Welcome to Tex-Edit Plus, my multi-window, styled text editor that fills the gap between Apple’s bare-bones TeachText and a full-featured word processor! It is particularly useful for formatting text that is transmitted to and from a BBS. Tex-Edit Plus is small, fast, easy-to-use and requires little memory. Tex-Edit Plus is ShareWare ($5).
With Tex-Edit Plus you can:
• Quickly create, edit and print styled text documents of any size (limited by RAM).
• View and print TeachText or SimpleText read-only (“ReadMe”) documents, including
pictures.
• View and print color PICT files, such as those produced by draw programs or
Apple’s built-in screen snapshot utility.
• Copy a selection from a PICT file, cropping the image for use in a word processor, etc.
• View, edit and print text documents created by virtually any word processor or computer.
• Reformat downloaded e-mail or text, correcting word-wrap problems and removing
extraneous, non-Mac characters.
• Prepare text for upload to a BBS, so that people with MS-DOS systems can view the
document as it was intended to be viewed.
• Instantly quote a brief passage from received e-mail, allowing the sender to remember
their original message.
• Add color to your America Online or eWorld e-mail.
• Read any text document aloud, if you have Apple’s Speech Manager extension. (Listen
to a TeachText read-only file, for example, as the text and pictures scroll by!)
• Quickly optimize a document for printing, substituting professional-looking typographical
characters for generic, typewriter-era characters.
• Create simple hypertext documents.
• Attach attention-getting sound annotations to spice up ordinary inter-office mail.
• And more…
Contents:
Drag & Drop spoken here…
Do you appreciate the ease with which the Finder allows you to shuffle application, document and folder icons? Have you mastered the System 7 trick of dropping a document onto an application icon, forcing that application to open the document? Do you like being able to drag text selections around in Microsoft Word? How would you like to be able to select any data in any program window and move it to any other program window as easily as you drag Word 6 to the trash? No cutting, no copying, no pasting, no program switching, no messing with data translations…
Apple’s wonderful new Drag Manager technology takes the popular Drag & Drop functionality of the Finder and extends it to its logical conclusion. Drag & Drop is more intuitive, easier to learn and much faster than the clipboard. The Drag Manager allows data streaming, delayed delivery of data, and simultaneous transfer of multiple items (each of which can have a different data type). The Drag Manager also integrates with Macintosh Easy Open, providing automatic data type translation. The new Finder can even keep track of separate “clipping” files, providing the functionality of a multi-layer clipboard.
Drag & Drop is easily demonstrated using Tex-Edit Plus. First open or create a few short Tex-Edit documents and arrange the windows so they don’t totally hide one another. (See Figure 1.) Select (hilite) a word, then move the cursor over the selection. Notice how the I-beam turns into an arrow when over a selected block of text. This signifies that the selection is “draggable.” Now click and drag the selection. A gray outline of the selection will follow your cursor as it moves over the window. A blinking vertical “insertion marker” is visible at the tip of the arrow, indicating the target location. Release the button while still in the same window. Instantly, the original selection disappears and then reappears at its new location. Notice how inter-word spacing is preserved at the origin and destination sites (similar to “smart” cut and paste).
Figure 1. A “gray” selection outline follows the cursor. Note the flashing insertion point.
Since the dragged text is still selected, try dragging it to another Tex-Edit Plus window. When the cursor enters the new window, notice how the text area of the window “lights up.” (See Figure 2.) This signifies that the window is capable of receiving all of the items being dragged. Release the mouse button. An exact copy of the text now appears in the new window at the point it was dropped. Although the recipient window does not become active (come to the front), you can still tell where the text went, because background text selections are outlined.
Figure 2. The destination window “lights up” if it can accept the dragged items.
As a matter of fact, you can now click on the outlined text in the inactive window and drag it to one of the other windows, copying the selection without having to activate either window! (Try it.) Now go back to the front-most (active) window and drag the text selection within the same window while holding down the option key. Notice that this results in a copy operation instead of a move (just like in the Finder). Drag the text selection to the top or bottom of the active window and notice that it will “auto-scroll” to reveal the rest of the document.
The real fun starts for System 7.5 (and System 7 Pro) users when the text selection is dragged to the desktop. A text “clipping” will appear at the drop point. (See Figure 3.) Double click the clipping file to see its contents. Drag it back into any drag-savvy application window when you wish to use it. You can even drag multiple clippings simultaneously. (They are inserted into the text in the order in which they were selected in the Finder.) I keep a “return address” clipping on the desktop and drag it to the top of all my correspondence. It’s much faster than the scrapbook!
Figure 3. Drag a selection to the desktop to create a “clipping” file for later use.
