Copyright: Copyright ¸ 1998 by William J. Shlaer


Contents

Contents - Informer Help

version 1.0 - program and help file copyright © 1998 by William J. Shlaer

Overview

File Menu

Edit Menu

Format Menu

View Menu

Templates


Edit Menu

Undo, Cut, Copy, Paste, Select All, Find and Replace are standard. Undo was developed experimentally, not thought through, so it is even more likely than other parts of Informer to be buggy.

Paste Quoted attempts to generate text that will look like the original when the Z-machine displays it. Special characters are converted. Line breaks are preserved with carets inserted. Indents are converted to leading spaces. It makes a difference if the selection includes the final paragraph mark, that little space that turns black at the end of the last line. Sometimes the indent comes out odd, but the game text should be all right. Color, bold face, italic and font changes are flushed. Word wrap new lines are ignored; the text will break where the Z-machine chooses.

Quote Selection is similar, but no leading spaces are generated. Do a cut then paste quoted to keep as much formatting as possible.

Quote Mark is used to do character conversion and new line preservation as you enter text. The short cut is the same key as the regular quote but use Ctrl instead of Shift.


File Menu

The File menu is mostly standard.

Open allows you to select the file to read in. Unformatted text is read from files with txt and inf extensions. Formatted text is read from rich text format files, with rtf and r^t extensions.

Save and Save As always saves two files. A rich text file, rtf, to preserve the formatting, and a plain text file, inf, for compilation. If there is an old rtf file, it is renamed with the extension r^t. Do not give the extension when saving.

Print prints formatted text if it can.

New, Help, and Exit are as expected..

There are a couple of special items.

Run starts a DOS batch file, running in a window, that attempts a compile. If it fails, a window with the compiler error listing appears. Clicking on an error that has a source code line number should take you to that line. If the compile works, WinFrotz is started to run the game. The file compile.bat will need to be edited so that the compiler and Z-machine interpreter are found in their correct directories, and so they know where to find the source file, where to send errors, and where the game file lives. The batch file must be in the default directory used by Informer. Normally, that is where the game file goes. Don't change the name errorlog.txt.

Note, a save is done every time you attempt to compile and run the code. The backup with the r^f extension has a short life. It is only one cycle behind the current version.

New Skeleton gives the code for a one location, do nothing game on which you can build.

Convert changes contained objects and class derived objects to the basic styles that do not interfere with special features of this editor. Make sure you back up the original code before attempting this. It has the potential to make working code uncompileable.


Format Menu

Font changes wipe out syntax highlighting. Redo the highlighting after you find your one true font.

Bold is straightforward.

Indent only affects new text. If your parents did not choose an indent for you at birth, you should make your choice no later than the start of a project.

Highlight Syntax will change the appearance of key words, comments, and quoted text. Syntax highlighting is not done automatically, hence this command. It does the entire file unless part of the text is selected. It can take a long time. Take a break. The color and emphasis for each element can be set in the bottom menu panel. Make your choice, then click one of the last three items.

Redo Indent will destroy any formatting present in the code. It should only be used if all lines start at the left margin without indent or leading space. If this is checked it takes effect the next time syntax is highlighted. Directives that start a line go to the left margin. A few key words are indented by one. All other lines are indented by two.


Overview
Overview - also see the readme.txt file

Informer - an Editor for Inform - v1.0 for Windows 95

Informer is a Windows 95 text editor specialized to Inform, a language for writing interactive fiction. Graham Nelson the developer of Inform also wrote an editor mode, Zapinform that runs under his operating system. I have never used that editor, but the manual has suggested many of the features of Informer. The present version of Informer is preliminary even though it has been given version number 1.0. I am releasing it now in the hope that it may be of use until PIDE or other integrated environment is released.

The program is basically a simple text editor with a few special features. These include:

Persistent indents. The indent is increased by Tab and decreased by Shift-Tab. All following lines keep the same indent until it is changed.

Syntax highlighting for key words, comments, and quotations.

Character conversion for quoted text, and a limited retention of formatting within the quote.

Templates or macros for many Inform constructs.

Object and routine names can be viewed, and clicking on the item puts the cursor in its code.

Locations can be mapped.

The code can be compiled and run. Compile errors can be clicked to put the cursor near the error.

Please note that some of the features of this program require you forego some styles allowed by Inform. Objects derived from a class must be declared by the key word Object and have a class clause to specify the inheritance. The use of arrows to indicate that one object is inside another will cause problems; put the container or room in the header of the contained object instead.  The basic editor functions and some of the special features can still be used if you want to retain these Inform styles. Take your choice.


Templates

Templates or macros are provided for many of the Inform structures. They are nearly worthless. They have a reasonably consistent, very loose format that may not be to your taste. Fortunately, Noslen Maharg has not imposed a line tax on code to be compiled. Some templates just put the cursor in the structure for you to fill in. Others use a separate window with directions as a title. No indent or other format can be applied in these windows. The first time you hit Tab, they close. Closing them with the X button produces a blank or incomplete whatever. Just erase it.

Room may be the nearest to a useful set of templates. For connected rooms, the cursor must be in the starting room. The new room is given a reciprocal connection back.

Objects are the things inside the rooms. The cursor must be in the room or container where the object will be located. Free objects have no game location until it is set during play.

Routine can generate a named routine or a routine as an object property. The cursor must be in the object that will have the property.

String, List, and Direction always produce object properties. List can be a single item or number.

Attributes go to the object containing the cursor. You can check several then click Use. A new attribute created with this menu will be added to the menu. Big deal.

Other collects the odds and ends. The cursor should be at the beginning of a line when using Comment Block and Divider.


View Menu

Source is the main edit window with your code.

Object Tree shows all defined objects organized by container. Class inheritance is also indicated. Click on a line to go to that object in the source.

Classes, Routines, and Attributes are similar. They only show the ones you define, not the ones from the library.

Map shows the rooms that can be easily connected to the room the cursor was in. To a man with a hammer, every problem is a nail. I had the Frobot mapper, so I have crudely grafted it onto the editor to do the mapping. There is a button to view its separate help file. The help index will not have topics for the mapper unless you open Frobot.hlp alone.

Error Log is generated by the Inform compiler. If the file exists and is significant, it will be redisplayed. Warnings may be viewed on this log.

Key Words and short words can be shown and changed. The ini file should preserve the changes. Short words are not used in the name clause when the objects name is converted. For example Rock by Marsh will not have "by" in the name clause if by is in the short word list.