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SlyEdit: The readme should only be in docs (not ctrl). Also, updated the version history of the correct one so that it's complete.

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SlyEdit message editor
Version 1.89d
Release date: 2025-01-26
by
Eric Oulashin
Sysop of Digital Distortion BBS
BBS internet address: digitaldistortionbbs.com
Alternate: digdist.synchro.net
Email: eric.oulashin@gmail.com
This file describes SlyEdit, a message editor for Synchronet.
Note: For sysops who already have a previous version of SlyEdit
installed and are upgrading to this version, please see the file
Upgrading.txt.
Contents
========
1. Disclaimer
2. Introduction
3. Installation & Setup
4. Features
5. Configuration file
6. Ice-style Color Theme Settings
7. DCT-style Color Theme Settings
8. Common colors (appearing in both Ice and DCT color theme files)
9. Text replacements (AKA Macros)
10. User settings
11. Taglines
12. Spell check and dictionaries
13. Version history
1. Disclaimer
=============
Although I have tested SlyEdit, I cannot guarantee that it is 100% bug free or
will work as expected in all environments in all cases. That said, I hope you
find SlyEdit useful and enjoy using it.
2. Introduction
===============
SlyEdit is a message editor that I wrote in JavaScript for Synchronet, which
can mimic the look and feel of IceEdit or DCT Edit. SlyEdit also supports
customization of colors via theme files, cross-posting into other message
areas, text search, and file import & export (works with files on the
BBS machine, and is enabled only for the sysop).
The motivation for creating this was that IceEdit and DCT Edit were always
my two favorite BBS message editors, but in a world where 32-bit (and 64-bit)
Windows and *nix platforms are common, 16-bit DOS emulation is required to run
IceEdit and DCT Edit, which is noticeably slow and sometimes unreliable.
Since SlyEdit is written in JavaScript, it is faster than a DOS-based message
editor and can run in any environment in which Synchronet runs, without any
modification or being re-compiled.
SlyEdit will recognize the user's terminal size and set up the screen
accordingly. The width of the edit area will always be 80 characters and
support up to 79 characters; however, an increased terminal size will provide
more room for message information to be displayed. Also, a terminal height
greater than the standard 24 or 25 characters will provide a taller edit area,
allowing more of the message to be seen on the screen at a time.
SlyEdit allows the user to select/change the color of their text using the
CTRL-K key, if the allowColorSelection is set to true in SlyEdit.cfg. Also,
you can have SlyEdit convert colors to ANSI when posting messages, for
compatibility with other BBS software. To do so, set the saveColorsAsANSI
setting to true in SlyEdit.cfg.
As of version 1.88b (2024-02-11), SlyEdit supports inputting UTF-8 text.
Also, SlyEdit has no moving parts that can wear out over time.
Thanks go out to the following people for testing:
- Nick of Lightning BBS (lightningbbs.dyndns.org) for testing early versions
- Nick (AKA Access Denied) of The Pharcyde (pharcyde.org) for testing the
newer versions and for his input on various features, mainly message quoting
- echicken (sysop of Electronic Chicken) for his solution to look up the
original author of a message after a user changes the "To" name when
replying to a message
3. Installation & Setup
=======================
These are the steps for installation:
1. Extract the archive. If you're viewing this file, then you've probably
already done this. :)
2. There are 2 ways SlyEdit's files can be copied onto your Synchronet system:
1. Copy the JavaScript files into your sbbs/exec directory and the .cfg files
into your sbbs/ctrl directory. If you plan to customize your SlyEdit.cfg
or color theme files, it's recommended to also put the .cfg files in your
sbbs/mods directory so that your configuration won't be accidentally
overwritten when updating the files from the Synchronet CVS repository.
SlyEdit will first check the sbbs/mods directory for the configuration
files, then sbbs/ctrl, and then SlyEdit's own directory for the
configuration files. In other words, the SlyEdit configuration files
in sbbs/mods take first precedence, sbbs/ctrl 2nd precedence, and
SlyEdit's own directory takes last precedence for the configuration
files.
2. Copy all files together into their own directory of your choice
3. Set up SlyEdit on your BBS with Synchronet's configration program (SCFG).
SlyEdit can be set to mimic IceEdit or DCT Edit via a command-line parameter.
The values for this parameter are as follows:
ICE: Mimic the IceEdit look & feel
DCT: Mimic the DCT Edit look & feel
RANDOM: Randomly select either the IceEdit or DCT Edit look & feel
To add SlyEdit to Synchronet's list of external editors, run Synchronet's
configuration program (SCFG) and select "External Programs", and then
"External Editors". The following describes setting up SlyEdit using the
ICE parameter for IceEdit emulation:
1. Scroll down to the empty slot in the editor list and press Enter to
select it.
