XNotesPlus Man Page
NAME
xnotes+ - X window system sticky notes
SYNOPSIS
xnotes+ [ -c | --sb | --sv | --ns | --na | --help/-?/-h | -
-bs bufsize | --notedir notedir | --interval seconds | --nw
pixels | --ao pixels | --tmpdir tmpdir | --printcmd cmd | -
-emailcmd cmd | - -calendarcmd cmd | --homedir path | -
-xpmdir dir | --audiocmd cmd | --audiodir dir | --noaudio |
--addrdir dir | --pilotdir dir | --rgbfile path | --defaults
| --install | --version ]
DESCRIPTION
XNotesPlus, the successor to XPostitPlus and xpostit, pro-
vides a mechanism for manipulating on-screen sticky notes.
XNotes may be displayed, edited, and saved to disk files.
In addition, any on-screen note may be resized to any arbi-
trary size either when it is created or at a later time.
Notes can have alarms, be categorized and colored by pro-
ject, printed, and emailed. There are quite a few options
available for each note.
All notes can be "hidden" - the notes are still available
but not shown on the screen until requested by the user.
Hidden notes will stay hidden when xnotes+ is exited and
then restarted (as long as the user saves all notes before
exiting).
The "plus" side of XNotesPlus includes its interface with
the 3Com PalmPilot(R) handheld PDA (personal digital assi-
tant). You can upload XNotes to the Pilot, download Pilot
Memos into XNotes, do backups and syncing of backups of your
Pilot, and retrieve (later to upload) data from the Pilot's
Address database. Additionally, another plus is the
Envelope printing feature. This makes use of the Address
database from the Pilot.
Envelope printing makes use of the Nenscript tool, the
source of which is included with XNotesPlus. The Pilot Tool
feature is a wrapping around the very useful PilotLink set
of tools. These, however, are not included with the
XNotesPlus source.
When xnotes+ is first invoked, it creates a small window
with the XNotesPlus logo. This is the control window for
xnotes+. Additionally, if any notes were stored in the save
directory (see below), these will be placed on the screen at
their last locations, unless they were hidden when saved
(see below). Each XNote is a seperate window on the screen.
XNotesPlus is controlled using the mouse buttons and a menu.
XNotes are created using a drop down menu.
OPTIONS
XNotesPlus has a very large number of command line options.
In the Motif version you can use the application defaults
file instead of the command line options to set these. In
the GTK version you can use the XNotesPlus.cfg file. The
Motif version of XNotesPlus accepts all of the standard X
Toolkit command line options, and both versions accept the
additional options listed below. With the 3.0 release, all
commannd line options, in both versions, use two dashes (--)
instead of one (as the previous versions had done).
-c Enables compatibility mode. Initially this was for
notes created using the %! magic cookie, ie Version
2.0 and Version 2.1. In XPostitPlus 2.2 this was
changed to %%!! because the original cookie was the
one being used for Postscript files. In the future
this mode may cover other items that are not compa-
tible between versions/releases. Yes, this option
is the only one that still accepts a single dash.
--sb Depricated - no longer used in XNotesPlus.
--sv Enables save-on-exit. When specified, this option
tells xnotes+ to save all XNotes to disk files when
exiting. If not specified, notes can be saved to
disk files manually by the user or via the autosave
feature. It is useful to specify this option since
hidden notes cannot be saved unless either the "Save
All Notes" option is used or the autosave option has
not been disabled. Its also helpful to use this
option since its not guaranteed that the autosave
feature will have saved all notes since their last
updates when xnotes+ exits.
--ns Disables the autosave feature.
--na Disables alarms.
--help | -? | -h
Displays a usage message.
--bs number
Depricated - no longer used in XNotesPlus.
--notedir dir
Specifies the directory to load and save notes. If
path begins with a `/' it is taken as-is; if it does
not begin with a `/', the path is taken relative to
the home directory. If the named directory does not
already exist, then xnotes+ attempts to create it.
The default is .xnotesplus.
--interval
Sets the timeout interval (in minutes) for when the
autosave timeout should expire. When this timer
expires, all notes are automatically saved to disk.
The default value is 10 minutes.
--nw pixels
Depricated - no longer used in XNotesPlus.
--ao offset
The offset is specified in pixels and is used to
determine the X and Y offsets from an anchor note
for a note being cascaded. The default value is 15
pixels.
--tmpdir path
Specifies the path name of the directory to use for
temporary files. By default ``/tmp'' is used.
--printcmd cmd
This must be a quoted command string that can be
used as the format string to sprintf(). It must
include "%s" for the temporary file name used when
printing a note. The buffer created with sprintf(),
this option value, and the temporary file name is
passed to the system() call to print the note. By
default, the printcmd value is ``lpr %s''.
