Copy and paste

When a table field is active, the “Copy” command applies to the currently selected text segment. Thus, e.g., if a field contains the word “Node”, and you select the letters ‘o’ and ‘d’, then the “Copy” command places the text string “od” on the clipboard and nothing else. 

If none of the table fields are active, the “Copy” command will copy the entire table, both as a picture, and as an ASCII text table and place it on the clipboard. The picture can be pasted into any graphical document, while the ASCII text table can e.g., be pasted into a word processor document or spreadsheet.

The “Paste” command is only available when one of the table fields is active, and the clipboard contains some text. 

If the clipboard contains a single text item, the “Paste” command replaces the contents of the current text field with the contents on the clipboard. 

If the clipboard contains a table of text items, i.e., text items separated by tabs and returns, then the “Paste” command pastes these table data into the current table starting at the active text field. Thus, the first clipboard item is pasted into the active field. If the first clipboard item is followed by a tab character, the second clipboard item is pasted into table field to the right of the active field. If the first item is followed by a return character, the second clipboard item is pasted into table field below the active field. In this way the process continues. Each time a tab character is encountered, the next clipboard item is pasted into the field to the right of the previous field. Each time a return character occurs, the next clipboard item is pasted into the field in the next row below the active field. 

If the clipboard table is larger than the part of the current table where the clipboard data is pasted in, all clipboard items falling outside the current table are simply ignored.

If the dimension of the clipboard table is the same as the dimension of the current table, and the active field is located in the first row and column of the table, then the “Paste” command will replace the contents of the current table with the clipboard data.

When you paste table data like this, make sure that the current table and the clipboard table have the same column ordering.

Note that if a node table contains more than one alias of the same node, or both an alias and the corresponding “ego” node, the effect of a “Paste” operation is a bit complex. Assume, e.g., that “Node A” and its alias, appear respectively in say, row 3 and 4 of a node table, and assume that the corresponding rows in the clipboard table contain different data. Then the data in the lowest row, i.e., the row corresponding to the alias, is pasted after the data in the row corresponding to the ego. Obviously the data in the two rows must be the same eventually. As a result, the data in the lower row overwrites the data in the higher row.

Fortunately, if the effect of a “Paste” operation in a table was not what you wanted, you can always bring the table back to its previous state, before the entire “Paste” operation, by using the “Undo” command.