2. For the external editor name, enter "SlyEdit (Ice style)" (without the quotes)
(or similar, depending on your personal preference)
3. For the internal code, use SLYEDICE (or whatever you want, depending on your
personal preference)
4. Press Enter to select and edit the new entry. Asuming that the .js files
are in the sbbs/exect directory, the settings should be as follows (the
wording and options shown may vary, depending on the version of Synchronet
you have installed):
Command line: ?SlyEdit.js %f ICE
Access requirement string: ANSI
Intercept standard I/O: No
Native (32-bit) Executable: No
Use Shell to Execute: No
Record Terminal Width: Yes
Word-wrap Quoted Text: Your decision - Wrap to specific width, 80, or no
Automatically Quoted Text: All
Editor Information Files: QuickBBS MSGINF/MSGTMP
Expand Line Feeds to CRLF: Yes
Strip FidoNet Kludge Lines: No
BBS Drop File Type: None
After you've added SlyEdit, your Synchronet configuration window should look
like this:
+[¦][?]--------------------------------------------------------------+
¦ SlyEdit (Ice style) Editor ¦
¦--------------------------------------------------------------------¦
¦ ¦Name SlyEdit (Ice style) ¦
¦ ¦Internal Code SLYEDICE ¦
¦ ¦Remote Command Line ?SlyEdit.js %f ICE ¦
¦ ¦Access Requirements ANSI ¦
¦ ¦Intercept Standard I/O No ¦
¦ ¦Native (32-bit) Executable No ¦
¦ ¦Use Shell to Execute No ¦
¦ ¦Record Terminal Width Yes ¦
¦ ¦Word-wrap Quoted Text Yes, for terminal width ¦
¦ ¦Automatically Quoted Text All ¦
¦ ¦Editor Information Files QuickBBS MSGINF/MSGTMP ¦
¦ ¦Expand Line Feeds to CRLF Yes ¦
¦ ¦Strip FidoNet Kludge Lines No ¦
¦ ¦BBS Drop File Type None ¦
+--------------------------------------------------------------------+
For DCT Edit mode, use DCT in place of ICE on the command line. For
random mode, use RANDOM in place of ICE.
Note that if you placed the files in a different directory, then the
command line should include the full path to SlyEdit.js. For example,
if SlyEdit was placed in sbbs/xtrn/SlyEdit, then the command line would
be /BBS/sbbs/xtrn/DigDist/SlyEdit/SlyEdit.js %f ICE
4. Features
===========
As mentioned earlier, SlyEdit is can mimic the look & feel of IceEdit or
DCT Edit. It also has the following features:
- Message quoting: When replying to a message, users can select lines from the
message to quote. By default, SlyEdit puts the initials of the original
author in front of the quote lines to indicate who originally wrote those
parts of the message. Optionally, sysops may disable the use of initials
in quote lines, in which case SlyEdit simply prefixes quote lines with " > "
as was done in IceEdit, DCT Edit, and other editors of the early-mid 1990s.
- Cross-posting into other message sub-boards: When posting a message to a
message sub-board, SlyEdit allows the user to select other message sub-boards
to post the message into. SlyEdit will post the message to the user's
current message sub-board by default. Using the cross-post feature, the
user can select any number of other message sub-boards to cross-post his/her
message into. SlyEdit respects the ARS security setting for each sub-board -
If a user is not allowed to post in a message sub-board, SlyEdit will not
allow the user to select that sub-board for cross-posting. The user can also
un-select their current message sub-board. When the user un-selects their
current message sub-board and chooses other message sub-boards to post
his/her message into, Synchronet will say that the message was aborted
because the message file wasn't saved as it normally is for the current
message sub-board. However, SlyEdit will output all of the message
sub-boards that the message was posted into. If the user un-selected their
current message sub-board, SlyEdit will also output a note explaining that
the BBS will say the message was aborted, even though it was posted into
other sub-boards and that is normal.
- Text search: Allows the user to search for text in the message. If
the text is found, the message area will scroll to it, and it will be
highlighted. Repeated searches for the same text will look for the
next occurrance of that text.
- Allows changing the message subject
Note: If using a Synchronet 3.17c development build (pre official release),
you will need a build from July 21, 2019 or newer.
- Navigation: Page up/down, home/end of line, and arrow keys
- Slash commands (at the start of the line):
/A: Abort
/S: Save
/Q: Quote message
/C: Cross-post message sub-board selection
- Sysops can import a file (stored on the BBS machine) into the message
- Sysops can export the current message to a file (on the BBS machine)
- Configuration file with behavior and color settings. See section 4
(Configuration File) for more information.
- Spell check
The following is a summary of the keyboard shortcuts, from SlyEdit's command
help screen (note that file import, with Ctrl-O & Ctrl-X, are only available to
the sysop or users with sysop access, and file import/export takes place on the
BBS machine):
Help keys Slash commands (on blank line)
--------- ------------------------------
Ctrl-G : Input graphic character ¦ /A : Abort
Ctrl-L : Command key list (this list) ¦ /S : Save
¦ /Q : Quote message
Ctrl-T : List text replacements ¦ /T : List text replacements
¦ /U : Your user settings
¦ /C : Cross-post selection
¦ /UPLOAD : Upload a message
Command/edit keys
-----------------
Ctrl-A : Abort message ¦ PageUp : Page up
Ctrl-Z : Save message ¦ PageDown: Page down
Ctrl-Q : Quote message ¦ Ctrl-W : Word/text search
Insert/Ctrl-I: Toggle insert/overwrite mode ¦ Ctrl-D : Delete line
Ctrl-S : Change subject ¦ ESC : Command menu
Ctrl-U : Your user settings ¦ Ctrl-C : Cross-post selection
Ctrl-K : Change text color ¦ Ctrl-R : Spell checker
Ctrl-O : Import a file ¦ Ctrl-X : Export to file
5. Configuration file
=====================
The configuration file, SlyEdit.cfg, is split up into 3 sections -
Behavior, Ice colors, and DCT colors. These sections are designated
by [BEHAVIOR], [ICE_COLORS], and [DCT_COLORS], respectively.