--emailcmd cmd
The "Email" option from the notes menu will pop up a
window prompting for an email address. The --
emailcmd command line option or .emailCmd resource
can be set to your systems mailer command. The
mailer must accept the text of the mail via standard
input (actually as a pipe from "cat tmpfile").
"cmd" must be a Unix style command in printf() for-
mat. See the section on Configuring the mailer.
--calendarcmd cmd
This is the command used to produce a calendar for
the current month. On most Unix systems this will
be ``cal'', which is the default. The output from
this command is redirected to a temporary file and
then inserted into a note at the current cursor
location.
--homedir path
Specifies the base directory from which the File
Selection Window will look for files and direc-
tories. If not specified, and the associated
resource .homeDir is not set then the environment
variable HOME is used. If this is not set either,
then the File Selection Window uses the root (/)
directory as its start point.
--xpmdir dir
Where XNotesPlus bitmaps can be found. This is nor-
mally under the ``notedir'' directory.
--audiocmd cmd
Command to run audio files (use %s for audio file).
--audiodir dir
Where audio files are stored. This is normally
under the ``notedir'' directory.
--noaudio
Disable audio for alarms.
--addrdir dir
Where address files are stored.
--rgbfile path
Fully qualified path to rbg.txt file.
--pilotdir dir
Directory to save PalmPilot backups to.
--defaults
Show configured defaults for all parameters. Nor-
mally this is just used for development work.
--notips
Disable the Tool Tips. This can be turned on and
off at run time. This option can be used to set the
initial state of the Tool Tips.
--install
Install a private colormap for XNotesPlus. May help
on low color displays, although XNotesPlus really
doesn't use that many colors.
--version
Displays the current version of xnotes+.
MOTIF RESOURCES
The Motif version of XNotesPlus understands all of the core
X Toolkit resource names and classes as well as those listed
below, which are all of class XNotesPlus. All of the
resources listed are also available as command line argu-
ments and can be specified using the ``XNotesPlus''
resources file. This file should be installed, but only if
modified by the user, in the users $HOME/app-defaults direc-
tory with the XAPPLRESDIR environment variable set to the
same directory.
The resources below are listed with their respective command
line arguments. See the OPTIONS section for details on
their meanings.
.compatibility
Command Line Option: -c
.scrollBar
Command Line Option: --sb
.saveNotes
Command Line Option: --sv
.noSave Command Line Option: --ns
.noAlarm
Command Line Option: --na
.bufSize
Command Line Option: --bs
.noteDir
Command Line Option: --notedir
.interval
Command Line Option: --interval
.nameWidth
Command Line Option: --nw
.anchorOffset
Command Line Option: --ao
.tmpDir Command Line Option: --tmpdir
.printCmd
Command Line Option: --printcmd
.emailCmd
Command Line Option: --emailcmd
.calendarCmd
Command Line Option: --calendarcmd
.homeDir
Command Line Option: --homdir
.xpmDir Command Line Option: --xpmdir
.audioCmd
Command Line Option: --audiocmd
.audioDir
Command Line Option: --audiodir
.noAudio
Command Line Option: --noaudio
.addrDir
Command Line Option: --addrdir
.rgbFile
Command Line Option: --rgbfile
.pilotDir
Command Line Option: --pilotdir
.noTips Command Line Option: --notips
.install
Command Line Option: --install
Note that it doesn't make any sense to specify the Help,
Version, or Defaults resources in the ``XNotesPlus'' appli-
cation resources file since all of these will cause
XNotesPlus to immediately exit.
WINDOWS AND DIALOGS
XNotesPlus uses several windows to manage the notes and
access other features. These include the Control Window,
the Notes windows, the Print Envelopes window, the PalmPilot
Interface window, the Projects windows, the Alarm window and
file selection windows, along with various dialogs for text
input and ordinary messages.
THE CONTROL WINDOW
The Control Window is the small window that opens when you
start the program. It is a relatively small window whose
maximum size is fixed but which can be made smaller using
window manager controls, if desired. XNotesPlus allows four
operations to be performed from its Control Window. Click-
ing (ie pressing and then releasing) the left mouse button
in the control window will cause all XNotes on the screen to
be raised to the top - that is, they rise above all other
windows on the display. Pressing the middle mouse button in
the control window will cause all XNotes notes on the screen
to be lowered to the bottom of all other windows. Pressing
the right mouse button in the control window raises the
xnotes+ menu. Finally, pressing the left mouse button down,
holding it there, and dragging it out of the Control Window
will open a new note window. This is called "tearing off" a
new note. Once the note is opened you can release the mouse
button.
Users with 2 button mice will need to check with the X
Server documentation as to how a 3 button mouse can be emu-
lated and how the 2 buttons will be mapped to match a 3 but-
ton mouse.
