Although there is a built-in editor in Msc-generator, you can also use an external text editor of your choice. When you press Ctrl+E or click on ‘Text Editors...|External Editor...’ button on the ribbon, an external text editor is started, where you can edit the chart description. If you perform save in the text editor, the chart drawing is updated, so you can follow your changes. Also, if there were errors or warnings, they are displayed in a the usual manner. If you select an error, Msc-generator will instruct the external editor to jump to the location of the error (if the external editor supports this functionality.)

During the time you are working with an external editor, the built-in text editor becomes read-only. You can exit the external editor any time to return to the built-in one. By pressing Ctrl+E or clicking on the ‘Text Editors...|External Editor...’ ribbon button again, Msc-generator attempts to close the external editor (which will probably prompt you to save outstanding changes).

You can select the text editor to start in Preferences|External Editor. You can select between the Windows Notepad, Notepad++ or any editor of your preference. The author finds Notepad++ a very good editor, so I included specific support^[7].

Note that Msc-generator does not support unicode or wide character systems for charts. Write your labels in ASCII only. There are no guarantees for non-ASCII characters to display correctly or at all.