To help with configuration, there is a menu-driven configuration script in
sbbs/exec called slyedcfg.js. To run it, open a command prompt in the sbbs/exec
directory and run it with this command:
jsexec slyedcfg
Alternately, you can specify the .js filename extension if you want to:
jsexec slyedcfg.js
The configuration script will copy your SlyEdit configuration file to your
sbbs/mods directory to help prevent it from being accidentally overridden when
doing an update from the Synchronet source repository. SlyEdit will pick up its
configuration from sbbs/mods if the configuration file is there.
The configuration settings are described below:
Behavior settings
-----------------
Setting Description
------- -----------
displayEndInfoScreen Whether or not to display the info
screen when SlyEdit exits. Valid values
are true and false. If this option is
not specified, this feature will be
enabled by default.
userInputTimeout Whether or not to use an input timeout
for users. Valid values are true and
false. Note: The input timeout is not
used for sysops. If this option is not
specified, this feature will be enabled
by default.
reWrapQuoteLines Whether or not to re-wrap quote lines. Valid
values are true and false. This feature is
enabled by default. With this feature
enabled, SlyEdit will re-wrap quote lines
to still be complete and readable after the
quote prefix character is added to the front
of the quote lines. SlyEdit is able to
recognize quote lines beginning with >
or 2 letters and a > (such as EO>). If this
feature is disabled, quote lines will simply
be trimmed to make room for the quote prefix
character to be added to the front.
allowColorSelection Whether or not to let the user change the
color/attributes of the text they're typing.
Defaults to true. When this is enabled, the
user can change their text color with the
CTRL-K hotkey.
saveColorsAsANSI Whether or not to save message color/attribute
codes as ANSI (if not, they will be saved as
Synchronet attribute codes). Saving colors as
ANSI in posted messages provides a
compatibility with other BBS software and
message readers that might not understand
Synchronet attribute codes (but most do
understand ANSI).
allowCrossPosting Whether or not to allow cross-posting
messages into different/multiple message
sub-boards. Valid values are true and false.
enableTextReplacements Toggles the use of text replacements (AKA
macros) as the user types a message. Valid
values are true, false, and regex. If regex
is used, text replacements will be enabled
and used as regular expressions as
implemented by JavaScript. For more
information, see section 10 (Text
replacements (AKA Macros)).
tagLineFilename Specifies the name of the file that stores
taglines, which users can optionally choose
from to be appended to their message upon
saving the message.
taglinePrefix Some text to be added to the front of
a tagline that is selected from the user.
The intention of this setting is to
differentiate taglines from the rest of the
message. This defaults to the string "... "
(3 dots and a space). If desired, this can
be set to a blank string (nothing after the
=) - for instance, if you only want to put
double quotes around text lines, you could
set this to blank and enable the
quoteTagLines setting.
quoteTaglines Whether or not to put selected taglines in
double quotes. This defaults to false. If
you like taglines to have double quotes and
no prefix, you can set this to true and set
taglinePrefix to a blank string (nothing
after the =).
shuffleTaglines Whether or not to shuffle (randomize) the
list of taglines displayed to the user for
selection.
allowUserSettings Whether or not to allow users to configure
their own user settings. This defaults to
true.
allowEditQuoteLines Whether or not to allow the user to edit
quote lines. Valid values are true and
false. If this option is not specified, the
default value is true.
allowSpellCheck Whether or not to allow spell check. Valid
values are true and false. Defaults to true.
You might want to disable spell check if,
for instance, the spell check feature causes
an "out of memory" error on your system.
useQuoteLineInitials Whether or not to prefix quoted message lines
with the previous author's initials when
replying to a message. Valued values are
true and false. If this setting is disabled,
SlyEdit will simply prefix the quoted lines
with " > ", as was done in IceEdit, DCT Edit,
and other message editors of the early-mid
1990s. This setting is enabled by default.
This setting serves as the default for the
user setting, which users can configure in
their own settings.
indentQuoteLinesWithInitials When prefixing quoted messages lines with the
previous author's initials, this setting
specifies whether or not to indent quoted
lines with a space. Valued values are true
and false. This setting is disabled by
default. This setting serves as the default
for the user setting, which users can
configure in their own settings.
enableTagLines Whether or not to enable the option for users
to choose a tagline to append to their
message upon saving the message. This
setting serves as the default for the user
setting, which users can configure in their
own settings.
dictionaryFilenames Dictionary filenames (used for spell check).
This is a comma-separated list of dictionary
filenames. The dictionary filenames are in
the format dictionary_<language>.txt, where
<language> is the language name. In this
list, the filenames can be in that format, or
just <language>.txt, or just <language>.
Leave blank to use all dictionary files that
exist on the system. The dictionary files
are located in either sbbs/mods, sbbs/ctrl,
or the same directory as SlyEdit.
Ice colors
----------
Setting Description
------- -----------
ThemeFilename The name of the color theme file to use.
Note: Ice-style theme settings are described
in Section 5: Ice-style Color Theme Settings.
