The editor is customizable from
Window > Preferences > Micro Focus > COBOL > Editor. You can change the above features, as well as colors, line numbers, margins and more.
You can associate a file extension with the COBOL editor. See
Window > Preferences > General > Editors > File Associations. You can also associate a file extension with the content type of a COBOL file.
Horizontal ruler
Specify whether to display the ruler and its color.
Insert/overwrite mode
As well as the typing features above, you can also configure the default typing mode when the editor first opens a file: either
insert mode, or overwrite mode. The default is insert mode, so in order to change this ensure you select:
.
Note: This option is used for all types of
Enterprise Developer editors: COBOL, PL/I, BMS, etc.
Smart caret
- Pressing Tab in the sequence area moves caret to area A - with this option enabled, pressing Tab while the cursor is in the sequence are moves the cursor to the start of area A.
- Pressing home/end moves caret to the beginning/end of the area - changes the way the
Home and
End keys move the cursor in the COBOL editor. Pressing
Home repeatedly first moves the cursor immediately before the first non-white space in the current area, then at the beginning
of the area, or to the first non-white space in the preceding area. Pressing
End repeatedly first moves the cursor immediately after the last non-white space in the current area, and then at the start of
the following area.
Read-only mode
Specify the color that indicates areas of code that are read-only.
Refactoring COBOL code
Specify your preferences for the refactoring functionality:
- Rename in editor without dialog
- Enable this if you want rename without seeing the
Rename dialog box that offers a preview of your changes.
Remove trailing whitespace
- Remove trailing whitespace after column 80 only
- Remove all trailing whitespace - remove trailing whitespace in all COBOL areas
- Remove trailing whitespace on save - using the save command automatically removes trailing whitespace.
Block matching
Enable these preferences if you want the editor to highlight the keywords that form the statement you have selected. An additional
tooltip, containing the opening keyword, is also displayed when you hover over the intermediary and end keywords.
- Mark paired keywords for navigation (e.g. IF and END-IF) and display hover text on closing keyword
- With this option enabled, clicking on the opening or closing keyword of a statement highlights both keywords. A tooltip containing
the opening keyword is also displayed when you hover over the closing keyword.
- Mark intermediary keywords (e.g. ELSE) - clicking on the opening or closing keyword of a statement also marks any intermediary keywords. Also, hovering over the
intermediary keyword displays a tooltip containing the opening keyword.