Now sit back and experiment to your heart’s content. Try to figure out how and why windows become active during all this moving and copying. (It really is quite logical.) Try dragging a selection onto the menubar. If you happen to drop data on an area that cannot accept that particular data, notice how it “zooms” back to its starting point. Try clicking in the middle of a selection. Guess what happens when you drag a selection onto the Trash. If you have System 7.5 and want a real surprise, select these three words: secret about box and drag the selection to the desktop!
Drag & Drop is a wonderful new technology that Apple has seamlessly integrated into System 7.5. It is also available to the users of 7.0, 7.1, 7.1.1 (Pro) and 7.1.2 through the magic of the Macintosh Drag and Drop extension file. System 7.1.1 and 7.1.2 users can use the Clipping extension to allow the Finder to create clipping files. Inter-application dragging on System 7.1 requires an additional extension (the Dragging Enabler file).
Unfortunately, implementing Drag & Drop is not as easy as it might seem. So far there are not many programs that can use the Drag Manager. (Finder and SimpleText are two.) Undoubtedly, more and more applications will become Drag Manager-aware as Mac users discover the power of this new technology and demand its addition to their favorite programs. Developers who insist on ignoring advanced features of the Mac operating system in an effort to maintain “cross-platform uniformity” are not deserving of our support…
MS-DOS versus the Mac…
You may have noticed that your e-mail sometimes has funny little boxes at the beginning of each line. This problem arises because MS-DOS and the Mac have different opinions about line endings.
MS-DOS editors commonly use a character-based line width. When the cursor gets to the last (usually 80th) character position, the editor obligingly backs up to the beginning of the word being typed, inserts a CR (carriage return) and LF (linefeed character) and then carries the unfinished word down to the next line. This prevents lines from extending past the right margin and also prevents words from being split between lines. In a similar manner, most generic BBSs terminate each line with a single CR.
In the Mac world, text editors dynamically “word-wrap” at the right margin and do not insert any special characters until the end of the paragraph, at which point they insert a single carriage return. (See Figure 4.) When viewing a non-Mac file, therefore, the Mac user may note that each line is preceded by an empty box (signifying the terminating LF character from the preceding line). In a large window, the text may not extend to the right margin, and in a small window, there is usually an odd mixture of alternating short and long lines. The Mac thinks each line is a separate paragraph!
Figure 4. This looks like a job for the “Strip CR/LF” command (in the Modify dialog)!
You may have also noticed strange squiggles and misspelled words scattered throughout your downloaded text. (See Figure 5.) This is because the Mac and MS-DOS have different ideas about the use of the “upper” ASCII range. (ASCII is a standard convention used to define how all computers store alphanumeric characters.)
Unfortunately, the ASCII convention only specifies values for the first 128 (out of 256) characters. The Mac uses the remaining upper range of characters to hold diacritical markings, foreign characters, typographical (curly) quotes and a host of other goodies not found on a standard typewriter. As you might guess, MS-DOS uses this upper 128 characters for a completely different set of characters.
Figure 5. Notice what happens to curly quotes, em dashes, ligatures, ellipses, etc.
Luckily for you, Tex-Edit Plus can easily handle all of these problems using the Modify dialog (see below).
Tex-Edit Plus versus other Editors…
You will discover that Tex-Edit documents lose all their style attributes when opened by other word processors (and visa versa). This is because most word processors use their own private method for storing character styles (font, size, color, etc.)
Tex-Edit Plus can swap styled documents with America Online, eWorld, Joliwrite, SimpleText and Stylus, since they all store style information in the same way. You have to rely on the clipboard (or Drag & Drop) to swap styled text with most other word processors. Curiously, at least one expensive word processor does not support Apple’s standard clipboard format for styled text. Go figure…
Apple Menu
About Tex-Edit Plus…
Here you will find a few helpful hints as well as instructions on how to contact me for suggestions or bug reports.
File Menu
New
This opens a new blank document window. Up to 40 windows can be open simultaneously, depending on Tex-Edit’s memory allocation. To increase Tex-Edit’s memory allocation, enter a new “preferred size” in the Finder’s Get Info dialog box. You will need to add about 50K per extra window.
Open…/Open Any…
Use this command to pick the TEXT or PICT document you wish to open. If you wish to view a non-TEXT document, such as a Normal Word document, hold down the option key before choosing this command. (Technically, Tex-Edit Plus only opens the “data fork” of the chosen file.) You may notice some strange characters embedded in the text. (For example: “ 4 4 2Real Mac users do it with Tex-Edit”) These proprietary formatting characters are used by the parent program.
Open Selection…
Use this command to jump directly to another document. This allows you to create simple hypertext documents. For example, the main (root) Tex-Edit Plus document could serve as a jumping-off point for a whole group of related documents. Select the word of interest and choose Open Selection to activate the “hyperlinked” document.
