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1-Visitor
July 24, 2014
Solved

Highlighting text in Arbortext Editor 6.1 F000

  • July 24, 2014
  • 2 replies
  • 4889 views

Hi,

We used to work with MsWord where we used "highlight text fucntionality" to identify the paragraph, sentence that need to be modified or reviewed later on.

But as we moved to Arbortext, authors are finding it impossible to markup/highlight text that are not finalised.

Is there a similar function in Arbortext we could use to identify text within an element (e.g <para>) as "not final".

Is there a way to highlght text in Arbortext?

This could be a great help and reduce intermediate authoring in word only to be copied to Arbortext later on.

Thanks,
Edwin

Best answer by SuzanneNapoleon

Create a graphic for the icons

1. Create a graphic file with two icon images for two highlighting colors. The example below uses yellow and red background colors. Each icon should be 16 x 16 pixels with a magenta background color. For an example, see ToolbarApplication.bmp in the Arbortext Editor\lib\dialogs directory.


2. Name the graphic file ToolbarHighlight.bmp and put it in the Arbortext Editor\custom\dialogs directory.

Add the icons to the Application toolbar

1. Go to Arbortext Editor\lib\dialogs and copy editwindow.xml.

2. Paste the copy of editwindow.xml in Arbortext Editor\custom\dialogs.

3. Open the new editwindow.xml in Arbortext Editor and make the following changes:

3.1. Insert an <imagelist> element in <imagegroup> between <imagelist path="ToolbarApplication.bmp> and <imagelist path="Toolbar Record.bmp>.

3.2. On the new <imagelist> element, set imagewidth=16 and path="ToolbarHighlight.bmp".

3.3. Within <imagelist path="ToolbarHighlight.bmp">, insert an <image> element and set id="imageHighlightYellow".

3.4. Insert another <image> element and set id="imageHighlightRed". The new code should look like this:

<imagelist imagewidth="16" path="ToolbarHighlight.bmp">
<image id="imageHighlightYellow"/>
<image id="imageHighlightRed"/>
</imagelist>


3.5. Locate <button id="Toolbar_Paragraph"> at the end of <toolbar id="toolbar4"> and insert a <checkbox> element.


3.6. Modify the attributes on <checkbox> as follows:


<checkbox command='td _font -none;it _font; mt BackColor="#FFFF00"'

id="highlight_Yellow" image="imageHighlightYellow"
statustext="Yellow highlighting" tiptext="Yellow highlighting">
</checkbox>

Note: You can use whatever wording you want for the statustext and tiptext attributes.

3.7. Copy the modified <checkbox> and paste it after itself and change the attributes as follows:

<checkbox command='td _font -none;it _font; mt BackColor="#FF0000"'
id="highlight_Red" image="imageHighlightRed"
statustext="Red highlighting" tiptext="Red highlighting">
</checkbox>

4. Save editwindow.xml and exit Arbortext Editor.

5. Start Arbortext Editor and open a document. If the toolbar is not displayed, enter the following at the command line: set toolbar4=on.

6. Select some text and click on the icon for yellow highlighting. The selected text will be displayed with a yellow background. The <_font> Touchup tag is there but is not shown.

7. Select some text and click on the icon for red highlighting. The selected text will be displayed with a red background. Again, the <_font> Touchup tag is there but is not shown.

If you want an icon to insert a <_font> tag that opens the Font dialog, create the desired graphic image and add it and the following to editwindow.xml:

<checkbox command="td _font -none;it _font;mt" id="font_Dialog"

image="imageFontDialog" statustext="Font Dialog" tiptext="Font dialog">

</checkbox>

Good luck!

Suzanne

2 replies

16-Pearl
July 25, 2014

Yes, you can insert what is called "touchup". Touchup is not related to the elements of the DTD but is an Arbortext-specific way of marking up changes to font, colour, etc. I don't have Arbortext in front of me right now but it should be under the Insert or Format menu perhaps.

Note that Arbortext also supports change tracking if that is more closely aligned with your needs.

eraj1-VisitorAuthor
1-Visitor
July 25, 2014

Thanks for pointing to some workaround. We could adapt such features in Arbortext to our need.

It would have been better if PTC pulled in this simple MS Word feature.

16-Pearl
July 26, 2014

I might have misunderstood your question. What does "been better if PTC pulled in this simple MS Word feature" mean? I don't see how Arbortext Editor text highlighting is different from MS Word text highlighting (except for the different buttons to click)?

Or do you mean that you would like to import MS Word to Arbortext with highlighting? Or do you mean copy/paste from MS Word is not retaining highlighting?

17-Peridot
July 29, 2014

I'd suggest to try the following approaches:

1) Use a common unused attribute for formatting the object in question (i.e. set "outputclass"=draft or "otherprops"=draft etc) and make sure Styler formats such element/tag (or any other element).

It's possible to build pretty sophisticated drafting/highlighting functionality.

2) You can also "comment out" the element in question with the "Insert - Comment" command and/or use "Insert - Instruction" command.

EditorBetonung.JPG