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Text File | 1991-07-31 | 16.0 KB | 416 lines

>|Intro|HyperText|Electronic Book|Linear Presentation|Table of Contents|Index|< EB HyperText ============ EB, the Electronic Book, is a simple ~topic oriented~ hypertext ~viewing program~. Topics may contain links to other topics or programs. A topic may even reside in another hypertext file. The links appear as highlighted hot-spots which when activated by the viewer force a jump to the specified target topic or program. The viewer can of course backtrack over any jump, a process known as popping the hyperstack. Traditionally all literature has had a linear presentation scheme determined by the author. Hypertext has liberated the audience by allowing each to choose somewhat the order of presentation and the admission or omission of material. Hypertext pundits however have largely ignored the qualities of a book that allow its reader nonlinear access, namely the ~Table of Contents~ and ~Index~. EB incorporates both, hence the name Electronic Book. <|Authoring - Inlinks|Viewing HyperText|Authoring - Inlinks|Authoring - Inlinks|> >|Viewing HyperText|Usage|Commands|Help|Toggle Mono/Color|Toggle 25 - 43/50|< EB Hypertext Viewing ==================== Usage: eb -m -ttopic pathname m optionally force monochrome display ttopic optional topic in hypertext file pathname optional hypertext file The following commands are available: F1 Help F3 Load new HyperText file F10, AltT ~Table of Contents~ AltF10, AltI ~Index~ CR Tranverse HyperLink AltF1, BACKSP Backtrack HyperLink F6 Toggle 25 - 43/50 lines ShiftF6 Toggle monochrome/color AltX Exit UpArr Line up DnArr Line down LArr Character left RArr Character right CtrlLArr Word left CtrlRArr Word right PgUp Page up PgDn Page down CtrlW Scroll up CtrlZ Scroll down CtrlPgUp First page of ~current topic~ CtrlPgDn Last page of current topic Home Beginning of line End End of line CtrlHome Top of window CtrlEnd Bottom of window Tab Next ~hyperlink~ ShiftTab Previous hyperlink Typing characters will take you to the first hyperlink that matches the prefix thus far typed. Typing any non-matching characters truncates the prefix to begin anew the process with the next character typed. <|Authoring - Inlinks|Authoring - Inlinks|Grammar - Explanation|Authoring - HyperLinks|> >|Authoring - Inlinks|Inlinks|256|topic|clue|HyperLinks|< EB HyperText Authoring ====================== The EB hypertext system is designed to allow hypertext authoring with any ASCII editor and the rapid conversion of existing material to hypertext. Taking any existing text file you can embed topic/clue specifiers from which EB can automatically create a table of contents and index on reader demand. You can also embed ~hyperlink~ specifiers. Hyperlinks are highlighted text hot-spots that force jumps to other topics in any hypertext file or launch programs when choosen by your readers. When the modified text file is subsequently viewed with EB, the specifiers are invisible to the reader. Instead the reader is left with ~hypertext~, and the ability to instantly jump to the table of contents or index and subsequent topic, or across any hyperlink. Let's first see how to embed a new topic along with optional clues in your text. . >|topic|clue|clue|< The ">|" characters must appear at the start of a new line and the specifier must not extend pass the end of the line. Specifier lines are limited to 256 characters including the new line character. "Topic" is what ever text you want to appear in the table of contents. Topics appear in the table of contents in the same sequential order that they appear in the file. "Clue" is what ever text you want to appear in the index. The index is comprised of an alphabetical listing of topics and clues. From the table of contents or index, the reader can instantly jump to the entry's corresponding topic. You can supply as many clues as you want or none at all. Each new clue is introduced with the "|" character. The "|<" characters terminate the topic/clue specifier. The topic begins on the next line after the "|<" characters. The topic/clue specifier is formally called the ~inlinks specifier~. <|Authoring - HyperLinks|Intro|Grammar - Explanation|> >|Authoring - HyperLinks|launch|tilde|diacritical|highlighting|Outlinks|< Each hyperlink is specified in two parts, a launch and a target. The ~launch~ is the highlighted text hot-spot in your original text and is delimited with the tilde diacritical mark. A corresponding ~target~ must appear in the ~outlinks~ specifier. Suppose you want the word "time" as in: Now is the time for all good authors ... is to be a launch. Simply bracket the word "time" with the tilde diacritical mark: Now is the ~~time~~ for all good authors ... The first tilde turns on highlighting while the second turns it off. The tildes are invisible when viewed with EB. This implementation of the launch allows the hypertext to appear in nearly the same spatial layout when authoring as when viewing. More than one launch may appear on the same line but none may wrap to the next line. Place two tildes immediately adjacent to each other if you want a tilde to appear as visible text instead of indicating the beginning or end of a launch. Extending our example alittle: . >|Authoring|< Now is the ~~time~~ for all good authors ... . <|DOS|> The ~inlinks~ specifier indicates the start of a new ~topic~ called "Authoring." No ~clues~ have been specified. The context of this topic includes the one launch indicating that the word "time" is to be highlighted. The outlinks specifier terminates the topic and contains the target, "DOS", which the reader will be taken to if the "time" hyperlink is choosen. The outlinks specifier must also appear at the start of a new line and not extend beyond the end of the line. Let's extend our example again: . >|Authoring|< Now is the ~~time~~ for all good authors to turn their ordinary text into ~~hypertext!~~ . <|DOS|hyped text|> A second launch and corresponding target has been added, namely "hypertext!" and its target "hyped text". <|Grammar - Explanation|Grammar - Explanation|Grammar - Explanation|Grammar - Explanation|Authoring - Inlinks|Authoring - Inlinks|> >|Authoring - Example|< Now for the whole example: . >|Authoring|< Now is the ~~time~~ for all good authors to turn their ordinary text into ~~hypertext!~~ . <|DOS|hyped text|> . >|Hyped Text|< Hyped text is ordinary text with embedded hypertext specifiers. . <||> . >|DOS|< Set DOS ~~time~~ ~~date~~ ~~Other DOS Commands~~ . <|^?command.com /ctime|^>date|^dos.htx|> In this example there are three topics: "Authoring", "Hyped Text", and "DOS". ~Nameless topics~ are will be unreachable if more one such topic exists in the file. ~Nameless clues~ serve to other purpose than putting more than one entry into the index for a given topic. "Authoring" is the default topic for the file since it appears first. The "Hyped Text" topic doesn't have any hyperlinks. Notice that the target pairing of "hyped text" with the topic "Hyped Text" is case insensitive! The "DOS" topic has three ~launches~ all with far targets. The first target is an spawn call to the DOS command processor. The second target demonstrates the preferred way to make a system call. The last target is the default (first) topic in the hypertext file entitled "dos.htx". Spawn calls return immediately upon termination to the page that spawned them. System calls ask the user to "Press any key ..." before returning. Besure to read the ~format reference section~ for complete details! <|Grammar - Rules|Authoring - Inlinks|Authoring - HyperLinks|Grammar - Rules|> >|Grammar - Rules|production|terminals|options|+|*|< EB HyperText Grammar ==================== The production rules below outline the grammar recognized by the Electronic Book. ~Explanations~ of the rules follow immediately after. Applying the production rules you can construct the format schema of any hypertext file readible by EB. The name of the rule appears to the left and its production to the right. If the production contains rules these rules must likewise be expanded until all rules are replace with terminal symbols. Rule names are capitalized while terminals begin with lower case. For example, starting with "HyperFile", expanding the rule provides for a file of optional comments followed by one or more "HyperTopics" which may be separated by additional comments. Optional components of the production are enclosed in brackets, i.e. []. Items considered together are enclosed in braces, i.e. {}. The "+" means one or more while the "*" means zero or more. The "|" symbol means either that which preceeds or that which follows but not both. If any of these special symbols are preceeded by a "\" then it is to be taken literally thus devoid of any special meaning. It's really not as hard as it may seem at first glance. Try your hand at reading the rules and their explanations. It will be easier to understand if you read the ~section on authoring~ first. HyperFile: [comments]{HyperTopic[comments]}+ HyperTopic: Inlinks Context Outlinks Inlinks: >\|topic{\|clue}*\|< Context: [text]{Launch[text]}* Outlinks: <\|[Target{\|Target}*]\|> Launch: ~~any text~~ Target: Near Target | Far Target Near Target: topic | default Far Target: topic^HyperFileName | default^HyperFileName | ignore^>system call | ignore^?spawn