change(1)

NAME
Change -- edit the change log history file

DESCRIPTION
The change macro is used to allow the user to keep track of changes to files in a manner similar to the GNU ChangeLog files. The change log file is simply a free format text file where the user can type in notes, and each day's worth of changes are automatically timestamped, making it easy for developers to inform users of their software what bugs have been fixed, etc.

The change macro keeps these comments in a file called Changes. (The name is kept to 8 characters for compatability with MS-DOS and OS/2 filename restrictions). When the change macro is executed, it looks firstly in the current directory for the change log file, and if not there, proceeds up the directory hierarchy looking for a file. This allows the user to keep a file in the top level directory but still be able to make edits to the change log even if the user is in a sub-directory.

It is also better (in my opinion) to have a global change log file than have each file include some comment as to why it was changed, because comments become benign after a long time and it is easier to truncate the change log file, than have to edit lots of changed sources.

The following is an example of a change log file: Thu Apr 18 08:59:26 1991 fox
   * tty.h, unix.c: Tried to tidy up the
     termio/termios/sgtty mess.
   * unix.cr: Make sure stderr gets redirected.
   * misc.cr/crisp.cr: <Tab> and <Shift-Tab> now
     indent/unindent block if hilighted.

The time stamp and username are automatically inserted for you together, with an indented asterisk so you can start typing immediately.

MENU/KEYS
This macro can be accessed from the CRISP features menu or by typing change at the command prompt.