Wordpad alternative.

  • Thread starter Thread starter fitwell
  • Start date Start date
On Wed, 03 Dec 2003 10:40:36 +1100, John Fitzsimons
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Ahh, that's where the problem lies. Here's the scoop: you can save
files to a TXT or RTF extension you want.
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You mean just save the file with an .rtf extension ? Sure, but the
file will still just be an ordinary text file. Not RTF.
I imagine a few other
formats might work, too, but those are only 2 I personally use.
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Then open the file. The app you use for either format normally will
launch for you and open the file. Re-save while you're in that app.
It's such an old trick of mine from so long ago, didn't even realize.
Very, very sorry about that.
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So that's how I "save to RTF", though it's a manual thing done on my
part.
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Sorry for confusion.
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Okay, so the added process changes the .txt file to .rtf ? Seems like
it would work, but be somewhat tedious.

Interesting approach. Thanks. :-)


Regards, John.
 
John Fitzsimons said:
Okay, so the added process changes the .txt file to .rtf ? Seems like
it would work, but be somewhat tedious.
Click to expand...

Btw, I tested out what she was doing. I used Crypt Edit to open a text file
that had an .rtf extension. Then I typed a couple of character into the file.
When saved, Crypt Edit converted that file to rtf format.
 
Please do. Perhaps start by getting them to answer whether they see wrap
or no-wrap on text in MSIE. What affects it one way or another, that will
be a harder question. It darn sure is not an interface option button, as we
know. Why it would be different on one system/install, from another, I am
totally out of possible ideas. As said, I tried to review every MSIE reg
entry that couuld even possibly remotely have connection, and did not get
anything in the attempt.
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Posted in an IE group yesterday. No answer as yet but will report
back.
 
fitwell said:
??? Gee. On my system, when MSIE 5.5 displays txt files, it is not wrapping
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[...]
Again, though, after last week's OS wipe/reinstall, I no longer have
that problem. I honestly don't know why (????!!!!). Yup, just
checked and everything displaying fine still.

Can anyone contribute any theories as to what could be causing the no
word wrap??
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I have been so stumped on this! I did a very thorough study of every little
detail on a Regmon log I took, ,of the accesses that occur the instant MSIE
displays a text file. I even pulled out the registry entries, with Resource
Hacker, from MSHTML.DLL, related to MSIE filetype handling, to a text note,
to study there. All with no fruition!

Then I booted into my near-virgin w98 partition. I assumed I would see
wrapping in MSIE there, as you did after your format/reinstall. Surprise,
get this. No wrap there, also. I've done almost nothing in that partition
since its install, have not touched the MSIE (5.0) installation. So, I
wonder, what is normal? The wrap or no wrap? You hit upon some really odd
fluke, somehow?

I am out of ways to try to guess on the mystery. So either I get desperate
and try to inquire in an IE group - at least about which is the normal case -
even if they don't know what leads to the state of wrap or no-wrap in MSIE.
Or else, I turn to the older tact: "try to not think about pink elephants."
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As just mentioned, Karen. I asked yesterday in an IE group and will
report back to this thread what they tell me.

btw, when you say above v5.0 I'm a little confused. Thought you
mentioned that you, too, were using 5.5 (?) That might have some
bearing if you're not using 5.5 after all (?). We'll know, hopefully,
soon enough.
 
You mean just save the file with an .rtf extension ? Sure, but the
file will still just be an ordinary text file. Not RTF.





Okay, so the added process changes the .txt file to .rtf ? Seems like
it would work, but be somewhat tedious.
Click to expand...

No, not at all. It just sounds so, esp. since the confusion happened
because it's so second-nature to me, I didn't explain properly from
the beginning and confusion reigned.

It's just an added mouse click.

The reason for saving to an RTF format is to add the colour to a plain
text file. Very large threads otherwise are very difficult to read;
but by adding the blue colour to quoted lines and adding a line of red
asterisks between messages, I find that it is easy to then read saved
Agent messages. You can imagine what a black&white Agent thread of 5
messages or more would be like without doing something like this!