THE XNOTES+ MENU
The xnotes+ menu provides the following selections:
Create Notes
A submenu of different note sizes you can pick from
to create new notes.
Raise All Notes
Raise all XNotes to the top of all other windows.
This is equivalent to pressing the left mouse button
in the control window.
Lower All Notes
Lower all XNotes so they are below all other win-
dows. This is equivalent to pressing the middle
mouse button in the control window.
Save All Notes
Save all XNotes to disk files. The directory used
is specified either with --notedir or with .noteDir
in the XNotesPlus application defaults file. Notes
are saved only if they have been modified and not
previously saved since that modification.
Unhide All Notes
All notes that have been hidden will be unhidden.
Hidden Notes
Pops up a scrolled list of all notes that are
currently hidden. The list contains the names of
the notes so it is wise to give a note a meaningful
name (using the Name option from the pull-down menu
of each note) before it is hidden. If no notes are
hidden then an error message is displayed stating
this fact.
Cascade Notes
Each note can be ``anchored''. If one or more notes
are anchored and the "Cascade" option is chosen from
the xnotes+ menu, then all the visible notes are
cascaded onto the anchored notes. An attempt is
made to distribute all visible notes evenly amongst
all the anchored notes. Each note also has an
"unanchor" option as well. Only one of "anchor" or
"unanchor" is sensitive for any given note. Hidden
notes are not affected by the cascade feature. The
default offset for cascaded notes (from the anchored
note) is 15 pixels. This can be changed with the
-ao option or the .anchorOffset resource.
Find A Note
If you "lose" a note and want to bring it up at the
cursor, select ``Find A Note'' from the xnotes+
menu. A pop up list of all notes will be presented.
Select the note you want and if it will pop up at
the cursor. Selecting a note from the list will
close this dialog window. The ``Cancel'' button
will close the dialog if no note is selected.
Envelopes
Allow simple printing of two sizes of envelopes,
making use of user specified addresses and/or the
list of addresses retrieved from a Palm Pilot's
Addresses database. See the section on Printing
Envelopes.
Projects
The Projects dialog. This allows you to define pro-
jects and assign them colors. All XNotes can be
assigned to any project. Once assigned, they take
on the color of that project so they become easier
to associate with one another. This feature is dis-
cussed in more detail in the section titled Pro-
jects.
Pilot Tool
The Pilot Tool dialog allows you limited abilities
to manage your Palm Pilot. These features are dis-
cussed in the section on the Pilot Tool.
Enable/Disable Tool Tips
By default, tool tips are enabled. These are the
small windows that pop open when you place the mouse
over certain buttons, lists, or other window com-
ponents. Currently, tool tips are available in
places where the use of a button or list might not
be obvious. Once you've learned to use these
features you can disable the tool tips. This menu
option will turn tool tips on or off while the pro-
gram runs, but you can also specify the initial
state of the tool tips with either a command line
option or an application resource (Motif) or config
file (GTK) entry.
Exit Exit xnotes+. If the --sv command line option was
given, or the saveNotes resource is true, all XNotes
will be saved to disk first. Otherwise you will be
prompted to save any notes that have recently been
modified and not yet saved.
The Create Notes Submenu This menu allows you a choice of
creating a few different sizes of notes. The sizes of the
notes, specified in inches, is actually fairly accurate,
although probably not exact. XNote windows may or may not
need to be positioned using the window manager. This
depends on the window manager you are using and the use of
dynamic placement features within that window manager. If
possible (and/or necessary), you should turn dynamic window
placement off for XNotes so that the notes will pop up in
their old spots.
Create 1.5x2 Note
Create a new XNote, 1.5 inches tall by 2 inches
wide.
Create 2x3 Note
Create a new XNote, 2 inches tall by 3 inches wide.
Create 3x3 Note
Create a new XNote, 3 inches square.
Create 3x4 Note
Create a new XNote, 3 inches tall by 4 inches wide.
Create 3x5 Note
Create a new XNote, 3 inches tall by 5 inches wide.
Create 4x6 Note
Create a new XNote, 4 inches tall by 6 inches wide.
The default size for a note created by dragging the mouse,
left button down, out of the Control Window is 3x3.
THE HIDDEN NOTES LIST
This dialog pops up from the ``Hidden Notes'' option of the
xnotes+ menu. The list is a scolled list of all notes that
are currently hidden. If there are not enough hidden notes
to fill the visible list then no scrollbar will be present.
If more hidden notes exist than can fit in the visible list,
then a scrollbar will become available for you to scroll
through the list.
Note that currently if you have this window open and then
hide a note, that note will not automatically show up in the
list. In this case you need to close the list window and
then reopen it.
