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1992-05-06
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Accent v1.1 *** July 1991
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
An universal accented character converter
This program can be freely redistributed, but it
must be bundled with its documentation files.
Accent is an improved version of Vortex (Fred Fish no. 454), fitted with a
file requester, a simple file reader, and a mouse-driven interface, The name
was changed because "Vortex" was already taken. Accent was developed in C on
the Amiga, then ported to the PC with Quick C (DOS-only version).
Accent will convert all accented characters common to a pair of computers
(Amiga <-> IBM-PC, Amiga <-> MacIntosh or IBM-PC <-> Mac). Unfortunately,
not all accented characters are convertible because some computers have an
incomplete set of accented capitals; did you know that only the Amiga offers
a complete set of lower and upper case accented characters for most european
languages? Naturally, only common characters can be converted from one
computer to another. For conversions to and from the IBM-PC, Accent assumes
that the extended character set (Code 850) is used, although this many PCs
use Code 863 or 437, which comprise only a few accented capitals (É, Ç and
Ü). Then, the user may get some graphic characters and mathematic symbols
instead of certain accented capitals... On the Mac side, some fonts like
Times and Helvetica offer a complete set of accented capitals, but most of
them are not implemented on "City" fonts (New York, Chicago...). Accent
assumes that the former are used.
The standard ASCII set (0-127), true to its american origin, ignores
accented characters. This is too bad, because there are only two latin
alphabet languages without accents: English and ... Dutch. So, accented
characters had to be patched up, and the result was called "extended ASCII
set" (128-255). Good idea, but every computer came up with its own standard!
Commodore implemented the international convention codes on the Amiga, but
was the only one to do so (nice shot anyway, Commodore). In a nutshell,
Accent will work for all languages provided with a keymap (Danish, Finnish,
French, German, Italian, Islandic, Norwegian, Spanish, Swedish), and any
other language using only "standard" accents (acute, grave and circumflex
accents, plus the tilde and the dieresis), that is, most west european
languages, and some others with other characters, e.g. the scandinavian
languages.
NOTE: Accent converts files, but not the diskette format. It won't read
IBM, Mac or C64 diskettes. You have to copy the file to be processed on an
Amiga disk. To do so, you can use utilities like Mac Link (PC <-> Mac),
DOS2DOS, CrossDOS or MessyDOS (Amiga <-> IBM), Mac2DOS or File Transfer
(Amiga <-> Mac), or Transfer (C64 <-> Amiga), with appropriate disk units.
You can also use a modem. Accent does not replace any of the
above-mentionned utilities, but merely complements them.
Without Arp.library, Acent will run from the CLI only. If you don't already
have it in your libs: drawer, copy it by double-clicking the ArpLibInstall
icon (18K free space needed). Icon.library is also needed, so boot from a
standard Workbench. Accent is garanteed to work with both Workbench 1.3 and
2.0 (Color-corrected for the Amiga 3000).
USAGE (from the Workbench):
==========================
Double-click on the icon. Extended icon selection is possible: while holding
Shift, select the Accent icon and double-click the source text file icon,
or vice-versa.
A) Source file to convert: (Keyboard shortcut: Right-Amiga-O)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Click the Open submenu to select the file to convert, and an Arp file
requester will pop up.
B) Destination file: (Keyboard shortcut: Right-Amiga-D)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Then, the default destination file name is shown in the Destination box;
Accent creates it by appending the ".ax" extension to the source file name.
The default file path is to ram: to speed up the conversion, but you may
send it to any disk. You may enter a different name with the Arp requester
(called by the Destination submenu), or write it directly into the box.
C) Direction and Options:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Select the appropriate Direction and Option with the » « buttons.
* CR/LF conversion is automatic, but manual override is possible.
* Tabs are not converted if the Tab box is empty or displays a zero.
D) Conversion:
~~~~~~~~~~~
Click "O.K." to generate a converted destination file. The source file is
unchanged by the process.
E) Reading a file:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You may then click the "Read" button to check the converted file.