Figure 6. If the word “song” is selected, then Open Selection will play the song file.
The desired document (or its alias) must reside in the same folder as the root document. If the selected file cannot be found, Tex-Edit Plus will beep and display a standard Open dialog. If the selected file exists and is not a TEXT, PICT or TeachText document, Tex-Edit Plus will open the document by launching its creator application. For example, if the desired document is an Excel spreadsheet, Tex-Edit Plus will launch Excel and Excel will display the spreadsheet.
Insert…/Insert Any…
Use this command to insert a bit of text from another document. The text from the chosen donor document is inserted into the active document at the cursor position, replacing any text that may be selected. The donor document is not affected. If you hold down the option key before choosing this command, you will be allowed to insert text from any file, including non-TEXT files.
Close/Close All
This closes the active window. You will be prompted to save any changes you may have made. If you hold down the option key, all document windows will be closed rapidly. Likewise, holding down the option key while clicking in the close box will close all windows rapidly.
Save
This saves any changes you have made to the file in the active window. Tex-Edit Plus displays a standard Save As dialog if the document has not yet been saved to disk.
Save As…
This brings up the standard dialog for creation of a new text file on your disk. There is a pop-up menu that allows you to choose the desired file format. Normal is the default styled Tex-Edit Plus format. Plain Text will create a Tex-Edit Plus document without any style information, thus saving a small amount of disk space (about 20%). Stationery Pad format creates a styled Tex-Edit Plus boiler-plate. Read Only will create a styled document that can be viewed, read aloud, printed and copied from but not altered. (This is useful if you want a “ReadMe” file to remain unaltered.)
Tex-Edit Plus can also directly create Word, Word Perfect, MacWrite, WriteNow, TeachText and America Online documents (as well as a few others). To create another type of document, select the Other option. This displays a dialog box that allows you to enter any 4-character creator code.
Normal, Stationery Pad and Read Only Tex-Edit Plus documents remember their size and screen position during each save. They will appear in the same place when re-opened, if you have selected Remember window size and position in the Preferences dialog.
A Sound File is a double-clickable System 7 sound document that can be placed in the System to be used as an alert sound, etc. Tex-Edit Plus can create such a file if you have used the Record Sound command to attach a sound to the current document. The text portion of the document is not inserted into the sound file.
Revert
Did you make a mistake that even Undo can’t correct? This command will restore the last saved version of the active document. All changes made since the last time the file was saved will be lost.
Page Setup
This displays the standard Page Setup dialog allowing you to set specific options for your printer. Please leave “Font Substitution” off to avoid misaligned indents in printouts.
Print Options…
This dialog allows you to set the page margins (in inches). You can also specify double-spaced printouts and page numbers (at the bottom of each printed page). None of these choices affect the actual file or the on-screen display.
Figure 7. Here, each page will be single-spaced and numbered at the bottom.
If the margins are set to zero, then your printer’s maximum printable area will be used. (The maximum printable area can generally be increased by selecting “Larger Print Area” in the Page Setup/Options dialog.) All settings are saved in the “Prefs” file when you quit Tex-Edit Plus (see below).
Print…
This displays the standard Print dialog for the printer you have selected in the Chooser.
Preferences…
Do you like to use 18 point Times, save all your documents in Word format and use curly quotes? The Preferences dialog allows you to preset many of these features and store your preferred settings in a “Prefs” file in the Preferences folder.
Figure 8. Customize many of Tex-Edit’s features and default window settings.
1) Show “Open…” dialog at startup. If this is selected, you will be greeted with the standard file selection dialog (instead of a new blank window) when Tex-Edit Plus launches.
2) Play sound when document opens. If this is selected, Tex-Edit Plus will automatically play the sound file attached to each document as it is opened. Sounds can be attached to documents using the Record Sound command in the Sound menu.
3) Tab creates ___ spaces. This option may be helpful to indent the first line of a paragraph (or create columns if you are using a mono-spaced font like Monaco). If this is selected, pressing the tab key will result in the insertion of the chosen number of spaces into the text.
4) Smart (“”) quotes. If this is selected, typographically superior (“curly”) quotes will automatically be used whenever you hit the single or double quote key. You may wish to disable this feature if you are creating files to be sent to non-Mac systems, since they won’t be able to recognize these characters.
5) Smart cut, paste and delete. In most cases, this option will save two keystrokes in the cut-and-paste cycle. Cutting a word from the middle of a sentence will leave only a single space, which is usually what you want. If you subsequently paste the word between two other words, Tex-Edit Plus will place a single space between each of the words. Likewise, the delete and forward delete keys will remove the selected word(s) as well as the extra space, saving one keystroke.
