Some kind requests for Santa

Nothing is perfect! This is where you can post your ideas and wishes for functions you'd like to see in Help & Manual. Current version only please (H&M7).

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Aureliano
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Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2016 11:06 pm
Location: Spain

Some kind requests for Santa

Unread post by Aureliano »

Hello to all,

As this year I have behaved well... mm... :) better than the previous one, I have decided to share with you some of my wishes for Christmas. Some of them. Here I go:

1 Left padding in Editor window: I like to read with some margin to the left and I have solved it adding indentation to the screen paragraph styles in my HM project. An option might be created so that the Editor could leave padding by a quantity to choose, for example, 150 pixels.

2 Keyboard shortcuts for colours and conditions: Colours organise concepts. I am used to apply styles consistently, however, highlighting text with customised colours, for example, means to struggle a lot by adding several keyboard macros to click on the Ribbon. The same happens with the condition or build labels.

3 Personalisation: Most of my macros assigned to the Function keys opt between two different tasks depending on the length of the active selection. Often, the second time that I hit the same key it could behave differently (standings kept in a static variable). I am going to explain it a little:
F1: It saves the current HM project if there is no selection, or, it cuts the selected text in the Editor window. The second F1 pastes from Clipboard.
F2: If there is no selection, the macro executes an hypothetical link at the actual position of the cursor, that is to say, targets that link, if the link exists, naturally. If I have selected something, it opens the HM Find & Replace dialog, ready to search. I would have liked to maintain F2 for Edit Caption, but I have not achieved keyboard macros to detect if Project Explorer panel has the application focus or not.
F3: If nothing is selected, the macro types the current date and a space, it selects these previous things and labels them with a COM condition tag, for comment. If there is something selected, it applies colour.

F4: It adds or completes a bidirectional link, in two steps. This function is inspired by MAXQDA, one of my favourite Social Lab programs. On that software, you mark a text or region of origin (A) with a keyboard shortcut or pressing a button and, then, you mark the text or region of destination (B), and voila!

F5: After having brought some text from another topic, some text with links, of course, this keyboard macro reconnects a specific bidirectional link within topic, that is to say, within the just pasted text.
F6: Edit Caption HM command (Edit table of contents caption, F2 with HM factory settings).
F7: Spell Check HM command (Spell check selected text).
F8: Just like F5, but for a bidirectional connection outside the topic. I could group F5 and F8 in the same keyboard macro, but I would need to know if the Anchor of point B is within the topic or no, something that is now out my reach.

4 Bidirectional links: Yeah, the management of links has difficulties (Re-thinking in-line linking: DITA devotees take note! http://thecontentwrangler.com/2012/05/0 ... take-note/) and solutions. I am going to show the one that I am using:

The first time that I hit F4, an Anchor and a Link (A) are created. The second time, another Anchor and Link (B) are created, connected to the previous one and vice versa.

For greater easiness, the just created Link A has a default topic as Target. I set it in 'Keywords' (HM Topic Options).

The keyboard macro saves the values of '<TITLE> Tag' and 'Topic ID' from topic where Link A is. If I am creating a numbered link, like a Question (Q), the macro looks for the following question number in a text file. Before adding the link, it verifies the end of the string 'Topic ID' from A. If it has '_Q', like in 'SOCIAL_LAB_Q', it will always number questions for that topic.

The macro adds an Anchor to the left of Link A. If the link is numbered, the anchor will have a letter prefix, for example, 'Q23' when I connect Question 23. If it is not numbered, will insert a time stamp with 'Z_yyyymmddhhmmss' format.

When I have decided the landing place or selection for Link B, I press F4 a second time.

Link B is created. If the link is numbered, the keyboard macro adds its value to the caption, that is to say, 'Q23'. If I have not selected any text before inserting Link B, the macro adds the value of '<TITLE> Tag' of A, that it kept before. Naturally, the Target of B will be the 'Topic ID' of A; and its Anchor will be the one of A (either a numbered string or a time stamp).

The keyboard macro saves the values of '<TITLE> Tag' and 'Topic ID' from topic where Link B is.

An anchor to the left of Link B is inserted. In case of Question 23, it is not forced here to number it with 'Q23', a reason why the stamped current time would be enough. The macro keeps that value.

It executes Link B and it arrives to Link A.

The macro edits Link A: If the link is numbered, it adds its value caption, that is to say, 'Q23'. If I did not select anything the very first time that I pressed F4, Link A had a 'New Link' caption. Now it will have the value of the '<TITLE> Tag' from B. In the same way, the Target of Link A will be the 'Topic ID' from B, and its Anchor will be the one of B.

It seems a little complicated, but it works reasonably well, except for lengthy topics, where it can fail. Here it is where I use the F8 too. My F8 macro aids to recompose the link bidirectionality.

I have built a small project for displaying purposes but attaching demo.hmxz is not allowed. It has example questions from the web of Anki, another one of my favourite programs; and some extracts from the British Encyclopædia.

