* Marriage Text witnesses not being included in Text from Source

[NickWalker]

Yes Jane I worked out how to do it immediately following your earlier post. It was my abstract way of expressing the fact that we probably had been told about this somewhere in the help files by Calico, but I have no idea where!

[Jane]

I guessed you found it Nick, but Chris said he could not get it to work.



Off Topic:
I have all the HHGTG Radio Series on MP3 and periodically listen to them when the world gets too real.

Have you come across these: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... 635E6598A5

[NickWalker]

Ah sorry missed that. Thanks for the link

[ChrisRead]

Thanks Jane, this was more about creating a template using the RT editor and then getting it out as Auto-text to use in AS, rather than just exporting a Note box content.

Edit:
The ctrl-alt double-click brings up the RT editor whereas double-clicking brings up the plain text editor with the option to check or uncheck it as being rich-text. Am I missing something, or are we all at cross purposes. The Save as tool option is the life saver for the discussion over cunning variable column tables. That's if it works out as hoped.

[NickWalker]

For example, if I look at the note editor in FH and it has this in it:

RichText1.PNG (14.81 KiB) Viewed 4964 times

If I then use Jane's Ctrl+Alt+Double click magic trick (it rhymes!) then I see this:

richtext2.PNG (11.01 KiB) Viewed 4964 times

And that's a very useful starting point for creating AS templates (or will be when I've fixed the issues discussed earlier).

[ChrisRead]

Ah, my fault, I was in a hurry (she who shall be obeyed) and when I quickly picked something to try, it didn't actually have anything interesting RT wise. Just had another go having seen your post, and yes I see the expected stuff. All makes sense now.

[ChrisRead]

That 'secret' trick from Jane makes it a lot easier to create a template fairly quickly. I've come to the conclusion that this approach is nigh on impossible to do if you try and stick to the {RTF-WIDTHx} as they are not in multiples of each other. For what I was wanting, it's not really an issue to have literal sizes as the vari-table layout is normally intentionally fixed, so you probably don't need the flexibility to adjust via the {RTF-WIDTHx} values. It would be difficult to maintain the layout unless you were scaling all the values in tandem.

I've played this table layout game before in HTML to achieve similar variable columns in different rows. In that case I standardised on 20 cells across and everything was then multiples of a cell always totalling 20 in a row, with some hideous CSS to hide or show cell borders. It was trying to match a hardcopy form the customer used.

Anyway here's something I cooked up. It's just the background so far, but I plan to fit in the keys and things to see how it works in practice in AS. It should also be easy to tweak to have variants (such as seven instead of eight) and other slight pre-printed differences in Parish records if wanted.

I picked a total size across of 6000 and then ensured the cell widths in a row added up to that. You can at least get a rough layout in the editor before then doing the adjustments in the raw RTF window.

<table="4410|405|485|700">
<row> <font="Calibri","swiss",0> | <align="c"><b>of | <align="c"></b> | <align="r"><b>Parish </row>
</table>
<table="6000">
<row> </row>
</table>
<table="485|3925|405|485|700">
<row> and | </b> | <align="c"><b>of | <align="c"></b> | <align="r"><b>Parish </row>
</table>
<table="6000">
<row> </row>
</table>
<table="1620|840|400|1865|1275">
<row> were married in this | </b> | <align="c"><b>by | </b> | <align="r"><b>with Consent of </row>
</table>
<table="3640|485|1155|720">
<row> | <align="c">this | | <align="r">Day of </row>
</table>
<table="1250|3250|1500">
<row> </b> | <b>In the Year One thousand eight hundred and | </row>
</table>
<table="1420|690|3890">
<row> | <align="c">By me | </row>
</table>
<table="3100|200|2700">
<row> This Marriage was solemnised between us | { | </row>
<row> | { | </row>
</table>
<table="1580|200|4220">
<row> In the Presence of | { | </row>
<row> | { | </row>
</table>
<table="1580|4420">
<row> | </row>
</table>
<table="460|485|5055">
<row> No. | </b> | <b> </row>
</table>
</b></font>

[NickWalker]

Perhaps what is required are some additional functions in AS to Add/Subtract/Multiply/Divide two values so you could do something like =MULT[{RTF-WIDTH1}%2] to have multiples of a width.

[ChrisRead]

I hesitated to suggest such things, but you're right. Probably need to try some stuff out and come up with some sensible requirements. Oh dear it'll be use cases and requirements analysis next.

[ChrisRead]

So, starters for ten...

=MUL[x%y] multiply x by y return result
=DIV[numerator%denominator] divide numerator by denominator return result
=ADD[x%y] add y to x return result
=SUB[x%y] subtract y from x return result

Logically leads on to comparisons as we already have =EQUALS[x%y] and =EQUALSNOT[x%y] and logical operators
=GREATER[x%y] compare y and x return true if x > y
=LESSER[x%y] compare y and x return true if x < y

Not sure where those might be used as yet, but it's just for completeness.

The other function that came to mind although not related to the above, is a follow on from the {DATE.DAY.ORD} (which is awesome) is a {DATE.DAY.TEXT} or similar that outputs the day in words i.e. 25 outputs as twenty five. May need couple of options to capitalise or not. Twenty five, Twenty Five, as generally the first word gets capitalised. There may be other thoughts around this idea that need considering such as similar for year. It's just a wild idea for consideration, but I know where I can use it.