6) Change document “creator” to:___ If you want Tex-Edit Plus to save documents so that another word processor (e.g., Word) will open when the document is double-clicked, check this option and enter the appropriate 4 character creator code. (For example, Word’s creator is MSWD.) The Finder uses this code to identify the document’s parent application and icon.
If you wish to save files as Tex-Edit Plus documents, check this option and use TBB6 (Tex-Edit’s creator code). To open, edit and save a file without changing its parent application or icon, leave this option off.
7) Documents remember their position. If this is selected, Tex-Edit Plus will restore a document’s previous size and screen position when it is re-opened. This only works with Normal, Stationery Pad and Read Only Tex-Edit Plus documents. If this option is off, document windows will be evenly “staggered” as they are opened.
8) Default window size:___ This pop-up menu allows you to set the size of new windows. If you always view BBS text of a given line width, several handy presets are available, allowing you to set the line width to exactly 60, 80 and 100 characters (if you are using 9 point Monaco). Full Screen windows will nearly fill the main screen, leaving a thin strip of desktop on the right side (for the disk and trashcan icons). The Custom Size option will make the default window size the same as the document window you are currently viewing.
9) Text wrapping width:___ To allow your text to automatically word-wrap to fit between the left and right sides of the window, select the Window Size option. This deactivates the horizontal scrollbar and may cause a delay when resizing windows containing a large amount of text.
If you are writing source code and want each entry to stay on a separate line, select the Wide Open option. The Page Setup Size option will wrap the text to the page width specified in the Page Setup dialog, giving you a better idea how the printout will look. These options do not affect the document, only the screen display.
10) Font/Font size:___ These pop-up menus allow you to change Tex-Edit’s default font and font size. The default font and size are used when a new window is created or when a generic text file is opened.
11) Block header:___ If you wish to use special characters to hilite and indent each line of “quoted” text used in an e-mail reply, enter the desired characters here. (e.g., “ > ”) These “block” settings are used by the Block Format command (explained under Special menu). The header may consist of 0 to 8 characters.
12) Block length:___ Enter the maximum character width of each block-formatted line (between 20 and 200 characters per line).
Quit
This closes the Tex-Edit Plus application. You will be prompted to save any altered or unsaved documents before Tex-Edit Plus quits.
Edit Menu
Undo
This reverses your most recent editing action or style change. After you undo something, it can usually be redone if desired.
Cut
This removes the current selection to the clipboard, making it available for pasting into other locations or other documents. The clipboard holds the text as well as its “styl” information, making styled selections available to other programs.
Copy/Copy Unstyled
This makes a copy of the current text or picture selection and places it in the clipboard. Sometimes it is convenient to move plain text (without any associated attributes, such as font, size or style). If you hold down the option key, only the plain, unstyled text will be copied to the clipboard.
Paste/Paste Unstyled
This moves a copy of the text in the clipboard to the current insertion point, deleting any text that may be selected. If you hold down the option key, only plain text will be pasted.
Clear
This erases the current text selection.
Select All
This hilites (selects) all the text in the document. If a PICT document is active, then the entire picture is enclosed in the selection marquee.
Paste Time
The current time is pasted at the insertion point. The clipboard is not affected. Use the “Date and Time” control panel (System 7.1+) to alter the format of the date and time.
Paste Date
The current date is pasted at the insertion point.
Insert Page Break
Use this feature to force your printer to start at the top of a new page. Tex-Edit Plus inserts a formfeed character, which shows up as a little gray non-printing box.
Special Menu
Find/Replace…
Suppose you wish to quickly locate a specific name in a long text document? Or, you want to update a document by replacing all instances of the year “1994” with the current year? The Find/Replace dialog allows you to locate any given text string and optionally specify a replacement string.
The Find button hilites the first occurrence of the desired string. (You may then use the Find Next or Replace & Find Again menu commands.) The Replace All button replaces all occurrences of the find string with the replacement string, then reports how many replacements were made.
Perhaps you want to search for non-printing characters in order to manually clean up a passage of downloaded text. The small buttons labelled CR (carriage return), Tab, FF (formfeed/page break) and LF (linefeed) give you easy access to four commonly encountered invisible characters.
Or, maybe you want to “dress up” your document by making the first character of each paragraph 14 point Horstcaps. Change your mind and want to try 18 point Old English green? Luckily, Tex-Edit Plus now offers a wildcard search character (the “?” button) as well as sophisticated tools for text style manipulation.
Figure 9. Some commonly used, non-printing characters are displayed.
All searches start at the top of the document, unless you select the Start search at cursor position option. The Cases must match option forces Tex-Edit Plus to look for exact matches. Turn this switch off if you wish case to be ignored. (To properly find and replace words with foreign language characters/diacriticals, you must leave this switch on.) The Whole words only option limits matches to distinct whole words (i.e., looking for “the” will find “the” but not “them”). All switch settings are saved between Tex-Edit Plus sessions.