XNOTES
Each XNote is made up of two parts (plus the scrollbar): A
text window where the text of the note is stored and a menu
bar. To enter text into an XNote, simply move the mouse
cursor into the text window and start typing. Use the mouse
buttons and arrow keys to move around the window and for
manipulating the selections for cut-and-paste operations. A
number of translations - ie keyboard shortcuts - are avail-
able. See the section on Keyboard Shortcuts for more
details.
The menu bar has four icons, each with its own menu. The
first two icons are, by default, small gray circles. The
leftmost circle is for alarms, the next one for anchors. The
next icon, the file icon is for file operations such as sav-
ing or emailing the note. The last icon is the notes icon,
which is used to access features such as naming the note,
assigning it to a project or inserting a calendar.
Clicking the left mouse button on the first icon shows the
alarms menu. There are two options: Set Alarm and Disable
Alarm. To set a notes alarm, select ``Set Alarm'' from the
alarms pull down menu. A window pops up with month, day,
hour and minute fields. The default for each of these is
the last alarm time that had been set (if no alarm had ever
been set for a note then the time is actually the time the
note was created). Use the arrow buttons on either side of
each value to set each field to the day and time you wish
the alarm to go off. You can use the Toggle button to reset
the fields to the current time. When the alarm expires, a
small window will pop up reminding you for which note the
alarm had been set.
Beneath the alarm settings is a scrolled list of audio files
you can choose to play when the alarm goes off. You don't
have to play an audio file, its just available if you'd like
to. A few default audio files should have been in the dis-
tribution you received. If you choose an audio file to play
you will also need to select the number of times to play it.
The Repeat field should be set to something other than 0 or
else the audio alarm won't play.
Playing audio alarms requires that an application that can
play the files be installed and XNotesPlus is configured to
use it properly. See the section on Configuring The Audio
Command.
If you wish to save this value between invokations you
should use either the notes ``Save'' option or the ``Save
All Notes'' option from the plaid windows menu. When a
notes alarm is set the gray icon will be replaced with an
icon of a clock (or wristwatch, if you like).
To turn off the a notes alarm, select ``Unset Alarm'' from
the menu. This will disable the alarm for that note and
remove the clock icon from the menu bar, returning it to the
gray circle.
Next to the alarms menu is the anchor menu. This menu has
only two options: Set Anchor and Disable Anchor. These do
pretty much as you'd expect. An anchored note is one that
will be at the bottom of the stack of notes when you cascade
them. Only one of the two options in this menu will be
active at any given time. If the "Set Anchor" option is
active, then the note is not currently anchored. If the
"Disable Anchor" is active, then the note is currently set
as an anchored note. When anchored, the anchor icon changes
from the gray dot to an icon in the shape of an anchor.
The file menu contains options pertaining to file input and
output:
Save After entering text in the XNote, you may wish to
save the note in a disk file using the file menus
``Save'' option. This way, if the machine goes
down, or if you exit xnotes+, the note can be
restored when you restart xnotes+. XNotes are also
saved automatically (if saveNotes is true) if a
SIGHUP, SIGINT, SIGTERM, or SIGQUIT signal is
received. Using "kill -9" on the xnotes+ process,
however, will not allow changes to be saved. Thats
a design intent in Unix - its just the way Unix sig-
nals work. If you need to kill xnotes+ manually,
use the "kill -s HUP " or "kill -s TERM" commands
instead, and only use "kill -9" if all else fails.
To save the note to a disk file, click on the file
icon and drag the mouse cursor to the menu item
labeled ``Save'', then release the mouse button.
The note will be saved as the file ``noten'' in your
notes directory, where n is some sequence number.
Saving a note means to save it in the XNote format
under whatever directory has been configured using
the --notedir command line option, the .noteDir
application default setting (for Motif only), the
noteDir config file entry (for GTK only) or the
default setting.
Note that the ``Save'' menu item will not allow you
to save unless something has been typed in the text
window of the note, the name of the note has been
changed, the project has changed for the note, or
the text of the note has been erased. This is a
good way of checking if you've made changes to the
note. If the Save menu item is "insensitive"
(grayed-out) then you haven't made any changes to
the Text of the note.
NOTE: it is important to remember that if you have
disabled the auto-save (--sv) feature then the note
will not be saved until you have pressed the
``Save'' button. You can also make sure changed
notes get saved on exit by enabling the Save on Exit
feature.
Open Used for importing a file into the note. The
imported file must be an ordinary text file or the
results of importing will be indeterminate. The
imported file is inserted at the current cursor
location. See the section on the File Selection
Window for more details.
Export Used for saving the text contents of the note to a
non-XNotes (ie a regular) file. Only the text of
the note is saved. Project and note name informa-
tion is not exported. Again, see the section on the
ile Selection Window for more details on how to use
that window.