If no theme file is specified, then default
colors will be used.
menuOptClassicColors Whether or not to use the classic Ice-style
menu option colors. Valid options are true
and false. If this option is set to false,
then new colors will be used for Ice-style
menu options. If this is set to true, then
the classic Ice-style menu option colors will
be used. Note that if this is set to false,
the color setting SelectedOptionTextColor
won't be used.
DCT colors
----------
Setting Description
------- -----------
ThemeFilename The name of the color theme file to use.
Note: DCT-style theme settings are described
in Section 8: DCT-style Color Theme Settings.
If no theme file is specified, then default
colors will be used.
The color theme files are plain text files that can be edited with a text
editor. For each color setting, you can specify color attribute characters as
specified in the Synchronet documentation for attribute (Ctrl-A) codes:
http://wiki.synchro.net/custom:ctrl-a_codes
Note that you don't need control (Ctrl-A) characters for the color settings;
just the attribute characters. A couple examples of specifying colors:
High green: gh
Normal cyan: c
6. Ice-style Color Theme Settings
=================================
Note that you don't need control (Ctrl-A) characters for the color settings;
just the attribute characters.
The following options are valid for Ice-style theme files:
----------------------------------------------------------
QuoteLineColor The color for quoted lines in the message
BorderColor1 The first color to use for borders
(for alternating border colors)
BorderColor2 The other color to use for borders
(for alternating border colors)
KeyInfoLabelColor The color to use for key information
labels (displayed on the bottom border)
TopInfoBkgColor The color to use for the background in
the informational area at the top
TopLabelColor The color to use for informational labels
in the informational area at the top
TopLabelColonColor The color to use for the colons (:) in the
informational area at the top
TopToColor The color to use for the "To" name in the
informational area at the top
TopFromColor The color to use for the "From" name in the
informational area at the top
TopSubjectColor The color to use for the subject in the
informational area at the top
TopTimeColor The color to use for the time left in the
informational area at the top
TopTimeLeftColor The color to use for the time left in the
informational area at the top
EditMode The color to use for the edit mode text
QuoteWinText The color for non-highlighted text in
the quote window
QuoteLineHighlightColor The color for highlighted text in the
quote window
QuoteWinBorderTextColor The color for the quote window borders
; Colors for the multi-choice options
SelectedOptionBorderColor The color to use for the borders around
text for selected multi-choice options
SelectedOptionTextColor The color to use for the text for selected
multi-choice options
UnselectedOptionBorderColor The color to use for the borders around
text for unselected multi-choice options
UnselectedOptionTextColor The color to use for the text for unselected
multi-choice options
7. DCT-style Color Theme Settings
=================================
Note that you don't need control (Ctrl-A) characters for the color settings;
just the attribute characters.
The following options are valid for DCT-style theme files:
----------------------------------------------------------
QuoteLineColor The color for quoted lines in the message
TopBorderColor1 The first color to use for the
top borders (for alternating border
colors)
TopBorderColor2 The other color to use for the
top borders (for alternating border
colors)
EditAreaBorderColor1 The first color to use for the
edit area borders (for alternating border
colors)
EditAreaBorderColor2 The other color to use for the
edit area borders (for alternating border
colors)
EditModeBrackets The color to use for the square brackets
around the edit mode text that appears
in the bottom border (the [ and ] around
the "INS"/"OVR")
EditMode The color to use for the edit mode text
TopLabelColor The color to use for the informational labels
in the informational area at the top
TopLabelColonColor The color to use for the colons (:) in the
informational area at the top
TopFromColor The color to use for the "From" name in the
informational area at the top
TopFromFillColor The color to use for the filler dots in the
"From" name in the informational area at the top
TopToColor The color to use for the "To" name in the
informational area at the top
TopToFillColor The color to use for the filler dots in the
"To" name in the informational area at the top
TopSubjColor The color to use for the subject in the informational
area at the top
TopSubjFillColor The color to use for the filler dots in the subject
in the informational area at the top
TopAreaColor The color to use for the "Area" text in the
informational area at the top
TopAreaFillColor The color to use for the filler dots in the "Area"
field in the informational area at the top
TopTimeColor The color to use for the "Time" text in the
informational area at the top
TopTimeFillColor The color to use for the filler dots in the "Time"
field in the informational area at the top
TopTimeLeftColor The color to use for the "Time left" text in the
informational area at the top
TopTimeLeftFillColor The color to use for the filler dots in the "Time left"
field in the informational area at the top
TopInfoBracketColor The color to use for the square brackets in the
informational area at the top
QuoteWinText The color for non-highlighted text in
the quote window
QuoteLineHighlightColor The color for highlighted text in the
quote window
QuoteWinBorderTextColor The color to use for the text in the quote window
borders
QuoteWinBorderColor The color to use for the quote window borders
BottomHelpBrackets The color to use for the brackets displayed in
the line of help text at the bottom
BottomHelpKeys The color to use for the key names written in
the line of help text at the botom
BottomHelpFill The color to use for the filler dots in the line of
help text at the bottom
BottomHelpKeyDesc The color to use for the key descriptions in the
line of help text at the bottom
TextBoxBorder The color to use for text box borders (i.e., the
abort confirmation prompt)
TextBoxBorderText The color to use for text in the borders of text
boxes (i.e., the abort confirmation prompt)
TextBoxInnerText The color to use for text inside text boxes
YesNoBoxBrackets The color to use for the square brackets used for
yes/no confirmation prompt boxes
YesNoBoxYesNoText The color to use for the actual "Yes"/"No" text in
yes/no confirmation prompt boxes
SelectedMenuLabelBorders The color to use for the border characters for the
labels of currently active drop-down menus
SelectedMenuLabelText The color to use for the text for the labels of
currently active drop-down menus
UnselectedMenuLabelText The color to use for the text for the labels of
inactive drop-down menus
MenuBorders The color to use for the drop-down menu borders
MenuSelectedItems The color to use for selected items on the drop-down
menus
MenuUnselectedItems The color to use for unselected items on the
drop-down menus
MenuHotkeys The color to use for the hotkey characters in the
menu items on the drop-down menus
8. Common colors (appearing in both Ice and DCT color theme files)
==================================================================
Note that you don't need control (Ctrl-A) characters for the color settings;
just the attribute characters.