Since one has to save the file anyway at the end of any colour-coding,
all you have to do is make sure you switch the file type at the bottom
of the SAVE AS dialogue box to RTF. As you'll see, when you save the
file for the first time after opening it, though the extension says
RTF the file type actually shows as TXT here. Just make the switch
right at that point and you're done. Easier/simpler/quicker to do
than to write about.
Interesting approach. Thanks. :-)
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Hey, you're welcome! :oD
 
fitwell <[email protected]>:
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Remains on my list to look over which text of the text editors would be good
to occasionally read main/news posts with, where you tell it to colorize the
quote (>) and similar.
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To speed up the process for Fitwell, others, it would seem like it
would be handy if there was a text, or rtf, editor that could create
coloured lines. For example, colour blue all lines that start with a
">". Wonder if there is a way to do that ?

Regards, John.
 
John Fitzsimons said:
To speed up the process for Fitwell, others, it would seem like it
would be handy if there was a text, or rtf, editor that could create
coloured lines. For example, colour blue all lines that start with a
">". Wonder if there is a way to do that ?
Click to expand...

I've planned for a while to take a close look at the editors who let you
customize their syntax highlighter files. Main purpose of mine was for
..reg files....

The other purpose, that's for mail & news messages. For when we sometimes
have a longer, involved message which we want to read over, outside our
mail\news reader. For those, the primary thing would be to offset the
comments ( >) lines to color, as Fitwell does.

Today I started to take a look into this. I've got about ten of the syntax
("programmers-") editors installed. I ran each one. Here was my test: whose
syntax customization options would be the simplest and fastest to figure
out.

The winner was ConTEXT. Quick instructions were in the help file. You create
a copy of a particular well-commented existing highlighter file, as template
for the new one you want to create. Define your keywords and extensions etc
within that. Then the ConTEXT interface provides a pretty convenient dialog
for further refinements, especially in the matter of colors.

I spent about twenty minutes, and got something working. I couldn't get
some of the refinements I wanted figured out, but the basics came through:
the making of a custom extension, setting the ">" to be a "comment line,"
choosing my colors.

Next...What do I see? That ConTEXT already comes with a highlighter file,
exactly for this, for mail/news messages.

http://www.fixedsys.com/context/hl/Hamster-Message.chl

http://www.fixedsys.com/context/ConTEXTsetup.exe
http://www.fixedsys.com/context/features.html

Hamster-Message.chl defaults to using extension .msg. But you can of course
create any extension you want (eg .mail) and define it in that file.

From your reader, save your exported mail/news messages with whatever
extension you decide on. And from there, you can of course set ConTEXT to
be the default handler for that extension.

Note to Fitwell. I recommend giving this choice a look-over. And here is
a nice benefit. After ConTEXT does the highlighting, you can export those
messages as .rtf or .htm, and the formatting (color, italic, etc) will be
retained.

Small note. I was hoping that a syntax editor would give me the option to
have lines starting with > vs >> vs >>> all in separate colors, like the
display you see in groups.google.com. But those differing levels of color
do not appear when using the hamster-message.chl highlighter file, and I
have not figured out how one would get that option in there.

A repete: I definitely recommend ConTEXT here. You have their existing
highlighter file all ready to go for the purpose. And then for changes to
color choices, extension, and so on, ConTEXT makes that easy to do.

And the one warning about ConTEXT does not apply here. I'd previously
viewed this editor as a heartbreaker, and avoided using it. The matter of
the author refusing to allow a word-wrap option for display. For mail&news
messages, however, that will not matter, since those already have short
line lengths (right-column hard breaks).

ConTEXT features page
http://www.fixedsys.com/context/features.html

ConTEXT downloads
http://www.fixedsys.com/context/ConTEXTsetup.exe
http://www.fixedsys.com/context/hl/Hamster-Message.chl

More highlighter files (php-html, etc):
http://www.fixedsys.com/context/download.html
 
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