Standard IRAF Tip: Fix backspace key
March 27th, 2004 by Marcos
Many Mac users apparently aren’t familiar with some standard IRAF tricks to getting the delete key to work properly. Most people insert a line like this:
!stty erase ^H
into their login.cl file so as to make the delete key work properly. Another issue is the delete key working right on laptops after the “e” IRAF command that lets you tap the up arrow and see your previous commands. My solution for this has been to change by default editor in IRAF to emacs, so my login.cl file has a line:
set editor = emacs
Evidently IRAF pulls in some keymapping from your standard text editor. Since I never invoke the iraf editior (be it vi or emacs or whatever) this change works for me. I believe there are ways to edit your vi.ed file somehow too.
Marcos Says
I’d like to point out that using the ecl is actually better than doing the ‘e’ and up arrow trick, but this post was first written before the ecl existed.
Dec 3rd, 2006 at 8:50 pm