16 Mar 1995 - Preliminary Information
At the top of the Workarea there are a collection of icons that represent the Toolbar (or Template) area. These items can be dragged into the document to create new elements. In some cases, the tool can also be double-clicked to open a secondary window.
If the workarea is empty, then dropping the document tool in it creates a new document. SpHyDir prompts for the name of the new file (which should be in the library and should end in HTM or HTML).
Within an existing document, the DOC tool creates a subdocument link to another HTML file. The user can always link another HTML file to any hotword in any paragraph or point in the text. However, a Subdocument link is used to build a single large logical document out of a sequence of smaller files.
A Subdocument object can go anywhere, but it will not make much sense or produce good results unless all the Subdocument are at the end of a file.
Drag the Document Tool over and drop it in the file as you would create a paragraph or point. The Subdocument definition is then completed by dragging the WPS icon for an HTM or HTML file over and dropping it on the newly created object. If the dropped file was previously processed by SpHyDir, the Title of that document can be extracted from the Extended Attributes of the file and will appear next to the Subdocument icon.
Within the current file, the Subdocument object behaves like a Paragraph whose entire contents is the TITLE of another HTML file and where that TITLE text is a hypertext link to the other file.
However, the Subdocument structure is also stored as Extended Attributes of the files in the library. Each *.HTM or *.HTML file has pointers to the files that it claims as subdocuments and to its "parent" (a file that claims it as a subdocument). The order in which the Subdocument objects appear in the parent establishes a Next and Previous ordering to the sudocument HTML files, which SpHyDir maintains and can use to generate uniform Headers and Trailers.
Sections correspond to document elements introduced by an H1...H6 HTML tag. Although SpHyDir recognizes these tags on input, it discards their original level number. When HTML is generated, the highest level section is given an H1 tag, then next level becomes H2, and so on. Sections have no explicit ending delimiter, so a section extends till the end of the document or until a new section of the same or a higher level is encountered. SpHyDir will probably work best if the entire HTML file is contained in a single top level (H1) section.
The Paragraph Tool produces an ordinary paragraph of text. Actually, paragraphs contain text, formatting tags (bold, italics,etc.), and hypertext links to other files and documents keyed to hotword phrases.
The Image Tool represents a graphic insert. First, drag and drop the image tool to the location in the document where the image is logically positioned. Then finish the definition by dropping the WPS icon of a GIF file on top of the Image object. Currently SpHyDir requires the GIF data type (XBM and JPG may be added later). Since the IBM IPF system doesn't support GIF, generated IPF source uses the same file name and an extension of BMP. GIF files can be converted to BMP files using the GBM utilities or any of a number of other graphics programs.
HTML authors are reminded that there are still a number of disadvantaged users who try to surf the net using charcter mode Unix. To accomodate such people, an Image should have alternate text (represented by the ALT attribute). The entry area at the top of the workarea can be used to type a phrase that will be displayed as alternate text.
By default, an Image object will be displayed by itself. This is probably the best choice for large images. An icon, on the other hand, should be displayed inline (as is the Image icon itself at the start of this section). When an Image object is selected, a "spin field" appears under the entry area at the top of the work area. Within this field, the selection "None" for alignment, places the image by itself. Otherwise, the text of a subsequent paragraph will appear to the right of the image. Top, Middle, and Bottom are standard HTML alignments. Left is an alignment option supported by Netscape.
An Ordered List Tool contains a sequence of numbered points. The list pushes down the tree structure one level. Drag the Point Tool and drop it in the list. Each Point acts much like a paragraph. Lists may also include Paragraph Objects (unexpected but widely used) and Subdocument Objects (useful when you want to number the chapters). A list may not contain a Section object!
An unordered lists contains unnumbered points, generally delimited by a "bullet" character. Unordered lists follow the same rules as the previous discussion of Ordered Lists.
A Definition List defines a set of terms. Each item in the list is preceeded by the term to be defined, set off from the definition by different levels of indentation. The Point Tool is used for definition lists as well. The Point Tool changes its behavior depending on the type of list in which it is placed.
The icon of a hand making a "point" represents the general list item. An item in a numbered or unnumbered list simply has text. An item in a Definition List also has the term or phrase being defined. This term can be entered in the Entry area at the top right of the workarea.