If it were decided to add this functionality to HM, what would be needed?

project.hmxz
    Table of content
        Topic1
            Topic options
                Bidirectional links
                    Initial 'Topic ID' target (text box)
                    Type of link (option group)
                        Normal
                        Numbered
                            Prefix (list box, loaded from 'Counters')
    Configuration
        Common properties
            Automatic counters for bidirectional links
                Two column form: 'Prefix text' and 'Counter',
                with 'Add' and 'Delete' buttons, where 'Counter'
                should allow to adjust the next integer manually.
                Examples of 'Prefix text': 'Q', 'Question ' with a
                space to the right, 'F', 'Figure '...
        Publishing options
            Automatic counters [future use]
                Select an action on compiling time whenever
                it appears 'Prefix text' plus integer number
                exactly in link caption (option group)
                Note: The dynamically generated numbers
                will not modify those that are in your project.
                    Do not renumber ('Q23', 'Question 23'...)
                    Renumber ('Q1', 'Question 1'...)
                    Revision ('Q1 {23}', 'Question 1 {23}'...)

For me HM is unbeatable like a knowledge management tool and, thanks to AutoIt, I am already enjoying most of the functionalities that I have described, although I would be pleased if they were available for other users of HM as well.

Thank you very much. Season greetings!

Aureliano
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Tim Green
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Re: Some kind requests for Santa

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi Aureliano,

Thank you very much for your comprehensive suggestions. We will certainly consider them, with the standard caveat that we get a LOT of suggestions from a LOT of users. So we do have to pick and choose what we implement, even if we would actually like to put all of them in on their individual merits.

Merry (Christmas / Hanukkah / Saturnalia / whatever doesn't offend you) and a Happy New Year! :santa:
Regards,
Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

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Aureliano
Posts: 7
Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2016 11:06 pm
Location: Spain

Re: Some kind requests for Santa

Unread post by Aureliano »

Hello everybody,

As a couple of years ago I delayed myself in sending the Letter to the North Pole, in this occasion I am going to advance a little my Christmas wishes. I feel overly confident as I have behaved well during this y... mmm... these months:

4 Bidirectional links: Yeah, it is well known that Santa Claus and his assistants are very busy and more by these dates. Many and fully assorted gifts...
I am going to collaborate in a MOOC with Help+Manual as one of the main protagonists and it would be impressive introducing the function of bidirectional links, already like something own of H+M. If the course becomes successful I will impart an in-person one at the company where I work, a big company, encouraging them to use H+M as solution to manage huge quantities of knowledge.

5 Bookmarks: You know, this is a command under the Project menu. Every time that I open a H+M session, I click on a bookmark. Until I do not use the mouse, H+M does not activate my custom keyboard shortcut for that command.

6 Insert hyperlink: The drop-down width for the anchor combobox has a dynamic width to suit very long anchors. Right, but... why not a dynamic width of the same combobox, for instance, proportional to the width of the Insert hyperlink dialog? Therefore, we could directly see long anchors without unfolding its list.

7 Equation editor: TRichView allows to insert equations yet! Great! In addition, it seems to generate a lighter XML code than in case of OLE objects. I cannot wait to enjoy it in H+M!

Thank you very much. Happy Halloween!

Aureliano
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Tim Green
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Re: Some kind requests for Santa

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi Aureliano,

Thank you very much for these suggestions. We're already looking into them. 8)

One question, however: Could you explain your bookmarks suggestion in a little more detail? We're not quite sure what you have in mind there.
Regards,
Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

Private support:
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Aureliano
Posts: 7
Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2016 11:06 pm
Location: Spain

Re: Some kind requests for Santa

Unread post by Aureliano »

Good afternoon,

5 Manage bookmarks: Currently, the bookmarks of the actual project can be managed by clicking on the respective button under the Project menu, or using a custom keyboard shortcut to invoke the associated command. You can assign the shortcut going to View › Program options › Shortcuts › Topics › Manage bookmarks. I use Ctrl+Shift+F5 (internally actManageBookmarks=24692).

The key lies within the ribbon. When I install Help+Manual I go to the View menu and uncheck 'Toolbar Visible' and check 'Minimize Ribbon'. Hence I gain some additional space for the editor.

When I open a session of H+M on a minimized ribbon setting, Ctrl+Shift+F5 does not work. Then I click twice on 'Project', namely, one click displays the ribbon content for that menu and the second click hides it again. Voila! Now I can already use Ctrl+Shift+F5 to call the 'Manage bookmarks' command.

If I go later to any other menu that is not 'Project' or 'File', Ctrl+Shift+F5 would stop working.

Ctrl+Shift+F5 behaves well if the ribbon is maximized.

All in all, I would be more than happy to follow any further progress on bidirectional links. I truly believe that this would leave H+M alone at the top and I know what I mean. :wink:

Thank you very much. Nice weekend!

Aureliano
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Tim Green
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Re: Some kind requests for Santa

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi Aureliano,

Thanks for the explanation. It's associated with the ribbon being closed and that's easy to fix. It will be corrected in the upcoming 7.4 update. 8)
Regards,
Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

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Aureliano
Posts: 7
Joined: Fri Dec 23, 2016 11:06 pm
Location: Spain

Re: Some kind requests for Santa

Unread post by Aureliano »

Good evening,

I have just installed Help+Manual 7.4.0.4600. Thanks a lot for attending wishes #5 Manage bookmarks and #6 Insert hyperlink in my list ... and long before Christmas arrived. :wink:

Kind regards,

Aureliano
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Tim Green
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Re: Some kind requests for Santa

Unread post by Tim Green »

Hi Aureliano,

:santa: :laola:
Regards,
Tim (EC Software Documentation & User Support)

Private support:
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