* This button may also be used to display any file anytime.
* Click the mouse or press the DOWN cursor to scroll down a file.
* Display width is limited to 80 characters.
F) Notes:
~~~~~
* MS-DOS file names are limited to 8 characters, plus an optional 3-
character extension. Any extra character will be left out.
* Use the ASCII->WP4 option for WP 4.2 only (WP 5 can load accented ASCII
files without problem).
* To speed up conversion, the default destination path is to ram:.
You may then copy that file from ram: to your disk (see below).
* To copy any file anywhere, select the "Copy" submenu. Both Direction and
Option are set to "No Conv.". The Tab box must be empty or set to zero.
* To change only tabs or format (ASC->WP) and not accents, set Direction
to "No Conv." To convert CR/LF only, a Direction must be provided (ex.
Ami->IBM), and Option must be set to "No Conv.".
* Hit Right-Amiga X to clear any box and R-Amiga Q to undo.
* Click the Iconify gadget (in the upper right corner) to close the window,
and double-click the iconify icon to re-open it. This icon can be dragged
on any part of the screen.
PRESELECTION OF DEFAULT VALUES
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You may change the startup values by editing the Tool Types box of the icon
(Workbench Icon submenu). For instance, FR=1 will change the default
language (English) to French. Delete this entry to get English back. You may
also enter any of the following parameters: AI=1, AM=1, IA=1, IM=1, MA=1,
MI=1, CA=1, NC=1, WP=1, AW=1, SL=1 (or SL=0), TB=4 (or any integer smaller
than 20), to open Accent with the Direction or Option you want (more
information about these parameters below).
Note: No spaces or lower case allowed in the Tools Types.
USAGE (from the CLI):
====================
Accent source_file [destination_file] -direction [-option -option...]
accent ? this help screen
where:
DIRECTION: | -ai/-ia: Amiga -> IBM-PC /or vice versa
choose one from: | -am/-ma: Amiga -> Mac /or vice versa
| -im/-mi: IBM-PC -> Mac /or vice versa
| -ca: C64(Traitex) -> Amiga
| -nc: No accent conversion
OPTIONS: -wp: Word Perfect source file
[optional] -aw: ASCII -> Word Perfect
-sl/-sl0: Converts line feeds /or keeps them
-tx: Replace tabs by x spaces
Source and Destination Files:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Parameters between braces are optional; if no destination file name is
given, Accent will create one by appending ".ax" to the source file name
(thus, "yuck" gives "yuck.ax"). On the IBM side, only 8-character file names
with an optional 3-character extension are accepted. Any extra character
will be truncated. If your source file name already has an extention, a
distinct destination file name must be specified. Moreover, any of the first
three parameters (prefixed by a dash) may include an AmigaDOS path: thus,
1> accent df1:texts/donald.doc ram:daffy.doc -ai
will read in the Amiga ASCII file "donald.doc" from the texts directory in
df1: and create the converted Amiga ASCII file "daffy.doc" in ram:. ASCII
file conversion selects -sl as default (-sl0 to override it).
Another example:
1> df1:c/accent myfile -ia -wp -t4
will run Accent from df1:c and read the Word Perfect IBM file "myfile" in
the current directory, where "myfile.ax" (Amiga WP file) will be created.
Option -wp selects -sl0 as default. Note that in the above example, option
-t4 will convert tabs to 4 spaces.
NOTE: * To speed up a conversion, copy your source file to ram:. Accent
is quite fast: it can convert a 40K file in 10 seconds or less.
* The following command lines: 1> accent source_file
1> accent source_file dest_file
are accepted and open the window just like clicking the icon.
* Any command line "-f" will open the window with a French display.
Direction and Options:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The following parameters (direction and options) must be preceded by a dash
and they can be in any order or number. You may use many options, or none,
but you have to use one (and only one) direction. Remember: one direction is
needed, but options are... well, optional. If two parameters give opposite
results (ex. -sl and -sl0), the last one prevails.
