, the editing feature is not needed. The file has 11k lines which makes it more difficult to scan for text.

Is there a lightweight text viewer with folding capabilities? Both CLI and GUI solutions are welcome.

Addition: I would like to have the next features too:

• shortcuts to jump from the child to the parent (e.g. Beer to More Stuff or the { next to it)
• quick search (till now, I used less in which I can search by pressing / followed by the search term and Enter. The Firefox "on the bottom search" bar is something that I would like to see for a GUI program)
• bonus: hiding blocks of text

The purpose of the viewer is getting me through the text file faster.

Answer 1

The editor geany, also useful as an IDE, has indentation based folding for python source files.

It should be a way to associate .dsl files with this type of representation

Answer 2

VIM to the rescue!

You can use VIM to fold methods with a rapid command. In normal mode, type zf2j and you'll get the method folded.

You can associate a key shorcut to the zf2j command and... You are done! :D

EDIT:

Found an interesting table with all the commands related to folding in VIM:

• zf#j creates a fold from the cursor down # lines.
• zf/string creates a fold from the cursor to string .
• zj moves the cursor to the next fold.
• zk moves the cursor to the previous fold.
• zo opens a fold at the cursor.
• zO opens all folds at the cursor.
• zm increases the foldlevel by one.
• zM closes all open folds.
• zr decreases the foldlevel by one.
• zR decreases the foldlevel to zero -- all folds will be open.
• zd deletes the fold at the cursor.
• zE deletes all folds.
• [z move to start of open fold.
• ]z move to end of open fold.

Answer 3

GEdit

With a couple of extra plugins such as bookmarks and simple-folding, gedit could be a viable contender.

Bookmark shortcuts -

Folding shortcut Alt + Z

How to install

Install the extra plugins

sudo apt-get install gedit-plugins

download the two simple-folding files from sourceforge Save them to .gnome2/gedit/plugins n.b. create the folder if it doesnt exist.

Activate the Bookmarks and Simple-Folder plugins through the menu option Edit --> Preferences --> Plugins

Answer 4

For my particular needs (analysing ACPI tables), I've created FoldedViewer:

view.html

It's name is actually FoldedViewer (no trademark infrignment intended if any) and the JS/ HTML5 program is useful for speeding up analys of DSDT/ SSDT tables by providing folding capabilities. If you're using a recent browser, especially if it's open-source like Firefox or Chromium, you'll be able to select files through a file picker.

Features:

• Fold blocks (determined by indention, Ctrl + Click)
• Show the number of childs blocks
• Jump to line number
• Save the fold state in the browser using localStorage
• Works from browser, no installation required
• Opens file from URL or using the file picker of the browser
• Shows the namespace and object of the block under the mouse position
• Highlights the current line and selected block
• Collapse/ expand all blocks with a single Ctrl + Shift + Click