Find Simple search utility that will find a specified
string in the note from which the Search dialog was
opened. The search can be done forward from the
current cursor location or backwards. The search
does not wrap when it reaches the end or beginning
of the note. Searches are currently case sensitive.
Print Prints the note using the defined printer command.
See the --printcmd command line option for details
on configuring this. Selectin this option causes
the note to be printed immediately, if possible. No
dialogs are opened with the Print option.
Email Opens a small window in which you can type an email
address. When you click on the Accept button the
note is emailed to the specified recipient using the
notes name as the subject of the message.
The second menu contains items for manipulating the note:
Hide, Erase, Destroy, Name, Project, Insert Calendar and
Insert Date.
Hide To hide a note, you can click on the notes icon and
select the ``Hide'' menu item. This will cause the
note to disappear from the screen. The note is
still available, its just not visible. To bring the
note back, select the ``Hidden Notes'' option from
the Control Window's xnotes menu. Then select the
note you wish to make visible again. NOTE: A hid-
den note will not stay hidden between xnotes+ ses-
sions unless you have saved the note. Saving a hid-
den note can only be done using either the autosave
features or the option to save on exit (see discus-
sion above) have been set or by using the xnotes
menu's ``Save All Notes'' option.
Erase To erase the entire contents of the text window, you
can click on the notes icon and select the ``Erase''
menu item. The erase is performed immediately and
cannot be undone. NOTE: erasing the text in the
window does not affect any contents of the note you
have saved on disk unless you press the ``Save''
button again.
Destroy To destroy an XNote, getting rid of its window on
the screen and the disk file it is saved in, click
on the notes icon and select the ``Destroy'' menu
item. This will bring up a confirmation window with
an ``Accept'' and a ``Close'' button. Clicking on
accept will close the window and remove the associ-
ated file from disk. This process cannot be undone.
The close button will cancel the destroy operation.
Name A notes name appears on the window managers title
bar (if you have these displayed - check your window
manager configuration guides for information on ena-
bling or disabling these). To rename a note, you
can click on the notes icon and select the ``Name''
menu item. This will bring up a dialog box, which
has two buttons labeled ``Confirm'' and ``Cancel''
as well as a field to enter text for the new name.
If you press the ``Confirm'' button, the new name
will be placed in the title bar of the note. If you
press the ``Cancel'' button, the operation is can-
celed.
Project The Project option in the notes menu allows you to
select one of the previously configured projects to
associate with this note. The dialog is similar to
the one accessed from the xnotes menu except this
one does not allow you to modify the projects. You
can only select a project here. Once selected, the
notes color will change to match the selected pro-
ject.
Insert Calendar
To insert a copy of the current calendar month in
the text select the ``Insert Calendar'' option from
the notes menu. The text will be inserted at the
current cursor location, so you should be sure to
position the cursor first. You can position the
cursor by just clicking in the text window of the
note.
Insert Date
Adding the date and time is done using the ``Insert
Date...'' option from the notes menu. A dialog box
providing a variety of formats is presented. Select
the format desired by clicking on the small box to
the left of the format string and then click on
"Accept". The text string will be inserted at the
current cursor location. Be sure to position the
cursor prior to using the option.
USING THE FILE SELECTION WINDOW
The File Selection Window is the fairly common Motif ver-
sion. A text field at the top of the window can be used to
filter the current directory. The left-side scrolled window
is the set of directories available from the current direc-
tory and the right side (if shown) is the list of files in
that directory. Double clicking in either window will
select the appropriate directory or file.
The File Selection window is used for saving, opening, and
exporting files. It is also used by the Pilot Tool feature
to select a directory in which to store backups. In this
latter case the right-side scrolled window (the one that
list files in the current directory) will not be displayed.
This is because with the Pilot Tool feature you only need to
select a directory to use.
Clicking on a entry in the files scrollable window will
cause that file to be selected. If you are opening a file
then the file chosen will be added to the current note at
the location of the cursor in that note. Be sure to set the
cursor to where you want to import text before opening a
file. If you are exporting a file then the text of the file
will be written to the file chosen. If the file already
exists then you will be prompted as to whether you really
want to overwrite it or not.
The Selection field at the bottom of the window can be used
to manually type a directory or file name. If the name
typed is a directory, the File Selection Window is updated
using the new directory as the base. If the name typed is a
file then that filename is used for the current task, either
opening or exporting. If exporting, and the file exists, a
window is popped up asking for confirmation to overwrite
that file. Click on ``Accept'' to proceed with the export
or ``Cancel'' to skip it.