The wildcard button inserts a placeholder character (◊) into either the find or the replace text. A wildcard in the find text is ignored during the search process (i.e. the wildcard will “match” any other character, including non-printing characters). A wildcard in the replace text instructs Tex-Edit to pass over the corresponding character in the found text selection during a replace operation.
For example, if you search for “◊athy” you will find “Cathy” as well as “Kathy”. Likewise, you could search for “◊athy” and replace it with “◊atherine”, which would simultaneously change “Cathy” -> “Catherine” and “Kathy” -> “Katherine”.
Both the find and replace text boxes have corresponding style popmenus. These popmenus allow you to set various style attributes independently. Entering “eagle” in the find text box and then choosing bold from the popmenu will “match” instances of the word “eagle” that are boldfaced (regardless of its font, fontsize and color). In a similar manner, the popmenu associated with the replace text will superimpose the chosen style(s) on the replacement text.
Find Again
This option becomes available once a match has been found. It allows you to continue searching for the next match.
Replace & Find Again
This replaces the hilited word with the replacement string (from the Find/Replace dialog) and continues searching for the next match.
Enter Selection
If you see a word in the document and wish to find its next occurrence, select the word and use this command to instantly copy the selection (up to 255 characters) into the Find/Replace dialog. Then use the Find Again command.
Change Case
If someone sends you a file that is ALL CAPS, select the offending text and use this command to fix it. You can change all the selected text to uppercase, lowercase, title case or sentence case. Title case capitalizes the first letter of each word and sentence case capitalizes the first letter of each sentence.
Block Format
Quoting a brief passage from received e-mail allows the sender to remember their original message and thus the context of your reply. This command will convert the selected text into a marked, indented block format, suitable for use in outgoing e-mail.
> Here is a brief example of block
> formatted text with the line length set
> to 40 and block header set to “ > ”.
Block formatting may also be useful if you simply wish to emphasize a brief passage of text embedded in your document. The number of characters per line and the indenting header characters are set in the Preferences dialog. Notice that words are not split.
Strip LF’s
Sometimes you download a file with funny boxes in front of each line. These boxes are actually linefeed characters that are inserted by MS-DOS systems. (They generally follow each carriage return to signify line endings.) Macs don’t use linefeeds. Use this command to remove all these useless characters from the document.
LF’s->CR’s (UNIX->Mac)
Use this command to quickly convert a downloaded UNIX or etext file into Mac format. UNIX systems use a single linefeed character (without a carriage return) to terminate paragraphs. All linefeeds are converted to carriage returns.
Electronic–text (etext) documents are prepared by “Project Gutenberg” of the Illinois Benedictine College. Project Gutenberg is working to make a large number of public domain texts available as etexts.
CR’s->LF’s (Mac->UNIX)
This is handy if you wish to upload a Mac file to a UNIX system. This command converts all carriage returns in the active document into linefeeds.
Modify Document…/Modify Selection…
File transfers between Mac and non-Mac systems often result in frustration for users at both ends. The non-Mac users end up with split words and run-on paragraphs, while the Mac users are greeted by a screen full of little empty boxes and oddly wrapped lines. If you’ve ever experienced these problems, you’ve come to the right dialog!
The Modify dialog is Tex-Edit’s most complex and powerful feature. It allows you to globally change (munge) special characters in the text. If you only wish to modify a portion of the document, select the text of interest before choosing this command. If you don’t like the resulting modifications, be sure to choose Undo before doing anything else. Tex-Edit Plus remembers the settings in the Modify dialog until you quit.
Figure 10. Perform multiple, simultaneous modifications to “clean up” any file.
1) Replace each tab with ___ spaces. This is useful for aligning tab columns created by other programs. If this is selected, each tab character will be replaced with the specified number of space characters.
2) Strip control characters. If a downloaded document contains lots of little boxes scattered through the text, this option may help. It deletes all non-Mac control characters. Specifically, it deletes all characters with an ASCII value less than 32 (except for tabs, carriage returns and formfeeds, which are used by Mac programs).
3) Strip high ASCII characters. If your downloaded text is filled with “wrong” characters and misspelled words, use this option to delete all characters in the upper ASCII range (128-256). This option will strip many useful typographic characters (ligatures, ellipses, em dashes, curly quotes, etc.) as well as foreign language characters, so you should first convert (“stupefy”) any useful characters you wish to keep.
4) Strip leading spaces. Would you like all your text to line up nicely along the left side of the window? Use this option to remove the spaces and tabs from the beginning of each line.
5) Strip trailing spaces. Use this option to remove the unnecessary padding (spaces and tabs) that some editors add at the end of each line.