call HyperFileName: pathname.ext | pathname | pathname. <|Grammar - Explanation|Authoring - Inlinks|> >|Grammar - Explanation|< A HyperFile contains one or more HyperTopics. Any text not residing within a HyperTopic is considered a comment and is not visible to the reader. A HyperTopic is comprised of an inlinks specifier, context of the topic, and outlinks specifier. Only the context is visible to the reader. An ~Inlinks specifier~ contains topic and clue strings which must not contain the '|', '>', or '<' characters. Furthermore the topic string may not contain the "^" character. One or more clues are optional. Only the first nameless topic in a file will be reachable from the Table of Contents, Index, or via a hyper-jump. Nameless clues serve no other purpose than creating more than one entry in the Index for a given topic. The Context contains all visible text for the topic and any number of hyperlink launches. An ~Outlinks specifier~ contains any number of targets for the launches within the Context. The first target corresponds to the first launch, the second target to the second launch, and so on. If a launch doesn't have a corresponding target, then the launch is aborted if attempted. The target strings must not contain the '|', '>', or '<' characters. A Launch is delimited with the tilde diacritical mark, i.e. ~~. The offset text will appear highlighted. Choosing the launch takes the reader to the target, if successful otherwise the launch is aborted. Two tildes appearing together in the text will appear as one visible tilde to the reader and will not be interpretted as a launch delimiter. A Target can be either near or far. A Near target specifies a topic within the current hypertext file. The empty string indicates the default topic which is considered always to be the first topic of a hypertext file. A Far Target specifies either a (default) topic in another specified hypertext file or an operating system/spawn call, in which case any topic string is simply ignored. The HyperFileName is any legal pathname. When the file extension is absent it is assume to be ".htx". No extension can be specified by appending a period to the pathname. Notes: In this first version of EB a restriction has been placed on the both inlinks and outlinks specifiers to begin at the start of a new line and not extend pass the end of that line. The format specification above doesn't require this - it is simply to make the parsing of the file faster and easier this first time around. Likewise, launches are required to appear on one line and lines are limited to 256 characters. The grammar specification has been deliberately designed to facilitate the adding of screen formating information and application language capabilities, e.g. variables, logic flow and I/O masks (both user and file interface). <|Authoring - Inlinks|Authoring - HyperLinks|> >|Registration|PSW|FlexList|Austin Code Works|Freeware|Shareware|< EB HyperText Registration ========================= ~EB~ is meant to be primarily a demonstration of how easy it is to use the FlexList programming tool. EB source code is included with FlexList. Those portions not tightly coupled to FlexList are also available as Freeware. EB was coded entirely without cutting any linked list code, FlexList did it all. This version of EB.EXE is freeware, meaning that there is no fee for using EB.EXE, but you must leave my copyright notice intact! Shareware/Freeware distributors are also free to distribute it. Commercial venders may bundle EB.EXE (unmodified) with their software without cost but in any literature mentioning it they must give proper credit to PSW! Licensing is required for other uses, e.g. you must register FlexList to incorporate components of EB into your software. FlexList II ANSI && K&R C $79.95 FlexList II C++ $79.95 * Ready-to-run C/C++ linked lists. * Hybrid structure: stack, queue, list, array. * Stores Heterogeneous/homogeneous data. * Accessible by value, reference or node. * Source is also broken in separate files along with makefile for easy library building. * 100+ page manual FlexList is also available at a discount from: The Austin Code Works 11100 Leafwood Lane Austin, Texas 78750-3587 USA Voice: (512) 258-0785 FAX: (512) 258-1342 E-mail: info@acw.com Thanks again for taking a look at EB and how easy it is to use FlexList in building applications! I hope you can use it in your shareware/commercial efforts to supply hypertext manuals to your customers. Your comments, suggestions, and questions are always welcome. John W. Small PSW / Power SoftWare P.O. Box 10072 McLean, VA 22102 8072 USA Voice: (703) 759-3838 CIS: 73757,2233 Happy Authoring! John <|Intro|>