listBoxBorder The color to use for the border of list
boxes, such as the cross-post area selection
box and the text replacements list box. Note
that this setting replaces crossPostBorder,
which was used in previous versions of
SlyEdit.
listBoxBorderText The color to use for text in the borders of
list boxes, such as the cross-post area
selection box and the text replacements list
box. Note that this setting replaces
crossPostBorderText, which was used in
previous versions of SlyEdit.
crossPostMsgAreaNum The color to use for the message group/sub-
board numbers in the cross-post area
selection box
crossPostMsgAreaNumHighlight The color to use for the highlighted
(lightbar) message group/sub-board numbers
in the cross-post area selection box
crossPostMsgAreaDesc The color to use for the message group/
sub-board descriptions in the cross-post
area selection box
crossPostMsgAreaDescHighlight The color to use for the highlighted
(lightbar) message group/sub-board
descriptions in the cross-post area selection
box
crossPostChk The color to use for the checkmarks for the
enabled message sub-boards in the cross-post
area selection box
crossPostChkHighlight The color to use for the highlighted
(lightbar) checkmarks for the enabled
message sub-boards in the cross-post area
selection box
crossPostMsgGrpMark The color to use for the current message
group marker character in the cross-post area
selection box
crossPostMsgGrpMarkHighlight The color to use for the highlighted
(lightbar) current message group marker
character in the cross-post area selection
box
msgWillBePostedHdr The color to use for the text "Your message
will be posted into the following area(s)"
text when exiting SlyEdit
msgPostedGrpHdr The color to use for the group name header
when listing the message's posted message
areas when exiting SlyEdit
msgPostedSubBoardName The color to use for the message sub-boards
when listing the message's posted message
areas when exiting SlyEdit
msgPostedOriginalAreaText The color to use for the text "(original
message area)" when listing the message's
posted message areas when exiting SlyEdit
msgHasBeenSavedText The color to use for the text "The message
has been saved." when exiting SlyEdit
msgAbortedText The color to use for the Message Aborted
text when exiting SlyEdit
emptyMsgNotSentText The color to use for the Message Not Sent
text when exiting SlyEdit
genMsgErrorText The color to use for general message error
text when exiting SlyEdit
listBoxItemText The color to use for text appearing in list
boxes (such as the list of text replacements
and the list of tag lines)
listBoxItemHighlight The color to use for the currently selected
item in list boxes (such as the list of text
replacements and the list of tag lines)
9. Text replacements (AKA Macros)
==================================
SlyEdit version 1.29 added text replacements (AKA Macros), which lets you (the
sysop) define words to be replaced with other text as the user types a message.
This feature can be used, for instance, to replace commonly misspelled words
with their correct versions or to replace swear words with less offensive
words. This feature is toggled by the enableTextReplacements option in
SlyEdit.cfg can can have one of three values:
false : Text replacement is disabled
true : Text replacement is enabled and performed as literal search and replace
regex : Text replacement is enabled using regular expressions as implemented by
JavaScript (more accurately, Synchronet's JavaScript interpreter, which
at the time of this writing is Mozilla's JavaScript engine (AKA
JavaScript-C or "SpiderMonkey").
The text searches are performed on single words only, as the user types the
message, and are replaced by whatever text you configure for the word. The
configuration for text replacing is read from a configuration file called
SlyEdit_TextReplacements.cfg, which is plain text and can be placed in either
sbbs/ctrl or in the same directory as SlyEdit's .js files (SlyEdit.js,
SlyEdit_Misc.js, etc.). Each line in SlyEdit_TextReplacements.cfg needs to
have the following format:
originalWord=replacementText
where originalWord is the word to be replaced, and replacementText is the text
to replace the word with.
The options for the enableTextReplacements configuration optoin are explained
in more detail below:
- false: Text replacing is disabled
- true: Literal text search and replace - The words will be matched literally
and replaced with the text on the right side of the = in
SlyEdit_TextReplacements.cfg. In this mode, word matching is not
case-sensitive. The words can have both uppercase and lowercase letters and
will still be matched to the words configured in SlyEdit_TextReplacements.cfg.
In this mode, if the first letter of the original word is uppercase, then the
first letter of the replaced text will also be uppercase.
While this works, one drawback to literal text searching is that it won't
replace a word if there are punctuation characters or other characters around
the word or if the word is misspelled.
