WP Reader - Reads styled text into Ovation

by Ian MacDougall


WP Reader is an indispensable utility for users of DeskEdit and Ovation, though it can be used equally well with many other text editing and desktop publishing packages, such as Impression Style. It enables users of DTP programs to create text in a normal text editor, such as Edit or DeskEdit, and transfer the text into their DTP program complete with all the style information.

In order to create text for the program, you must decide upon a set of characters to use to indicate the fact that a certain section of text is to be in a particular style. Three styles are available, known as Bold, Italic and Underline. Although these are the default names used by the program, it is a simple matter to set the program up to get superscript instead of underlining, for example. The program comes set up to translate the style control codes of DeskEdit into the codes required by Ovation.

To transfer the text you must first install WP Reader in the normal way, by double-clicking on its icon in a directory display or by clicking on its icon in the RISC User Menu Program. Its icon will then appear on the icon bar and it will be ready to use, assuming that you do not have to alter its set-up to suit packages other than DeskEdit and Ovation.

The program works by mimicking the action of the keyboard; therefore you must not touch the keyboard while a conversion is in progress, or you will corrupt the file being transferred. To get the DTP program ready for the conversion, you must open the file you want to put the text in and click Select to place the caret where you want the text to appear. Now you should drag the text file that you want to import onto the WP Reader icon. The text will now be transferred to the DTP program. You can click on the icon bar icon to pause or restart the transfer - this is useful if you need to use the keyboard while the transfer is in progress. When you do resume the transfer, you should ensure that the caret is at the end of the text in the DTP program, i.e. where it was immediately after the transfer was paused. During a transfer you should ensure that you do not click in any window, or icon, or open a menu that may claim the caret, such as a save box, or unpredictable results will occur. If you are in any doubt, it is best to leave the program to get on with its work in peace.

If you decide to abandon the transfer, you must ensure that WP Reader is in the paused state, and then choose the Stop option on the menu.

Configuring WP Reader
In order to change the effects that are used by the program, or to tailor its input or output to suit other editors or DTP programs, there is a configuration window which can be opened by clicking Select on the icon bar icon when there is no transfer in progress. The top part shows the key codes that are used by WP Reader. The input codes for DeskEdit can be found in the manual and these are programmed in. If you do not have a copy of DeskEdit you can enter these codes into other text editors, such as Edit, by holding down Alt and typing the number displayed against the relevant entry in the Input part of the configuration window, using the numeric keypad. If this does not work, press F12 and type
   RmReinit InternationalKeyboard
then press Return twice. If it still doesn't work then the text editor you are using may not recognise these codes, and you should try Edit instead.

The output codes correspond to the key that would be used to select a particular style when typing into the DTP program. For example the keypress Shift-F1 would be recognised by the value 401, and Crl-I by the value 9. Note that the codes already set up in WP Reader for Ovation are internal codes used only by Ovation and are unlikely to be suitable for other applications.

Below the Input and Output sections is an area which allows you to control the filtering of the input text. A radio button pair allows you to choose what happens when a pair of linefeeds is encountered. You may want this to be passed through unaltered to the destination, in which case you should select the topmost radio button (Do not filter CR/LF). Alternatively, you may want a single linefeed to be passed as a space, and a double linefeed to be passed as a single, i.e. to filter out formatted text to enable the destination application to perform its own formatting. In this case you should select the second radio button.

Below this is a switch to Allow topbit chars. Normally this is switched off in order to ignore certain special code sequences. You should switch it on if you want to use accented characters or symbols such as the copyright character () or pound sign.

When you have set up your options, you can save them permanently by clicking on Save in the window, or choosing Save choices from the icon bar menu.


 Copyright RISC User 1994