CONFIGURING THE MAILER
In order to use your systems mailer with the Email feature
of XNotesPlus, you need to configure the appropriate mailer
command using either the -emailcmd command line option, the
.emailCmd resource (for Motif) or the emailcmd entry in the
config file (for GTK). The format for these is the same:
a double-quoted string which contains the name of the mailer
command, the option for providing the subject line, and the
addressee. By default the Unix command "mail" is used. For
most users this default will work just fine and you don't
need to change a thing.
If you wish to use another mail command, or if for some rea-
son the ``mail'' program is not on your system, you can con-
figure XNotesPlus accordingly. Note: the following discus-
sion is a little technial and intended for those people who
understand a little about C programming.
The default email command is defined in the XNotesPlus
application defaults file (and in the source code fallback
resources) as:
"mail -s\"%s\" %s"
The format is the standard format used by printf(). The
first string parameter is the subject line. The
backslashes are required so that the following double quotes
are passed properly to the command. If these are left out
the subject will be truncated to the first word of the first
string parameter and an attempt will be made by the mailer
to send mail to non-existant recipients. The second string
is the addressee. The order of the string parameters is
significant (subject first, addressee second) - it must be
this order no matter what mailer you use. The mailer com-
mand must also accept the text of the mail via standard
input. This too is required.
As an example of using a different mailer, if you use elm,
you might want to change the mailer commad to:
"elm -s\"%s\" %s > /dev/null"
The difference here is that elm prints out a few messages
when it runs in batch mode and you should send those to
/dev/null.
PROJECTS
A new feature of XNotesPlus 3.0 is the ability to associate
notes to specific Projects. A Project is just a name and a
color, nothing more. You specify a project name, give it a
color, and later assign notes to that project. Once
assigned, the notes text background will assume the color
specified for that project.
Projects are defined through the Projects dialog, accessible
from the xnotes+ menu's ``Projects'' option. The dialog has
two scrolled windows: a list of the colors defined in the
rgb.txt color database and a list of configured projects.
Below the latter is a text field where you can type in the
name of a project, or edit the name of the currently
selected project.
To add a new project, type in its name in the text field.
Then select a color from the color names list. On low color
displays you may have to search for awhile till you find one
that works. If the color can be allocated for use, the sam-
ple text below the text field where you typed the projects
name will change colors to show you how the note will look.
When you've got the right color, click on the Accept button
and the project will be added to the scrolled projects list.
You can change the color of an existing project by clicking
on the projects name. The project name is displayed in the
text field and the sample text background is updated with
the currently configured color. Just select another color
and click on the Accept button. The update is immediate.
When you are done with configuring projects just click on
the Close button at the bottom of the dialog.
A sample projects file should have been part of the distri-
bution you received. This file is ordinary text and you can
hand edit it if you prefer.
In order to assign a note to a specific project you simply
choose the ``Projects'' option from the notes menu in the
XNote you wish to update. The Change Project dialog opens
with a scrolled list of projects to choose from and a bit of
sample text to show what the effect will be. When you've
made your selection, click on the Accept button and the note
will automatically be updated. Don't forget to save the
note!
AUDIO ALARMS
Alarms in XNotesPlus can be set to go off at any time, allow
you to use the program as a automated reminder service.
Earlier versions of XNotesPlus predecessor, XPostitPlus,
simply popped up a window to let you know the alarm has
expired. In this release, audio alarms have been added.
Now, using an audio player of your choice, you can have an
audio reminder to go with the visual one.
To configure an audio player, use the --audiocmd command
line option, the (for GTK). The format of the command
string follows the same conventions as the email command,
where printf() style arguments are used to specify the file
name and the volume to play the audio file.
The default audio program configured is the ubiquitous sox.
This tool works well on both Linux and Solaris systems and I
suspect it will work well with other Unix OS's. The format
of the default command is as follows:
"sox %s -t .au -v %d /dev/audio"
The %s represents the name of the audio file and the %d is
the volume to play the file. Unfortunately, the volume set-
ting may not actually work with XNotesPlus. I'm not sure
why just yet.
Audio players must be capable of playing whatever audio
files you place in the audio directory (usually
$HOME/.xnotesplus/audio-d). The audio files you received
with the XNotesPlus package should have contained a set of
.wav audio files, but you can add whatever other audio files
you like as long as the audio player understands how to play
them.
PRINTING ENVELOPES
Another new feature to XNotesPlus is the Envelopes dialog.
This window allows you to specify simple headers for print-
ing on either #6 (letter) or #10 (legal) sized envelopes.
The window contains 2 scrolled text windows, an options menu
of Point Sizes to use for the printed text, a set of toggle
buttons for choosing the envelope size, a toggle to use Bold
characters and a text input field for specifying the name of
the printer to use.