- regex: With this option, SlyEdit will treat the word searches (on the left
side of the = in SlyEdit_TextReplacements.cfg) as regular expressions, as
implemented by JavaScript. When using regular expressions, SlyEdit will start
trying all the regular expressions provided and apply only the first one that
changes the text and will stop there.
Regular expressions offer a more flexible way to serach and replace text. For
example, in case a word is surrounded by punctuation or other characters, a
regular expression can be given that will still match the word. For example,
you might want a regular expression that changes "teh" to "the" (since "teh"
is a common misspelling of "the"). To ensure that the word is replaced even if
the word has other characters around it, you could use a regular exprssion and
replacement such as this:
(.*)teh(.*)=$1the$2
That way, even if the word is enclosed in quotes (such as "teh"), the word will
still be converted to "the". And to preserve the first letter's case (if it's
uppercase or lowercase), this regular expression and replacement string would
handle that:
(.*)([tT])eh(.*)=$1$2he$3
SlyEdit applies the regular expressions on a per-word basis; that is, the
expression .* in a regular expression will match any characters only in the
last word the user typed, not the entire line.
For more information on regular expressions, the
following are some web pages that explain them:
General information about regular expressions:
http://www.regular-expressions.info/tutorial.html
Information on text grouping and backreferencing with parenthesis (the page
calls them "round brackets") - A very powerful feature of regular expressions:
http://www.regular-expressions.info/brackets.html
General information about regular expressions geared toward JavaScript:
http://www.javascriptkit.com/javatutors/re.shtml
Information about using backreferences with regular expressions in JavaScript:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2447915/javascript-string-regex-backreferences
JavaScript-specific information on regular exprssions:
http://www.w3schools.com/js/js_obj_regexp.asp
http://www.w3schools.com/jsref/jsref_obj_regexp.asp
One nice thing about JavaScript's implementation (among others) of regular
expressions is that it supports the use of parentheses for character grouping
and backreferencing to place a portion of the matched text in the replacement
text. In JavaScript, each numbered capture buffer is preceded by a dollar sign
($). For example, the regular expression (darn) will match the word "darn" and
store it in buffer 1, and in JavaScript (and with SlyEdit's search and
replace), you would use $1 to refer to the word "darn". For example, for
(darn), the replacement $1it would replace the word "darn" with "darnit".
10. User settings
=================
Since version 1.32, SlyEdit has the ability for each user to configure some
settings for themselves. The user settings include the following:
- Whether or not to enable the option to use taglines
- Whether or not to prompt for spell checking when saving a message
- Whether or not to add the original author's initials to quote lines
(this was previously only configurable in SlyEdit.cfg)
- Whether or not to indent quote lines that use author's intials (this was
previously only configurable in SlyEdit.cfg)
- Whether or not to trim spaces from quoted lines (when replying to messages).
Some users indent their paragraphs with spaces as a writing style. When
this setting is enabled, this feature removes leading spaces from quoted
lines when replying to a message. A user might want to disable this, for
example, when they want to ensure that a message is quoted exactly as-is.
- Whether or not to auto-sign messages. When this setting is enabled, the
user's messages are automatically signed with their alias or their real
name, depending on the sub-board's settings. There is additionally a setting
to specify whehter to use only their first name when signing with their
real name, and also whether to sign emails with their real name (emails
don't have a configuration like sub-boards do).
- Dictionaries for spell-check. If there is only one dictionary configured,
this option won't appear on the user options list. If there are multiple
dictionary files on the BBS machine (in either sbbs/mods, sbbs/ctrl, or in
the same directory as SlyEdit), the user will be able to choose any or all
dictionaries to be used for the spell check feature. Multiple dictionaries
can be selected, so if the user writes messages in more than one language,
or if a message could contain multiple languages, the spell-check feature
will use all selected dictionaries for spell checking.
The user settings files will be stored in the sbbs/data/user directory with the
filename <user number>.SlyEdit_Settings, and the user number will be 0-padded
up to 4 digits.
11. Taglines
============
SlyEdit version 1.32 added the ability for users to optionally choose a tagline
to be appended to their message upon saving the message. Each user can
configure in their user settings whether or not they want to enable this
feature. The setting enableTaglines in SlyEdit.cfg sets the default setting,
but users are free to change it for themselves.
The taglines are loaded from the text file SlyEdit_Taglines.txt, which can be
located in any of the following directories, searched in the following order:
- sbbs/mods
- sbbs/ctrl
- The same directory as SlyEdit's .js files
Synchronet version 3.16 has the ability to place the tag line after the user's
signature, so if you are running version 3.16 or newer of Synchronet, the tag
line will be placed after the user's signature, if the user has a signature.
Specifically, Synchronet 3.16 starting with the beta build on July 5, 2015 will
behave that way; with earlier versions of Synchronet, the tag line will be
placed before the user's signature. On June 22, 2015, Synchronet added support
for a file called editor.tag (in each node directory's temp directory) which
can contain an editor tagline, and on July 5, 2015, Synchronet included an
update in which the full path & filename to the tagline file will be written
to line 7 of the MSGINF drop file, which SlyEdit reads on startup. If the
MSGINF file includes the 7th line, then the tagline will appear after the
user's signature (if they have one). If the MSGINF file does not include the
7th line, then the tagline will appear before the user's signature.
