online collaborative code editing ide

Question

I am trying to build a collaborative code editor using node.js. I am able to make contents inside a textarea collaborative (multiple people can edit it simultaneously).

How to turn an existing textarea into a code editor using CodeMirror without replacing the textarea? (if I directly try to make the text area into editor using code mirror it will either replace it or create an editor below it without replacing it)

How do I make the existing text area into code editor?

Answer 1

Actually, this should be somewhat simple. If one builds a synchronous editor, it should be event-based, isn't it in your case?

So you should be able to do 2 things: detect an edit (and send it to others) and programmatically change the content of the edit area once you recieve a message ("another guy has edited"). And that's not difficult to do:

• to detect editing, use the change/changes events
• to set changes, use content manipulation methods like setValue or replaceRange