GXWaterfall
editing features
The following paragraphs give information on how to
use the current editing features present in GXWaterfall. After
becoming familiar with these features you should be able to create
new waterfall documents and edit old ones which the various
GXWaterfall tests can be applied to.
Line Editing
The line editing features enable the user to alter
lines of glyphs that have already been created (e.g. by drag and
drop). There are three ways to alter lines:
- Typing in a line (this section)
- Drag and drop from palette (see below)
- Drag and drop from another line (see
below)
Clicking the mouse on a line causes a red edit box to
appear around the glyphs. A flashing cursor indicates the insertion
point. The insertion point can be moved by :
- Clicking the mouse at the required point
- Using the Left/Right arrow keys to move the
cursor
You can now type new text on the keyboard and it will
be inserted at the cursor. The delete key will delete the character
directly to the left of the cursor.
By clicking on a line and holding the mouse button
down, you can select a range of characters from a line (like in a
word processor). You can now cut, copy and paste characters. If paste
is selected from menu (or via hot key), the copied characters are
inserted at the flashing cursor if a line is selected (red edit box),
otherwise they are appended at the end of the document in the current
document font and size. Selected characters can be cut using menu Cut
option/hot key or by pressing delete key. Pasting when characters are
selected replaces the selection with the clipboard characters. Lines
can contain multiple fonts.
NOTE: Cut characters are not copied to the clipboard
first.
The glyph character lines and the size tags (size
indicators to left of output windows) can be edited in this way. The
size tags are useful for inserting notes in outputs. They initially
only contain size information but you can type in notes as well /
instead.
TIP: Use a series of underscores in the size tag
fields to underline any areas of interest in the corresponding glyph
line, then put accompanying note to right of glyphs).
You can edit all types of GXWaterfall output using
these procedures e.g., waterfall, metrics compare etc.
You can also change the font of glyphs in a glyph
line (NOT size tags). Select/hilight a range of glyphs from the line
as before, then select the required font from the font menu. The
glyphs will redraw immediately in the new font.
NOTE On Deleting: Every line of characters must
contain at least 1 character, therefore, if you delete all characters
on a line, a space character will be inserted automatically - this
can be deleted after a new character(s) is added.
Copying and
Pasting from the Glyph palette
One or more characters may be copied from the Glyph
palette to the clipboard by going to the Configure menu option and
then choosing the Glyphpalette menu item.The glyph palette box will
then be displayed as shown below.Characters to be copied from the
palette are clicked on with the mouse whilst holding down the shift
key if more than one glyph is to be selected.Once all the required
characters have been selected then go to the Edit menu option and
choose the Copy menu item.The selected characters will then be copied
to the clipboard where they can be pasted into a Waterfall document
or any other application.
Glyph Palette
Dragging & Dropping
Glyph palette dragging and dropping is an alternative
to copying from the glyph palette and then pasting to the text
window(s) using menu/hot key commands. Select the required glyphs
from the glyph palette in much the same way as before :
- Single selection (mouse click only)
- Range selection (mouse click with Shift held
down)
- Multiple single selection (mouse clicks holding
down Option/Command)
When you have selected all the glyphs you want, hold
down the mouse button on the final click and move the pointer.
Outlines of the glyphs selected will follow the mouse.
Now you have to drop the selection somewhere:
If you release the mouse button in the palette window
or any non-waterfall window, the selection will "zoom back" and no
action will have occurred. So, if you change your mind having started
dragging, drop anywhere but in a Waterfall text window (e.g. palette
window).
You can drop a selection into a GXWaterfall text
window in basically two places:
- On an existing line of glyphs
- Anywhere else in the window
If you drop on a line of glyphs, the selection will
be inserted in the line at the mouse pointer in the palette font and
the line size. Therefore you can insert at the beginning of a line,
end of a line or somewhere in the middle of a line.
Dropping anywhere else in the window results in the
selection being appended to the end of the document in the current
document default font and size.
Glyph Line Dragging
& Dropping
Glyph line dragging and dropping allows you to select
a range of glyphs from a document glyph line and insert the selection
in another glyph line. Glyphs are selected from a glyph line in the
usual manner by clicking and holding the mouse down on the required
selection. You can then drag a copy of the selected glyphs to the
insert position. Using this feature you can drag and drop glyph
selections consisting of multiple fonts, styles and sizes.See the
following example...
Before text is dragged and dropped.
After text is dragged and dropped.
The
Hierarchical Font and the Size Menus
The Font Menu
The font menu enables you to select a font AND an
associated style. Any font that has more than one style will have a
submenu containing the style options. Note that if only one style is
available, no submenu will appear for the font and the font name will
be the family font name (e.g. Times) and not necessarily the full
name (e.g. Times Bold Italic).
Below is an example where the chosen font is Hoefler
Text and the style is Ornaments.
When the user selects a new font, the glyph palette
will update itself immediately (there is no longer a need to close
and reopen it). Note that selecting a different font no longer
changes all glyph lines in the window to that font. Instead you can
select sections of individual lines and choose the required font -
only the selection will update to that font, and the font will become
the default i.e., any subsequent pasting to end of the document, or a
Waterfall output etc. will be in the default font.
The Size Menu
The size menu can be used to set the default font
size for a document. After selecting a new size, any subsequent
pasting to the end of the document or in-line typing will be in the
default / selected size.
Text and
Background colors
The color menu allows changing of background and text
colors. Selecting 'Background Color...' from the Color menu results
in a standard color picker being displayed. Select colors until a
suitable one is found, then click OK to accept the color, or Cancel
to leave background unchanged. The other color menu option depends on
whether a line has been selected by the user (i.e. the red edit box
is visible). If a line is selected, the option 'Line Text Color...'
can be chosen. Pick a color to use for that line only. If a line is
not selected, choosing the 'Default Text Color...' option lets you
select the default application color. Now any pasting, waterfall,
text test etc. to the end of the document(s) will be in the default
color (initially black).
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