The scrolled window labeled ``From:'' will be filled with
your personal address from the ``id'' file normally found in
your $HOME/.xnotesplus directory. If this file does not
exist then this field will be blank. You can type in any
text you want for the From: address. Pressing the Save but-
ton just below the scrolled window will save the text to
your id file.
The scrolled window labeled ``To:'' works like the ``From:''
window except it has a Load button. This button will open a
scrolled list of addresses taken from your Palm Pilot's
Addresses database, if any. If no entries exist then an
error dialog is presented stating the local database could
not be opened. To access the Pilot's databases you first
need to use the Addresses Fetch feature of the Pilot Tool
dialog. See the section on USING PILOT TOOL for more infor-
mation.
The point size menu gives the list of available point sizes
for the output. The envelope will print in postscript using
the nenscript program (which must be in your path in order
to work). Both the Bold toggle and the point size are
passed as arguments to nenscript. The printer field is also
passed to nenscript, however this is different than the
printer command used to print notes. With the Envelope dia-
log, the printer specified should be the printer name, not
the command used to print. Nenscript will handle the print-
ing - it just needs to know which printer to use. This is a
little confusing and I hope to have a better solution for it
in a future release.
The toggles for setting the envelope size will simply deter-
mine how the temporary file passed to nenscript will be for-
matted. The formats are chosen to fit on their respective
envelopes, but other than that the sizes are not really
exact.
USING PILOT TOOL
The latest, greatest feature to be added to XNotesPlus is
the Pilot Tool. A recent gift of a Palm Pilot Pro enticed
me to find the pilot-link software, used to communicate
between the Pilot and a Unix system. These tools are quite
simple to use and lend themselves well to being called from
other programs. Naturally I decided it was time to update
XPostitPlus so I could sync memos with my notes.
The Pilot Tool dialog is broken into 3 main pieces: Pilot
Memos, Pilot Addresses, and Pilot Sync. Pilot Memos con-
sists of a scrolled list, two toggle buttons and two push
buttons. The toggle buttons determine which direction
you're going to go: Import means you are importing Pilot
Memos into XNotes, Export means you are exporting XNotes out
to the Pilot as Memos. The Fetch push button will retrieve
either the list of XNotes (for exporting) or the list of
memos from the Pilot (if importing) and place them in the
scrolled list. You can select one or more of these from the
list and then click on the Process button. This will deter-
mine which XNotes to convert to Memos or which Memos to con-
vert to XNotes.
The Pilot Addresses feature is the simplest of the bunch:
just click on the button and the Pilot's Addresses database
will be retrieved. The data is stored in a file called
xnaddresses, generally under the $HOME/.xnotesplus/pilot
directory, although this is configurable with command line
options, etc.
Pilot Sync will do backups of your Pilot to local direc-
tories. There are actually 4 types of backups: Backup,
Restore, Sync and Update. Check with the pilot-link
software for details of what each of these really does.
Generally, you can use the Backup type to make backups and
Restore to restore them should your Pilot crash for some
reason. I'm not completely sure what the Sync and Update
are used for.
The file button will open a File Selection window that
allows you to specify a directory to use for backups. The
default directory (or any directory you select from the File
Selection window) is displayed in the text field next to the
file button. You can type in any directory you want there
as well. If the directory does not exist then it will be
created, if possible, before the backup process is started.
Additionally, you can remove or rename the directory speci-
fied using one of the appropriate buttons (``Remove Dir'' or
``Rename Dir''). When you are ready to start the backup or
restore process, click on the Start Transfer button.
Once any communication with the Pilot is about to begin you
will be prompted to press the Hot Sync button on the Pilot's
cradle. Once the data transfer has started you won't be
able to do anything else with XNotesPlus until the transfer
completes. In future versions I may try to fix this. It
depends on if anyone complains about it or not.
Before you can even have access to the Pilot Tool you must
set the following environment variables. If these are not
set you will not get the Pilot Tool option in the xnotes
menu.
PILOTPORT
Specifies the serial port to which the Pilot's cra-
dle is connected. For many PC-Unix users (eg Linux,
Solairs x86) this will be something like /dev/cua1
or /dev/ttyS01.
PILOTRATE
You need to also specify the speed at which
transfers should be done. Although this isn't
really required by the pilot-link software, it helps
speed things up. The value you should use is prob-
ably 57600, but that may be dependent on your serial
ports. It seems to work fine on PCs with 16550
UARTS on the serial ports at least.
KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS
Many of XNotesPlus features are accessible directly from the
keyboard. The key combinations, known as keyboard
shortcuts, can be used while any XNote or the Control Window
has keyboard focus - which means you have to click on the
window first at least once. Keyboard shortcuts are most
useful when used from within the XNotes themselves.
