kent@xanth.UUCP (Kent Paul Dolan) (06/26/87)
I have a plain text file of about 23 Kbytes size I want to browse from
workbench. I'd like to be able to use Notepad, because it lets me flip
pages, it has a pretty, crisp display format, it is smart enough to
count wrapped lines when deciding how much to display on a page, unlike
the version of "more" I have, and it dynamically reformats the lines
when I change the window size. Kudos to Commodore staff for all of these
nice features.
When I use the workbench menu "info" entry to attach a .info file from
an existing Notepad file to the plain text file I want to display, and
then double click the icon, the plain text file comes up just fine, and
displays with properly wrapped lines and dynamic redisplay, just like I
want it to.
But, page flipping doesn't work at all, and when I scroll down about 36 lines,
the scrolling stops. When I leaned on the scroll down gadget for a while,
the text reformatted into the alternate character set and was crunched into
two lines, one across the window drag bar, and the other about mid window.
A while after I quit trying to move the display, the monitor speaker burst
into a random memory trash version of music, the power light shortly
thereafter began to cycle, and soon Mr. Guru paid a call.
I guess I did something wrong. ;-)
So, a few questions not covered by the Amiga manual.
1) Is that file unrealistically large to expect to use with Notepad V1.2?
If so, is there another workbench utility that counts wrapped lines
right, and allows forward and backward scrolling through a document?
2) Do Notepad files have embedded control characters missing from my file?
3) If so, are they documented somewhere so that I could add them in as
quoted characters with emacs? Could someone give me a brief gloss, if
that's not unreasonable?
4) Alternately (and nicer) is there a utility floating around to allow
plain text files to be converted to Notepad format? If so, will it
let me decide where to install the page breaks? I think I can get
one document page on either three or four Notepad pages, so I'd like
to break at the document's existing logical page breaks, with extra
breaks between to fit Notepad page size.
I want this enough to type it in again from scratch, if that's the only way,
but at my progress rate, that's a week wasted, so I'd really appreciate any
help from the net.
Thanks,
Kent.
--
Kent Paul Dolan, LCDR, NOAA, Retired; ODU MSCS grad student // Yet
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By the time you learn to write C code that you can read yourself six months
later, you're three months past retirement age. Then again, Methusalah
couldn't read his own week old APL code to the day he died. ;-)andy@cbmvax.UUCP (Andy Finkel) (07/17/87)
In article <1421@xanth.UUCP> kent@xanth.UUCP (Kent Paul Dolan) writes: > >I have a plain text file of about 23 Kbytes size I want to browse from >workbench. I'd like to be able to use Notepad, because it lets me flip >pages, it has a pretty, crisp display format, it is smart enough to >count wrapped lines when deciding how much to display on a page, unlike >the version of "more" I have, and it dynamically reformats the lines >when I change the window size. Kudos to Commodore staff for all of these >nice features. > >When I use the workbench menu "info" entry to attach a .info file from >an existing Notepad file to the plain text file I want to display, and >then double click the icon, the plain text file comes up just fine, and >displays with properly wrapped lines and dynamic redisplay, just like I >want it to. > >But, page flipping doesn't work at all, and when I scroll down about 36 lines, >the scrolling stops. When I leaned on the scroll down gadget for a while, >the text reformatted into the alternate character set and was crunched into >two lines, one across the window drag bar, and the other about mid window. > >A while after I quit trying to move the display, the monitor speaker burst >into a random memory trash version of music, the power light shortly >thereafter began to cycle, and soon Mr. Guru paid a call. > >I guess I did something wrong. ;-) > >So, a few questions not covered by the Amiga manual. > >1) Is that file unrealistically large to expect to use with Notepad V1.2? By popular demand (not my idea, in other words) notepad was limited to the size of files it could handle to 9800 characters. On the other hand, I'm disappointed it Gurued with your file, rather than doing nothing. Guess some error code has an error. Well, things are different now, so next release, I'll let it handle bigger files. >2) Do Notepad files have embedded control characters missing from my file? Notepad uses a CONTROL-L (form feed ) to divide pages. You may be missing those. > >3) If so, are they documented somewhere so that I could add them in as > quoted characters with emacs? Could someone give me a brief gloss, if > that's not unreasonable? Aside from the formfeeds, it uses ANSI standard codes for its functions, it the SGR series, like <ESC>[1m<NUL> for bold face. (The <NUL> is there so I can find the suckers on a reverse search more quickly). Fonts are specified by <ESC>[<param1>;<param2>;<...param n>"f<NUL> the <params> are the name of the font reduced to the numeric values of their ASCII codes, and the size of the font. So, for example, topaz 8 would become <ESC>[116;111;112;97;122;8"F<NUL> The <NUL> only appears once per group of commands, at the end. > >4) Alternately (and nicer) is there a utility floating around to allow > plain text files to be converted to Notepad format Easiest thing would be to load it into MicroEmacs (on the Extras disk), and install the formfeeds. MicroEmacs has a Quote character function to enter control characters into a file. andy -- andy finkel {ihnp4|seismo|allegra}!cbmvax!andy Commodore-Amiga, Inc. "The goal of Computer Science is to build something that will last at least until we've finished building it." Any expressed opinions are mine; but feel free to share. I disclaim all responsibilities, all shapes, all sizes, all colors.
kim@amdahl.amdahl.com (Kim DeVaughn) (08/05/87)
In article <2137@cbmvax.UUCP>, andy@cbmvax.UUCP (Andy Finkel) writes: > In article <1421@xanth.UUCP> kent@xanth.UUCP (Kent Paul Dolan) writes: > > > >2) Do Notepad files have embedded control characters missing from my file? > > Notepad uses a CONTROL-L (form feed ) to divide pages. You may be missing > those. > > >[ ... ] > > Aside from the formfeeds, it uses ANSI standard codes for its functions, > it the SGR series, like <ESC>[1m<NUL> for bold face. (The <NUL> is there > so I can find the suckers on a reverse search more quickly). Fonts > are specified by <ESC>[<param1>;<param2>;<...param n>"f<NUL> the <params> > are the name of the font reduced to the numeric values of > their ASCII codes, and the size of the font. So, for example, > topaz 8 would become > <ESC>[116;111;112;97;122;8"F<NUL> > The <NUL> only appears once per group of commands, at the end. Ah ha ... so Notepad is the culprit! :-) :-) Not being a user of Notepad, I wasn't aware that it followed it's escape sequences with a null character. But I do know that every once-in-awhile, I happen across a file that gives Matt's DME editor fits, and that those files have embedded escape sequences, terminated with a null. These files sometimes show up in stuff downloaded from BBS's, etc. I talked to Matt about this, and it seems that DME handles control characters just fine ... except for one. You guessed it ... null's confuse the poor thing to no end! So, as the Robot would say, "WARNING, Will Robinson, WARNING!" If you use DME, do not edit Notepad files!!! /kim -- UUCP: kim@amdahl.amdahl.com or: {sun,decwrl,hplabs,pyramid,ihnp4,seismo,oliveb,cbosgd}!amdahl!kim DDD: 408-746-8462 USPS: Amdahl Corp. M/S 249, 1250 E. Arques Av, Sunnyvale, CA 94086 CIS: 76535,25