Alessandro Levi Montalcini
C.so Re Umberto 10
10121 Torino
Italy
e-mail: LMontalcini@pmn.it
anonymous ftp: //ftp.alpcom.it/software/mac/LMontalcini

 

SimpleText Color Menu 2.1.1 docs - August 1995

• Introduction
◊  SimpleText Color Menu is a free drag & drop utility that installs an extra cool Color menu and an extra useful Goodies menu inside Apple’s SimpleText text editor (versions 1.1, 1.1.1, 1.2 and 1.3 only). The features added include color, find and replace, window switching, word counting and page margins. If you don’t have a copy of the SimpleText application, then you’ll have to find one. This shouldn’t be too hard since SimpleText ships with all the new Macs. You may also download it from Apple’s own FTP and Gopher sites if you’ve got an Internet access (try at ftp.support.apple.com or at info.hed.apple.com).

• Installation
◊  To install the SimpleText Color Menu in your SimpleText 1.1, 1.1.1, 1.2 or 1.3 application:
  - make a copy of the SimpleText application;
  - drop the copy on top of the SimpleText Color Menu installer’s icon (or launch the installer, click “Done” at the documentation window, and locate your copy of SimpleText in the directory dialog).

• The color menu
◊  The color menu works as expected: select some text, choose a color, and there you go!
◊  The provided colors were chosen because they can be displayed correctly on 16-color monitors, even though the first six ones are somewhat lighter than those defined by the system. You can change them or add your own colors to the Colors menu by using Resorcerer or ResEdit to modify the related resources (i.e. the 'MENU' and 'mctb' resources with ID=150). Note that ResEdit 2.1.3 crashes on some machines (including my Power Mac 6100) when the 'MENU' resource is opened, so you may want to use Resorcerer instead. If you change the number of items in the Colors menu, make sure that the last item is always “Other…”. Please do NOT distribute modified versions of SimpleText Color Menu.
◊  Here’s what the menu looks like after you install it in SimpleText:

 

• The goodies menu
◊  The goodies menu gives you a wealth of useful commands:
  - Find and Find Again work as usual;
  - Enter Selection sets the currently selected text as the text to find;
  - Replace, Replace & Find Again and Replace All work as usual, except they can’t be undone;
  - Choosing an item from the Windows submenu brings the chosen window to front;
  - Next Window and Last Window let you swap the two frontmost windows or cycle through all windows;
  - Document Statistics displays the number of characters, words, lines and paragraphs in your document.
  - Apply Default applies the default font, size, style and color to the currently selected text or to the entire document;
  - Save Current Style As Default saves the font, size, style and color of the currently selected text into the default style sheet; the saved settings are used when opening unstyled text documents (such as old TeachText documents) and when using the Apply Default command (see above);
  - Define Print Margins lets you define page margins for printing; the numbers are in pixels at 72 dpi.

 

• Compatibility notes
◊  SimpleText Color Menu 1.0, 1.1 and 1.2 used an MBDF resource to add their extra code to SimpleText, but many menu-related control panels and extensions had trouble with this approach. Jim Walker was kind enough to modify his excellent OtherMenu extension for Color Menu compatibility, but I got more crash reports from people using ClickChange, A La Carte and other common control panels. Versions 1.3 and later don't use the MBDF resource any more, so all these problems should be definitely fixed.

• Version history
◊  2.1.1 - Fixed all installation problems with SimpleText 1.3, 1.2 and 1.1.1 and disabled the Color menu on machines without Color QuickDraw, since reading the colors from the menu itself requires a color-capable Mac.
◊  2.1 - Added more colors and support for SimpleText 1.3, which is shipping with the latest CD-ROM setup and beta versions of QuickDraw 3D. The colors in the Colors menu can now be easily personalized with Resorcerer or ResEdit.
◊  2.0 - Added text replacing, word counting, print margins and color icons; ported to CodeWarrior.
◊  1.4 - Works with Apple’s new SimpleText 1.2 (which was released with the System 7.5 Update 1.0).
◊  1.3.4 - Added "Next Window" and "Last Window" menu items, fixed a few minor issues in the installer, added more documentation and pictures.
◊  1.3.3 - Cleaned up the code and added online documentation.
◊  1.3.2 - Fixed an incompatibility with the Control Strip (and possibly other extensions that install floating windows). Thanks to Larry Rosenthal for his detailed crash report.
◊  1.3.1 - Updated the Color Menu installer to work with SimpleText 1.1.1 (this was a lot harder than expected, since the code in SimpleText 1.1.1 requires a new 'dcmp' 3 resource decompressor that’s not available under System 7.1.2 and earlier; I had to write a specific utility to make the installer’s resource map support compressed resources).
◊  1.3 - Changed the MBDF resource to a jump table patch to solve all incompatibilities.
◊  1.2 - Added a Find command and a Windows submenu; SimpleText Color Menu should now be more compatible with menu-related extensions and control panels.
◊  1.1 - Added a new Goodies menu that lets you change SimpleText’s default font and style.
◊  1.0 - First public release.

• Distribution
◊  SimpleText Color Menu is ©1994-95 Alessandro Levi Montalcini. It can be freely distributed as long as it is not modified and there’s no charge for it, but it may not be included in any commercial package without my consent.
◊  You may find the latest version of all my shareware programs by anonymous ftp to ftp.alpcom.it, inside the /software/mac/LMontalcini directory. The complete ShareDisk package, which contains all my stuff and can be registered at a very low price, is also available there.
◊  All online services and bulletin boards may make it available to their users at no charge other than the normal connection fees.
◊  All non-profit user groups may distribute it at no charge.
◊  All magazines may publish it on floppy disk without asking me first, as long as I get a copy of the issue containing my software.
◊  All CD-ROM shareware collections and CD-ROM magazines may include it without my prior consent, as long as I get either a copy of the CD-ROM or an offer to buy the CD-ROM at a discounted price.
◊  All redistribution companies such as Educorp may distribute it, as long as I get a copy of each media containing my software and a catalog of the company’s offerings (where applicable).

• Disclaimer
◊  SimpleText Color Menu shouldn’t cause any damage, but you’re using it at your own risk. As an independent software developer, I can make no warranties whatsoever on it.