12. Spell check and dictionaries
================================
Since version 1.64, SlyEdit has a spell check feature. Spell check can be
started by the user with the Ctrl-R hotkey, or by the Edit > Spell Checker
option in the DCT-style ESC menu (only available when in DCT mode). For spell
check, SlyEdit will check each word to see if it exists in the configured
dictionary/dictionaries, and if not, it will prompt the user for a corrected
version of the word. The sysop can configure one or multiple dictionaries in
SlyEdit.cfg with the dictionaryFilenames option. Dictionary files need to be
in the format dictionary_<languageName>.txt, where <languageName> is the name
of the language. Also, ideally, the language names should follow standard
language tags, as in "en-us" for English (US), etc. See these web pages for
more information:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Language_localisation
http://www.lingoes.net/en/translator/langcode.htm
Also, the dictionary filenames will be parsed and the language name will be
used in the menu of dictionaries in the user options - The user is able to
enable/disable the configured dictionaries for their own use for the spell
checker.
For the dictionaryFilenames option in SlyEdit.cfg, you can specify a comma-
separated list of dictionary filenames. The dictionary filenames are in the
format dictionary_<languageName>.txt, where <language> is the language name.
In this list, the filenames can be in that format, or just <languageName>.txt,
or just <languageName>. You can leave the setting blank to use all dictionary
files that exist on the system.
SlyEdit will search for the dictionary files in the following directories, in
this order:
1. sbbs/mods
2. sbbs/ctrl
3. SlyEdit's own directory
Dictionary files must be sorted in order for word matching to work properly
(SlyEdit uses a binary search for quick word matching, which requires the words
to be sorted). Also, all of the words in the dictionary files must be lower-
case, since SlyEdit does case-insensitive matching by converting words in the
message to lower-case and comparing them with the words in the dictionary.
13. Version history
===================
Version Date Description
------- ---- -----------
1.89b 2024-05-11 In SlyEdit_Misc.js, check to see that
xtrn_area.editor[user.editor] is an object before using it.
1.89a 2024-05-04 Don't line-wrap poll messages for quoting, as that could
mess up the formatting of the poll options. Also, a minor
fix for the 'to' name length in DCT mode when using a wide
terminal.
1.89 2024-04-30 Quote wrapping length: When re-wrapping quote lines, read
the editor configuration settings for "word-wrap quoted
text" as specified in xtrn.ini (settable in scfg) - Wrap
quote lines to the width specified there, or if not
specified, default to 79 columns. This is to help ensure
quoted text is a reasonable width for many terminals. The
wrapping logic is also called for prepending quoted text
with the quote prefix, so (for now) there needs to be a
default quote wrap width.
1.88d 2024-02-16 Header display update for UTF-8. And printing from/to/subj
after writing the header with empty data so that the
header 'graphic' characters & everything lines up
properly.
1.88c 2024-02-12 UTF-8 support in the displayed header and when quoting
text and when quoting message text
1.88b 2024-02-11 Previous change reverted; now has "real" UTF-8 support.
New feature: Entering a graphic char with Ctrl-G (Ctrl-G
was previously the key for general help, which wasn't much)
1.88 2024-02-07 Support for entering UTF-8/Unicode characters; internally
uses K_CP437 to convert to CP437, so the strings are still
in CP437 internally in Synchronet
1.87a 2023-12-17 Using the msg_area.sub object to check sub-board settings
instead of opening the sub-board (for determining whether
to post with real name)
1.87 2023-08-15 Improvement to paragraph/line breaks in quote line wrapping
1.86 2023-07-26 Started refactoring the re-wrapping of quote lines to work
better for the various quote prefixes used in various
messages.
1.85 2023-05-15 Internal: Refactored readColorConfig() in _DCTStuff.js
and _IceStuff.js.
Removed the readValueSettingConfigFile() function.
1.84 2023-02-10 Sysops: When importing a file from the BBS machine,
SlyEdit now prompts to send it immediately or not (if not,
edit it before sending). Sending immediately can be
useful for posting ANSI files unmodified.
1.83 2022-12-13 Quote lines that are wider than the user's terminal width
are now wrapped to the user's terminal width to ensure
all the quote lines are entirely available to be quoted.
1.82 2022-12-01 Bug fix: Added some safety checks when reading the
configuration file
1.81 2022-11-26 Refactored the way the configuration file is read. Also,
the color configuration files now can just specify
attribute characters, without the control character.
1.80 2022-07-04 Added the ability to change/set the text color (using the
CTRL-K hotkey). If desired, changing the text color can
be disabled if, and the colors can be saved as ANSI
(rather than Synchronet attribute codes) for compatibility
with other BBS software & message readers. The
allowColorSelection option in SlyEdit.cfg specifies
whether or not to allow changing text colors, and the
saveColorsAsANSI option specifies whether or not to save
the message colors as ANSI.
1.79 2022-06-21 JS strict mode enabled. Small JS issues fixed.
1.78 2022-06-09 Removed high-ascii characters from the SlyEdit JS files;
used ascii() with their numeric ASCII values instead. This
should avoid issues with text editors converting
characters incorrectly.
1.77 2022-05-27 Fixed a few instances where SlyEdit was trying to access
sub-board information with an empty sub-board code (in the
rare case when no sub-boards are configured).
1.76 2022-03-05 When selecting quote lines in a reply message, SlyEdit now
remembers the position in the quote selection menu so that
the quote menu isn't always at the top whenever it's
opened again. This issue may have been introduced when
SlyEdit was refactored to use DDLightbarMenu for its
lightbar stuff.