6) Strip double spaces. Many people who learned to type on typewriters are still in the habit of following each sentence with two spaces. When using proportional fonts, it is typographically preferable to separate sentences using a single space. This option will change each instance of double space characters (following a sentence) into a single space.
7) Strip diacritical marks. Many foreign languages use accents, umlauts, cedillas and the like. If you wish to upload text that contains foreign characters, use this option to remove the diacritical marks from letters, converting them to their ordinary (English) equivalent.
Figure 11. Non-English characters and their English equivalents.
8) Quotes. The foot and inch marks (' ") are poor substitutes for typographical (curly) quotes, however they are all that most BBSs understand. Use this popup menu to replace all ordinary quote marks with typographer quote marks and visa versa.
9) Ligatrs. The two available choices allow you to replace all occurrences of “fi” and “fl” with the single-character typographer ligatures or visa versa. Note that some fonts do not have these ligatures installed, thus producing empty little boxes. As with the smart quotes, ligatures are usually not recognized by less intelligent computer systems.
10) Ellipses. This popup menu presents two choices, allowing you to replace all ordinary ellipses (three consecutive periods) with a typographic ellipsis character or visa versa.
11) Dashes. This popup menu presents two choices, allowing you to replace all ordinary twin dashes with a typographic em dash character or visa versa.
12) Line Endings. These various choices allow you to easily convert BBS or MS-DOS line formatting to Mac line formatting and visa versa. (See the section: “MS-DOS versus the Mac” above.)
Use Strip CR/LF to convert downloaded text to Mac-formatted word wrapping text. If you wish to format text for upload to a BBS, use the Add CR option and set the Line Length to about 60 characters (which easily fits on most BBS editors). To convert a file for transfer to an MS-DOS computer, use Add CR/LF.
13) Reset. Use this shortcut to turn off all the selected modifications at once (resetting them to their default values).
Go To Line #…
If you are working with source code or a line-numbered legal document, use this command to jump to any specified line in the document.
Figure 12. Instantly select any line in the document.
This option is most helpful if you use the “Wide Open” text wrapping width (Preferences dialog).
Word Count…
It is sometimes helpful to know exactly how long your book report is so far. This command shows the word count, line count, character count, sentence count and paragraph count for the entire active document as well as the current selection. The character count is also continuously displayed in the lower left corner of each window, followed by the number of characters currently selected (hilited).
Font Menu
The font menu lists all the fonts available to Tex-Edit Plus. The current selection’s font is checked.
Size Menu
The size menu lists a selection of common font sizes. The current selection’s font size is checked.
Smaller
This decrements the current selection’s font size by one point. If the selection contains varying text sizes, then each of the various text sizes is reduced by one. The command keys are a useful shortcut for easily adjusting font size.
Larger
This increments the current selection’s font size by one point.
Other(_)…
If you wish to change quickly to an odd font size, use this command to select any point size between 1 and 256. Simply enter the desired value in the edit box (or use the arrow buttons).
Figure 13. A text sample is displayed at the given size.
The sample text is redrawn as its size changes.
Style Menu
Use the Style options to add a splash of color or emphasize important points. If you have a color-compatible Mac, then the standard color picker dialog is available in the Color submenu.
The Justification submenu may be useful for centering text on announcements or if you are using a right-to-left language script. The justification setting affects how the document is displayed and printed, but does not alter the file’s contents. Full justification will align both the left and right margins in the display and the printout.
Sound Menu
Read Entire Document
This command is remarkably helpful for proofreading documents, catching grammatical errors that elude both spelling checkers and tired eyes. It reads the entire active document aloud. The reading can be canceled or paused at any time.
Read Starting At Cursor
Use this command to begin reading at any arbitrary point in the document.
Read Selection
If you only wish to listen to a specific passage of text, use this command to read the selected text. The reading can be stopped or paused as desired.
Stop
This command immediately stops the reading session and any sound that may be playing.
Pause/Resume
This command temporarily pauses or restarts the reading session.
Turn Speech On/Off
This command activates the Speech Manager. It must be selected before any other speech-related commands are usable. Turning speech off will immediately stop all speech and sound playback and release any memory allocated for the Speech Manager.
Speech Settings…
Want to try a different voice or listen to a document read at double-speed? This dialog allows you to modify some of the Speech Manager’s speech characteristics. The Voice pop-up menu lists all the currently available voices. Selecting a voice will adjust the Voice pitch, Speech rate and Modulation to that voice’s default setting.
Figure 14. Radical alterations of voice characteristics are easy.
Try experimenting with different rates and pitches to get the most pleasing results. The Sample button will cause a sample sentence to be read aloud.
Auto-Highlighting
Would you like to sit back and watch what is being read while Tex-Edit Plus proofreads your document? Choose By Word or By Sentence from this menu to have Tex-Edit Plus scroll each word/sentence into view and hilite it as it is read aloud. Background editing functions are disabled while auto-highlighting is active.
