NOTE: even if you are someone who doesn't read ReadMe-type files, *BE SURE* to read the section below titled "COPYING MARGIN MODE FILES" if you use margins at all!
NOTE ALSO: Each section has a MARK defined for it... pull down "Utilities, Go To Mark..." to browse.
Feel free to experiment with this file while reading this text... you can always restore it with the "Project, Revert to Saved..." menu item.
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A new feature in Textra 1.18 is the real-time GUI-based margin system, much as one encounters in commercial word-processing systems, but rarely in shareware text editors. If you are using Textra to read this file, you can see the margin control bar at the top of the window, just below the status line. The margin sliders work pretty much like those in the commercial products.
Why margins?
A LITTLE BACKGROUND...
Reason number 1: you wanted it. No other feature has been asked for as much. I originally didn't think it would be worth the effort... Textra *is* a text editor, not a word processor or desktop publishing system... I thought it would always look like a 'wanna be'. But as I actually started to use it, I realized that while Textra is not (nor will ever be) Microsoft Word or Final Copy, it will always be faster (and simpler to use) at simple text :) Since for many of us most text use is simple text, this provided a second reason to actually get it released...
Reason number 2: You were right... it is useful! The addition of the margin system to Textra provides unprecedented ease-of-use to manage simple ASCII-based letters and other formatted text files. More than ever before, Textra earns it's name... it provides something quite "extra for text".
WHAT ARE MARGINS GOOD FOR?
One uses margin mode for paragraph-based documents... letters, book reports, etc. It is not for files that are line-based, like programming files or scripts. For those, just keep Textra in its native text-editor mode.
HOW TO USE IT...
The first thing to understand about using margin-mode is that whenever you use the RETURN or ENTER key, you create a new paragraph. Anything typed between these keys will be formatted on-screen according to the adjusted margins.
One can simply put the cursor anywhere within a paragraph to have the margin bar assume the margins set for that paragraph. (The same happens if text is selected within a paragraph.) If you change the setting of the margins by dragging the margin sliders, the paragraph immediately reformats to assume those margins.
Note that when you click on a margin slider, the status line will display the value of the margin for as long as the mouse button is depressed, and continuously updates the value as the slider is dragged.
Of course, Textra allows you to select more than one paragraph (or even the entire file), but the margin bar only displays the margins for the first selected paragraph. However, if the margins sliders are changed with more than one paragraph selected, all selected paragraphs will assume the new margins.
One final note about dragging the margin sliders... if you hold down an ALT key while dragging either the indent or left margin sliders, both sliders will move.
CREATING A NEW FILE...
1. Pull down "Project, Open New File..." (a new window will open.)
2. Pull down "Edit, Activate Margins..." (a requester will appear)
3. Select the "Line Breaks" checkbox and click "OK".
Now you can now enter your text and adjust the margins as desired.
OPENING AN EXISTING MARGIN FILE...
As you can see when you opened this file, once a margin-mode file exists, you can open it, save it and generally handle it like any normal text-mode file, using the same menu and key equivalents. In fact, pretty much all of Textra should work as expected... let me know if it doesn't!
IMPORTING SIMPLE-TEXT FILES (LETTERS, ETC.)...
Let's assume you have a formatted document in simple text format (readable by any text editor), and you want to work on it in margin mode...
1. Open the file in Textra's normal text-editor mode.
2. Make sure that at least one blank line exists between each paragraph. Many files are formatted this way for clarity normally. Add them in if they are not there.
The reason why: Since simple text files have RETURNs after every line, Textra cannot use them to tell where each paragraph ends in the input file. For the conversion process, Textra instead looks for a blank line in between each paragraph, so add them in unless they are there already.
NOTE: For ASCII graphics, it is necessary to temporarily put a blank line between each line of the graphic. This is easier than it sounds: provided 'doublespace.textra' and 'singlespace.textra' ARexx scripts, placed in your REXX: drawer by Textra's installation program, are extremely helpful in adding and deleting these lines, respectively.
3. Pull down "Edit, Activate Margins..." (a requester will appear)
4. Select the "Blank Lines" checkbox and click "OK".
Textra will compute workable margin setting for each paragraph which will preserve the current screen formatting. (To again produce a simple-text version of a margin file, see the section "SAVING AS SIMPLE TEXT", below.)
EXCHANGING FILES WITH OTHER WORD PROCESSORS...
From Others -> to -> Textra
Most word processors have a "save as text only" feature. You should locate and use this mode when creating the file to use as input to Textra. This format normally places each paragraph on a single line, of whatever length necessary to contain the entire paragraph. In this format, the RETURN at the end of the line also marks the end of the paragraph. (Because of this, there is no need to add 'blank lines' as there is when importing normal simple-text files.
Here's how to load in this kind of file...
1. Pull down "Project, Open New File..." (a new window will open.)
2. Pull down "Edit, Activate Margins..." (a reqester will appear)
3. Select the "Line Breaks" checkbox and click "OK". The entire document will assume a default formatting.
From Textra -> to -> Others
You can read Textra margin files directly into most word processors: when you do, they will usually ask a question similar to the above... something like "Do you want RETURNS after 'paragraphs' or 'every line'? You should indicate 'paragraphs' to these prompts.
It is recommended that copy the margin file and then read the copy into the other word processor. This preserves the original Textra margin format file should you need it later.
Helpful note: Some word-processors normally only display their proprietary-format files in their file requester lists. In such programs, you can usually specify a "Show all files" option to see Textra input files.
SAVING AS SIMPLE TEXT...
You can create a text-only version of a margin file at any time with these steps:
1. Pull down "Project, Save File As..." (a requester will open.)
2. Change the displayed name of the file so that the original margin mode file is not overwritten.
3. Select the "Plain Text (no margins)" gadget. (This gadget only appears in margin files).
4. Click the OK button.
COPYING MARGIN MODE FILES...
Textra keeps it's formatting information in a "shadow file" in the same directory as the text file. The shadow file is given the same name except for one difference: it has a '}' character prepended to it. (This causes the shadow files to appear last in alphabetical lists, like most file requesters and the "List by Name" feature of Workbench).
For example, if you create a margin file called...
Letter to Mom
...there will be a shadow file created called...
}Letter to Mom
...and this file will contain the related formatting information. Note however, that shadow files are not text files: they contain binary information.
The most important thing you should keep in mind about shadow files is: ALAWYS KEEP THEM WITH THE TEXT FILES. If you copy or rename the text file, do the same to the shadow file. If Textra can't find the shadow file when it loads the text file, it will not be able to format the document.
NOTE: The easiest way to copy a Textra margin file is to load it into Textra and do a "SAVE AS..." under a different filename or in a different location. This insures that the shadow file accompanies the new text file. Of course, you can also choose to copy both files under Workbench or from Shell.
Note that Textra will be able to tell if the text filebecomes out-of-sync with the shadow file, so you should not make changes to the text file with another editor... instead, make a copy and edit the copy. If Textra determines that the files are out-of-sync, it will ignore the shadow file and the document will appear unformatted.
One last note about shadow files... they also hold MARKs information, if any are defined. You can read more about MARKs in Textra.doc, if you like.