1.75 2021-12-11 Refactored the cross-post menu and quote selection window
to use DDLightbarMenu instead of SlyEdit's own lightbar
code.
1.74 2021-01-23 Making use of the new K_NUL and checking user input
against null, SlyEdit no longer thinks a 0x0 (sent with
CTRL-Space on a Mac) is a timeout. K_NUL was added on
Jan. 21, 2021 by Rob Swindell. (This update was from Deon
George)
1.73 2020-03-31 Now uses DDLightbarMenu instead of SlyEdit's own internal
choice menu.
1.72 2020-03-04 For cross-posting, to make sure the user can post in a
sub-board, SlyEdit now checks the can_post property of the
sub-board rather than checking the ARS. The can_post
property covers more cases.
1.71 2020-03-03 Added a new configuration option, allowSpellCheck, which
the sysop can use to configure whether or not spell check
is allowed. You might want to disable spell check if the
spell check feature causes SlyEdit to abort with an error
saying it's out of memory.
1.70 2019-08-15 Fix for a bug introduced in the flowing-line update in
1.68 where some quote blocks were sometimes not being
included when saving a message. Also, quote lines are now
wrapped to the user's terminal width rather than 80
columns.
1.69 2019-08-14 Updated to only use console.inkey() for user input and not
use console.getkey() anymore. The change was made in the
getUserKey() function in SlyEdit_Misc.js. Also, SlyEdit
will now write the editor style (ICE or DCT) to result.ed
at the end when a message is saved. Also, when editing a
message, if the cursor is at the end of the last line and
the user presses the DEL key, then treat it as a
backspace. Some terminals send a delete for backspace,
particularly with keyboards that have a delete key but no
backspace key.
1.68 2019-08-09 Updated to honor the SUB_ANON and SUB_AONLY flags for the
sub-boards when cross-posting so that the "from" name is
"Anonymous" if either of those flags enabled.
Updated to allow message uploading. Started working on
updates to save new text lines as one long line, to help
with word wrapping in offline readers etc.
1.67 2019-07-21 Now supports the RESULT.ED drop file, with the ability to
change the subject. Synchronet 3.17c development builds
from July 21, 2019 onward support result.ed even for
editors configured for QuickBBS MSGINF/MSGTMP.
1.66 2019-05-29 Added more parsing for dictionary filenames for 'general'
dictionaries and 'supplimental' ones
1.65 2019-05-24 Added support for parsing many standard language tags for
the dictionary filenames
1.64 2019-05-24 Started working on adding a spell check feature. Also,
updated to use require() instead of load() for .js
scripts when possible.
1.63 2019-04-18 Started working on supporting word-wrapping for the entire
width of any terminal size, beyond 79.
1.62 2018-11-11 Updated to save the message if the user disconnects, to
support Synchronet's message draft feature that was added
recently.
1.61 2018-08-03 Updated to delete instances of User objects that are
created, due to an optimization in Synchronet 3.17 that
leaves user.dat open
1.54 2017-12-26 Improved quoting with author initials when a > character
exists in the quote lines: Not mistaking the preceding
text as a quote prefix if it has 3 or more non-space
characters before the >. Also fixed an issue where
wrapped quote lines were sometimes missing the quote line
prefix.
1.53 2017-12-19 Updated the PageUp and PageDown keys to ensure they match
what's in sbbsdefs.js, since Synchronet added key codes
for those keys on December 17, 2018. SlyEdit should still
work with older and newer builds of Synchronet, with or
without the updated sbbsdefs.js.
1.52 2017-12-17 Added the ability for the sysop to toggle whether or not
to allow users to edit quote lines, using the
configuration option allowEditQuoteLines.
.. Removed some history comments ..
1.00 2009-08-22 Initial public release
2009-05-11 Started development
docs/slyedit_readme.txt
+ 13
− 0
View file @ 423c3283
......@@ -922,6 +922,15 @@ message to lower-case and comparing them with the words in the dictionary.
===================
Version Date Description
------- ---- -----------
1.89d 2025-01-26 User inactivity timeout improvement (via use of
console.getkey() instead of the custom function that was
being used)
1.89c 2024-10-29 Open the quote file in binary mode to avoid EOF issues on
Windows if a unicode "right arrow" code exists in the
message, which would get truncated to ASCII Ctrl-Z (ASCII
26), which is interpreted as EOF on Windows.
1.89b 2024-05-11 In SlyEdit_Misc.js, check to see that
xtrn_area.editor[user.editor] is an object before using it.
1.89a 2024-05-04 Don't line-wrap poll messages for quoting, as that could
mess up the formatting of the poll options. Also, a
minor fix for the 'to' name length in DCT mode when using
......@@ -935,6 +944,10 @@ Version Date Description
wrapping logic is also called for prepending quoted text
with the quote prefix, so (for now) there needs to be a
default quote wrap width.
1.88d 2024-02-16 Header display update for UTF-8. And printing from/to/subj
after writing the header with empty data so that the
header 'graphic' characters & everything lines up
properly.
1.88c 2024-02-12 UTF-8 support in the displayed header and when quoting
text and when quoting message text
1.88b 2024-02-11 Previous change reverted; now has "real" UTF-8 support.
......
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