Record Sound…
If you’d really like to “wake up” recipients of your documents, try attaching an audible note! This command displays the standard sound input dialog for microphone-equipped Macs. Once you finish recording the desired sound, it is attached to the current document (making it available for playing when the document is re-opened later). Only one sound can be attached to each document, therefore the old sound is erased when a new one is recorded.
Play Sound
This command will play the document’s attached sound file, if any. Use command-period to interrupt sound playback.
Erase Sound
Want to minimize your document’s size? This command permanently erases the document’s attached sound file. It is not undo-able. Read-Only document sounds cannot be erased.
Windows Menu
All open documents are readily available using the Windows menu. Choose the document you wish to activate. The currently active window is checked.
Switch
Having trouble juggling several documents at once? Use this command repeatedly to “cycle” through all open documents.
Miscellaneous
Helpful Hints
Here are some simple hints and tricks to increase Tex-Edit’s usefulness:
• The watch cursor will spin during any time-consuming, interruptible operations.
Use command-period to interrupt the operation.
• To edit the text in a TeachText read-only (ttro) document, open a new blank window
and use the Insert command—or simply select and copy the entire document. (This
tip also applies to SimpleText and Tex-Edit Plus read-only documents.)
• Open any file by dragging it onto Tex-Edit Plus or its alias. (See “Limitations” below.)
• To move a styled Tex-Edit Plus document into another word processor without losing
style information, use the clipboard to copy and paste the entire document.
• Triple click to select a sentence.
• Quadruple click to select a paragraph.
• Option-click on a close box to close all windows.
• To delete all occurrences of a string, use the Find/Replace dialog. Just leave
the replace field blank and choose Replace All.
• Count the number of occurrences of any given string using the Find/Replace
dialog. Enter an appropriate number of wildcard characters in the Replace with
box, then choose Replace All and note the number of replacements.
• To see non-printing characters (tabs, CRs, etc.), use the ASCII fonts included with
this archive.
• Tex-Edit’s PICT handling abilities are handy when it comes to cropping screen
shots (Command-shift-3) for use in other programs (e.g., Word). Just
click-and-drag a selection marquee and choose Copy.
• If you run out of memory during a PICT copy operation, try keeping the entire
selection marquee visible.
• If you start noticing slowdowns during editing operations, break your document
into “chapters” and use Tex-Edit’s convenient Windows menu along with its
ability to hyperlink between documents (Open Selection).
• A TeachText read-only document can be read aloud (if speech is turned on) by
choosing one of the Read… commands in the Sound menu.
• A document can be read in the background if Auto-Highlighting is off. You may
use all of Tex-Edit’s normal editing functions during the reading session.
• If you wish to create longer sounds, simply increase Tex-Edit’s memory
allocation (in the Finder’s Get Info dialog).
• To create an emphasized, indented, centered block of text (such as used to quote
brief poetic passages in a larger document), use the Block Format command with
the Block header (Preferences dialog) set to all spaces.
• To avoid misaligned columns and indents in printouts, leave “Font Substitution” off
(in the Page Setup dialog).
Keyboard Shortcuts
Tex-Edit Plus makes full use of Apple’s extended keyboard including the forward delete, home, end, page up, page down and cursor keys. The F1-F4 keys invoke the standard undo, cut, copy and paste commands. Other shortcuts:
• Shift-arrow extends a selection.
• Option-left/right arrow moves the cursor one word at a time.
• Option-up/down arrow moves the insertion marker to the beginning/end of the line.
• Option-shift-left/right arrow extends the selection one word at a time.
• Option-page up moves the cursor to the top of the previous screenful of text.
• Option-page down moves the cursor to the bottom of the next screenful of text.
• Option-shift-page up selects all the text between the end of the current selection
and the top of the previous screenful of text.
• Option-shift-page down selects all the text between the start of the current
selection and the bottom of the next screenful of text.
• Option-home will move the insertion marker to the beginning of the document.
• Option-end will move the insertion marker to the end of the document.
• Option-shift-home will select all text up to and including the current selection.
• Option-shift-end will select all text from the current selection to the end of the file.
• Shift-delete mimics the extended keyboard’s forward delete key.
• Enter or Return activate the default (outlined) button.
• Esc or Command-period activate the Cancel button.
• All other pushbuttons have command key equivalents based on the first letter in the
name of the button. (For example Command-d activates the Don’t Save button in
the “Save Changes?” dialog.)
• Command-period will also stop all sound playback, stop all speech and stop most time-
consuming operations.
Other Features
Tex-Edit Plus is 32 bit clean, stationery aware, drag manager aware, required Apple event aware, System 7 compatible, color compatible, big screen compatible, 68040 cache compatible and PowerPC compatible (under emulation). Balloon help is available.