Directions: -ai -am -ia -im -ma and -mi:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The first letter designates the source computer and the second one,
the destination computer. Thus, -ai means Amiga -> IBM-PC.
NOTE: ASCII files exported to the Mac should not be loaded in MacWrite,
which uses its own format for text files. MS Word, which uses ASCII
files, is a better choice.
Direction -ca:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Accent will also convert Traitex files (Commodore 64/128) to Amiga files
(ASCII or WP). This is a special case because every C64 word processor uses
its own codes for the accents... Option -ca can convert with unequal success
other C64 files using screen codes, like PaperClip or Scripsit files, but
not PETSCII files. (If you don't know what they are, you don't need to read
this in the first place). Note that the -ca direction ignores all the
options below except -aw.
Direction -nc:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
With option -nc, source accented characters are left unconverted. This
option is used with options -aw, -sl and -tx (below) to change only the file
format, the line feeds or the tabs without changing the accents.
Example: 1> accent mystuff -nc -aw
will convert an Amiga ASCII file to an Amiga WP file.
Another example: 1> accent ram:myletter df0:myletter -ai -nc
This line uses Accent as a simple file copier. Nothing is changed.
One more example: 1> accent blurp -nc -t4
This line will only replace all the tabs by 4 spaces in blurp.ax.
Another example: 1> accent mytext -nc -ai -sl
This line will change the LF to CR+LF in mytext.ax, and nothing else.
Please note that this operation requires *two* directions, the second
direction beeing needed for the right CR/LF conversion.
Option -wp:
~~~~~~~~~~
Option -wp converts Word Perfect files from one computer to another. Why
Word Perfect? Because it's the only word processor implemented on 4
different machines (this, in turn, creates a need for Accent). Besides,
it's my favorite word processor... Please note that with other word
processors, you should save your files with the ASCII (or Text) option
before feeding them to Accent if a straight file conversion does not work.
Accent can also convert ASCII files to WP files (option -aw), but not the
reverse, because the "Save Text File" option in Word Perfect already does
that. Likewise, Accent can create WP 4.2 files (and not WP 5.x files) from
ASCII files because WP 5.x already accepts and converts WP 4.2 files. In
short, I kept Accent streamlined and fast by restricting its options to
those not already provided by Word Perfect.
Option -aw:
~~~~~~~~~~
To convert an ASCII file to a WP 4.2 file, use option -aw. This option was
implemented because WP 4.2, unlike WP 5.x, will not load correctly an ASCII
file with accented characters. Try it and see what I mean. Option -aw
selects -sl0 as default. The file format may be slightly disturbed, but at
least, every word is displayed.
Options -sl and -sl0:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Accent can also convert the line feed character(s), which vary for each
computer. (simple line feed (LF) for the Amiga, carriage return + line feed
(CR + LF) for the PC and simple carriage return (CR) for the Mac). Option
-sl is chosen by default for ASCII file conversions (-sl0 will cancel it),
and option -sl0 is selected with -wp and -aw options.
Option -txx
~~~~~~~~~~~
Accent can also convert tabs to spaces (1-20), which is handy for texts that
have been formatted with non standard tab values (telltale sign: when you
see a scrambled text on your screen). Normally, a tabulation character
stands for 8 spaces (ASCII) or 5 spaces (WP). Give it a few tries and you
will become an ace text straightener (and eventually get hired as a ghost
writer for some politician).
Calling Accent from another program
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You can program Accent with all the options you need with batch files,
macros, hot keys or in a directory utility like Disk Master or SID. With DM,
all you need is the line: c:accent %s -ai -wp to convert a WP file from
Amiga to IBM. Two mouse clicks and look what happens: a cute .ax file
appears in the file requester.
Any comment is welcome.
Michel Laliberté
875, avenue Dollard
Outremont, Québec
Montréal, H2V 3G8
Bugs & Updates: 8-)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I may add a fully configurable character set, with Load and Save buttons,
if you users ask for it. No known bugs; please notify me if you find one.
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