trailing blank line in a text file

[Robert Locke]

On Tue, 2004-07-20 at 21:39, Olga wrote:
> No in vi and nano I do not see anything. But in gedit I see the following
> (for example)
> 
> 1 Mike
> 2 John
> 3 Adam
> 4
> 
> The above is an example of what a file looks like with lines numbered.
> (numbers are not actually part of the file). I want the file to be only 3
> lines long (as an example); however, what I get is 4 lines where line 4 is
> an empty line. I can eliminate only using mc (F4). In nano, vim, vi it is
> invisible, but in gedit (gui editor) it shows what I displayed above. I
> can backspace after 4, it bring me to Adam, but when I save the file and
> reopen it, the output is exactly the same as I am showing now (empty line
> 4 stays).
> 

Let's try a different approach....

After you save the file in whichever editor, can we confirm that it
actually has the "four lines" or really just has "three lines"?

How about running "wc -l filename" and see how many lines it reports... 
This will help to confirm for you whether the file truly has the blank
line, or is just a visual construct of the editor.

--Rob