kilo commentary: In which an array of text lines turns out to be a bad design choice

Way back in step 55, the step was taken to store the file the editor is working on as an array of lines. Steps 119 through 125 are dealing with joining two lines (deleting at the start of a line) or creating a new line with the Enter key. Because of the array-of-lines data structure chosen many steps ago, these are both relatively complicated operations.

In an editor that treats a file simply as a sequence of characters, these operations are as easy (or hard) as inserting or deleting a character anywhere else in the file.

I am reminded of one of Fred Brooks' aphorisms, "plan to throw one away; you will, anyhow." kilo is not something you really fix so much as work through to identify all the mistakes to avoid the second time through.