Requirements
Tex-Edit Plus requires System 7.0 or better. To use the speech facility, you need Apple’s new Speech Manager extension. (The old MacinTalk no longer works.) To use the Drag & Drop function, you will need to use System 7.5 or place the Macintosh Drag and Drop extension in the Extensions folder. (See the “Drag & Drop Spoken Here” chapter for more details.)
Limitations
Tex-Edit Plus is made to handle files of unlimited size, although speed problems will arise when the file exceeds 500-1000K, depending on your computer’s processor speed. This compromise benefits PowerBook owners by keeping the entire document in RAM and minimizing disk accesses.
In unusual circumstances, it is possible to create a document that is so stylistically complex (many changes in font, size, style, color, etc.) that the text styles will be lost when the document is re-opened. Normally, the speed problems associated with large, complex files will intervene long before this style limit is reached. If you need to create huge documents with many different styles, it is wise to break the document into manageable chunks.
To maximize its utility, I have given Tex-Edit Plus the ability to read the data fork of any file that it is forced to open (via a Finder drop or the Open Any command). It is unwise to try to open an application file, especially if it is running. (“Doc, it hurts when I do this…”) Never try to open a System file.
About The Speech Manager
The Speech Manager extension and the MacinTalk Pro extension should be placed in the Extensions folder. All voice files should be placed in a folder named “Voices” in the Extensions folder. The Speech Manager only requires 150K of RAM and will function on practically any Mac, while the higher quality MacinTalk Pro voices require a lot more memory and processing power (700-2800K and 68020+). Tex-Edit Plus runs fine without the Speech Manager.
You can purchase the Speech Manager direct from Apple or from Quality Computers (1-800-777-3642). Quality Computers sells a low-priced package that includes a fascinating group of speech-related programs and utilities.
Trouble Shooting
It is easy to use all of Tex-Edit’s memory allotment while manipulating large PICTs or large text files. If you see an “out of memory” message, simply increase Tex-Edit’s memory allocation in the Finder. I would suggest at least 1200K if you plan on doing a lot of PICT editing with a big color monitor.
If you have trouble with the speech functions, try increasing Tex-Edit’s memory allocation. The “high quality” MacinTalk Pro voices use the most memory. “Marvin” and “Fred” use the least.
If the speech functions still don’t work, or if you notice any other strange behavior while using Tex-Edit Plus, try deleting the “Tex-Edit+ Prefs” file in the Preferences folder. The Prefs file will be re-built fresh the next time you use Tex-Edit Plus.
Some general problems are caused by a corrupted “Desktop” file. Try re-booting your computer with the option-command keys held down. (This is good general monthly maintenance.)
Some other general problems are caused by Extension conflicts. Try re-booting your computer with the shift key held down.
Registration
Tex-Edit Plus is ShareWare ($5). Payment may consist of an equivalent amount of foreign currency or stamps. (I love collecting foreign stuff!) My mailing address is:
Tom Bender
5313 Beverly Drive
San Angelo, Texas 76904
Please include your e-mail address, if possible, so I can send you a message acknowledging your registration. If you would like a printed receipt, please send me a stamped, self-addressed envelope.
Registered owners are entitled to all updates, source code and product support. Registered users of previous versions of Tex-Edit are entitled to ownership of Tex-Edit Plus, of course. (Thank you for your support!)
Feel free to give Tex-Edit Plus (with this document) to anyone. You may use Tex-Edit Plus for as long as you wish (i.e., there is no time limit on the trial period). You are under no moral obligation to send in the ShareWare fee and you are under no obligation to erase the program if you don’t pay the fee. Simply think of the ShareWare fee as a much-appreciated way to encourage future development and to say “thank you!”
Source Code
Registered owners may obtain a copy of the THINK Pascal source code (for personal use) by sending a disk and a self-addressed stamped disk mailer envelope to the mailing address given above. The source code is well-documented and may be helpful for other amateur programmers.
Product Support
If you have questions, suggestions or bug reports, you may send a letter to the above address. For a faster, more convenient response, you can reach me via modem:
America Online: TomBB
eWorld: TomBB
Internet: tombb@aol.com
Other Products
Please also try Eliza (clinical psychologist), Re-Pete (memory game) and Azile (Eliza’s evil twin)! I will continue to support Tex-Edit 2.x, which is a System 6-compatible and limited to 32K files.
Credits
I am grateful to the many users who have contributed to the evolution of Tex-Edit Plus, however I would especially like to thank E.J. Chichilnisky (for suggestions, feature development and extensive beta testing), Martin Kimeldorf (for extensive help with the manual), and Marco Piovanelli (for development of the WASTE text engine that allows large file handling)!