The following describes the keyboard shortcuts available by
default from any XNote and the functions associated with
them.
ALT-T Opens the alarm (timer) window.
ALT-A Toggles the anchor for the current note.
ALT-D Prompts the user to destroy the current note.
ALT-C Inserts a calendar at the current cursor position.
ALT-H Hides the current note.
ALT-E Erases the current note.
ALT-O Opens the File Selection window for importing a file
to the current note.
ALT-S Saves the current note.
ALT-P Prints the current note.
CTRL-ALT-E
Opens the Envelopes dialog.
CTRL-ALT-P
Opens the Projects dialog for configuring projects
(not the Change Project dialog).
ALT-Q Quits XNotesPlus. If save on exit has been enabled
then modified notes will be saved. If not, you will
be prompted as to whether or not you want to save
them.
The followin are the default bindings for mouse and keyboard
actions associated with the Control Window. Note that the
mapping of Button 1, Button 2, and Button 3 to real mouse
buttons depends on your X server. Check your X server docu-
mentation for details on this mapping.
Click mouse button 1
Raises all notes above any other windows on the
display.
Click mouse button 2
Lowers all notes beneath any other windows on the
display.
Press and hold mouse button 3
Presents the xnotes+ menu.
Mouse button 1 down, hold, drag
Tears off a new 3x3 note.
ALT-Q Quits XNotesPlus. If save on exit has been enabled
then modified notes will be saved. If not, you will
be prompted as to whether or not you want to save
them.
SEE ALSO
X(1), pilot-xfer(1) and any of the PilotLink software,
cal(1), mail(1), lp(1) or lpr(1), sox(1)
BUGS
The sizes of the XNotes are only as accurate as the display
dimension and resolution returned by the server. On the Sun
server and possibly others, this means they may not be all
that accurate.
The Dialog used to name a note doesn't limit the number of
characters that can be used in a name, although it does
prevent (by use of translations) a user from putting a new-
line in the text. The drawback to not limiting the length
of the name is that the dialog box's text field won't resize
to the right as characters are typed off the right hand edge
of the field, although it will scroll that way.
Color selection using the rgb file for low color displays
sucks. I have some ideas for an alternative method, but
decided not to wait to implement it before releasing 3.0. I
don't know when I'll actually get around to it. In the mean
time, just hand edit the projects file with colors you
already use for some of your other applications or window
manager.
You can't delete projects from the Projects dialog yet. You
also can't change the name of a project. To do either, edit
the projects file by hand. Look at the xnprojects or
xnprojects-gtk file in the data directory.
In the older XPostitPlus, the -c option was reported to not
read in old notes properly. It would eat the first line.
This can be worked around by adding a blank line to the old
notes. However, I couldn't reproduce this problem. I sug-
gest creating a backup of your old notes before trying to
run with the -c option, just in case.
Without a color display for canary yellow notes and the logo
in the Control Winodw, the aesthetic value of xnotes+ cannot
be fully appreciated.
The GTK version has a few bugs, mostly related to the
GTkText widget. I can't change the notes background color
using this widget, so project colors are set around its
border and in its scrollbar. There are also some ugly bugs
in the widget that can cause XNotesPlus to crash. The
GtkText widget is still a work in progress, so perhaps these
problems will go away with time.
One other problem with GTK is that I haven't figured out how
to prevent resizing of windows. Doing so can prevent odd
redistributions of some window components - especially when
there is no real need to resize. If you resize the windows
(except the note window itself, of course), you're on your
own!
No, the GTK port will not be part of GNOME, although if pos-
sible it will be GNOME compliant in the future .
AUTHOR
Originally based on xpostit by David A. Curry, SRI Interna-
tional
XNotesPlus and XPostitPlus are both written and copyrighted
by Michael J. Hammel (mjhammel@graphics-muse.org).
Post-It and the plaid design are registered trademarks of
3M.
The SOX (audio) software can be found at
http://www.spies.com/Sox/.
More recent versions (ie a new distribution) can be found at
http://home.sprynet.com/sprynet/cbagwell/projects.html.
Nenscript, by Craig Southeren, is a freely redistributable
program to convert ASCII files into Postscript. It is made
available with XNotesPlus as a service to my users and
through Craig's (and CSA's - his employer at the time) kind
graces. Current releases can be found at
http://www.im.lcs.mit.edu/~magnus/nenscript/.
The pilot-link software can be found at
Generic UNIX
ftp://ryeham.ee.ryerson.ca/pub/PalmOS
RedHat RPM's
ftp://ftp.redhat.com/pub/contrib/i386/pilot-link-<latest>.rpm
Debian
ftp://ftp.debian.org/debian/hamm/hamm/binary-i386/otherosfs/pilot-link-<latest>.deb
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