https://www.adamhyde.net/towards-web-based-word-processors-p2/

To get this discussion off the ground, I think it’s helpful to first think of what the standard features of a text editor are since word processors have all these features and then some. It’s the ‘and then some’ that I’m most interested in i.e. the essential features that make something a word processor.

Text Editor Features

So, here is my first stab at defining the features of a general, all-purpose, text editor. Keeping in mind that there are no strict rules to this and all category clumpings for this entire discussion are necessarily loosey goosey… text editors include the ability to:

• open, update, and save a suitable document, format, and store (eg on the file system or online) for recording the text.
• CRUD (to slightly abuse an acronym used in programming) text ie Create, Read, Update, and Delete text. I include here the ability to add/update/delete via normal keyboard input as well as common cut and paste tools.

That is actually it – the core feature set for a basic editor. A text editor doesn’t need to do much more than this.

Then there is another set of features that your favorite text editor may have (most text editors have some of the following) while still remaining a text editor. I want to categorise these as text editor features (most are related directly to editing text) and they include the ability to:

• select text
• select single and multiple block level items (eg paragraphs)
• apply inline styles (such as italics, bold, underline, strikethrough etc)
• apply subscript/superscript
• spell check (to varying degrees of sophistication)
• find and replace characters and words (to varying degrees of sophistication)
• calculate a document-wide word count (including possibly character count, line count etc)
• add and remove tabbed space / indents
• create, modify and remove hyperlinks
• add and remove images
• apply block level (eg para/image) justification / alignment