The Target object generates a permanent public hypertext target. Type a name (preferably without blanks) in the entry area at the top of the workarea. This name can then be used in hypertext links from other documents in the library. Although SpHyDir may generate internal targets for section headers (to make the TOC work), these names will change if the section is renamed. A Target object is only renamed if the user changes it, so it becomes a more reliable target for long term use.
There are three views about hypertext targets. HTML allows any word, even any letter, to be the target of a hypertext link. This level of precision is meanless to the viewer. IPF requires a hypertext link to jump to a header that generates its own Window. In HTML terms, the IPF strategy would only allow HTML files to be targets and not individual subsections. This explains why OS/2 HLP and INF files seem to be fragmented into silly, unmanagably small individual panels.
SpHyDir tries to split the difference. A Target is an object, so it can only go in front of Section, Paragraph, Image, List, or Point objects. When SpHyDir encounters a target while reading HTML, it moves in in front of the paragraph or point in which it was found. When SpHyDir generates IPF, however, it will probably have to move the reference back to the start of the current Section.
Within an ordinary paragraph, line breaks and multiple blanks are ignored. The Preformatted Text object is used for examples where the lines and spaces are important. In most browsers, Preformatted Text is rendered in a font with characters of equal width.
The Form Tool creates an interactive area in which the Web user can enter data to submit a request or query. A Form can include all of the previous document objects, and data fields from the bottom row of the toolbar. To process a form, the server must execute a program written by the form designer. This makes the use of Forms an advanced topic that will be described in a separate section.
There are other document elements that are not used frequently enough to warrant a place on the Toolbar. In particular, the Horizontal Rule <HR> tag is generated by positioning at a section or paragraph, holding Alt and pressing H. The line goes in front of the selected object.
SpHyDir would be simple if the VX-Rexx and OS/2 programming interface allowed the user to drop tools and components in between two existing document elements. This would clearly indicate where the new element is to go. However, the environment requires the tools, files, and other objects to be dropped on top of existing components. This forces SpHyDir to invent some rules about positioning.
A Target is a label for the thing that follows it. If you drop a Target on a paragraph or section, then it makes sense to assume that the Target should go in front of whatever you drop it on. When a hypertext reference is made to the target name, the following document component will be what shows up on the screen after the jump. You may not drop a Target on the Document object that is the first object in the tree, since there is no "before" to place the Target and because the start of the document doesn't need any label, the filename will do fine to identify it.
Sections and Lists contain things. In the Workplace, if you drop a file on the icon of a folder, the file goes into the folder. So the normal behavior is that if you drop anything (other than a Target) on a Section or a List, then the new element is added inside that Section or List in front of anything already there.
If you drop something on a Paragraph, Image, or Point then the new item goes after the thing you dropped it on. Thus to add a new Point to the end of an existing list, drop the Point tool on the last Point in the list. To add a new Point to the beginning of a list, drop the Point tool on the parent List object.
These rules seem to cover all but two cases. Lists can be nested inside other lists. When this occurs, there is no way to add a new outer point after the end of a nested inner list because every time you try to drop a point on the inner list icon the new point is positioned inside the inner list instead of after it in the outer list. Similarly, there is no way to add one section after another because whenever you drop something on a section it goes inside it and not behind it. So there is an extra rule that if you hold down Ctrl when dropping a Point on a List the Point goes after the list, and if you hold down Ctrl when dropping the Section tool on an existing Section, the new Section goes behind the current section. This is not entirely satisfactory. A section can go on for many screens, and it it somewhat unexpected to have to go many screens back to the start of a section in order to drop something on the section object and add it many screens down after the section end. I am waiting for a better idea to come to mind.
Originally, the idea would be that Ctrl-dropping a tool placed the tool after the thing on which you dropped it. That seemed like a good rule, but it doesn't work with Sections because you can't put a paragraph, image, or list after a Section. Sections don't end, you see, until a new Section begins (in HTML terms, a section ends when a new H1...H6 header is encountered). The only thing that you can put behind a section is another Section. Everything else that you try to put behind the section ends up inside it anyway.
Copyright 1995 PCLT -- SpHyDir Web Document Manager -- H. Gilbert
May be distributed with SpHyDir program
This document generated by SpHyDir another fine product of PC Lube and Tune.
Continue
Back
PCLT