This thread has gone on a bit of a journey since the original '{' problem, but I think it's been worthwhile, and we both learned something new about FH from Jane along the way.

Please tell me to back-off if I'm distracting you from other things that need doing, as I'm wary of monopolising your time.

[ChrisRead]

So, this is the 'complete' auto-text sample based on the one I posted before. I have had to keep the fixed column sizes for now until if and when your idea for maths functions happens. I've otherwise tried to stick to the style of existing templates. It has flagged up a couple of functions/keywords that would be useful. One is the day in alphabetic form I mentioned before, and the other is a function that achieves the same but have more general use. It takes a number and returns it in alphabetic form. This comes from the desire to transcribe the dates in writing as they almost always have done in parish registers. So, the only issue left with this sample is that I have a full year where I wanted a written tens part of the year (even getting the tens would be better).

Anyway, have a good remainer of the weekend.

<table="6000">
<row> {RTF-TITLE}<font="Old English Text MT","script",0><fs="+4"></b><align="c">Parish Register of a Marriage</font></fs> {RTF-TITLE.OFF}</row>
<row> {RTF-HEAD}MARRIAGES Solemnised in the Parish of {RTF-HEAD.OFF}{PLACE.SHORT}{RTF-HEAD} in the Year {RTF-HEAD.OFF}{YEAR}{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>

<table="4390|405|485|720">
<row> =LINKIND[{KEYPERSON.ID}%{KEYPERSON.FULL}] | <align="c">{RTF-HEAD}of {RTF-HEAD.OFF} | <align="c">=IF[=EQUALS[{KEYPERSON.RESIDENCE.PLACE}%{PLACE}]%this%the] | <align="r"> {RTF-HEAD}Parish{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>
<table="6000">
<row> =IF[=EQUALSNOT[{KEYPERSON.RESIDENCE.PLACE}%{PLACE}]%of {KEYPERSON.RESIDENCE.PLACE.SHORT}%]</row>
</table>
<table="485|3905|405|485|720">
<row> {RTF-HEAD}and{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | =LINKIND[{SPOUSE.ID}%{SPOUSE.FULL}] | <align="c">{RTF-HEAD}of{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | <align="c">=IF[=EQUALS[{SPOUSE.RESIDENCE.PLACE}%{PLACE}]%this%the] | <align="r">{RTF-HEAD}Parish{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>
<table="6000">
<row> =IF[=EQUALSNOT[{SPOUSE.RESIDENCE.PLACE}%{PLACE}]%of {PLACE.SHORT}%]</row>
</table>
<table="1620|840|2190|1350">
<row> {RTF-HEAD}were married in this{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | Church | {MARRIAGETYPE} | <align="r">{RTF-HEAD}with Consent of{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>
<table="3595|485|1200|720">
<row> | <align="c">{RTF-HEAD}this{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | {DATE.DAY.ORD}| <align="r">{RTF-HEAD}Day of{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>
<table="980|3460|1560">
<row> {DATE.MONTH.FULL} | {RTF-HEAD}in the Year One thousand =IF[=STARTSWITH[{YEAR}%17]%seven%=IF[=STARTSWITH[{YEAR}%18]%eight%error]] hundred and{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | {YEAR}</row>
</table>
<table="1420|690|3890">
<row> | <align="c">{RTF-HEAD}By me{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | <align="l">=IF[{MINISTER}%{MINISTER}%=IF[{ASSOCLIST[Minister].COMMA}%{ASSOCLIST[Minister].COMMA}%=IF[{ASSOCLIST[Priest].COMMA}%{ASSOCLIST[Priest].COMMA}%=IF[{ASSOCLIST[Rabbi].COMMA}%{ASSOCLIST[Rabbi].COMMA}%]]]]</row>
</table>
<table="3200|200|2600">
<row> {RTF-HEAD}This Marriage was solemnised between us | \|{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | =LINKIND[{KEYPERSON.ID}%{KEYPERSON.FULL}]</row>
<row> | {RTF-HEAD}\|{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | =LINKIND[{SPOUSE.ID}%{SPOUSE.FULL}] </row>
</table>
<table="1580|200|4220">
<row>{RTF-HEAD} In the Presence of | \|{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | {ASSOCLIST[Witnesses].COMMACR}</row>
</table>
<table="460|485|5055">
<row> {RTF-HEAD}No.{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | {OTHER} | </row>
</table></font>

[NickWalker]

One issue is there are a number of ways that years can be written.
e.g. 1783 could be:
One thousand seven hundred and eighty-three
Seventeen eighty-three
Seventeen hundred and eighty-three
(and the same 3 without the hyphen).

I'm also aware (as I was when I added the ORD keyword) that it is in English and that this is not helpful to users who are recording in other languages.

[ChrisRead]

You are right, and I'm being rather anglo-centric which is remiss of me. From experience I should know better.
For the ORD one it maybe possible to take OS language settings in to account, at least for those that are known/understood if was a major issue for people. Or an AS setting to be a little more localised and controlled.
I suppose the same goes for the turning a number into words (I'm thinking French from 70, because whoa).

I realised that not doing it as a specifically date option, but a general purpose function potentially provided a more flexible
option for people to do localised variants in conjunction with the potential maths functions to carve up a number as they wanted. I knew it was probably a deeper issue than I was looking for, but could put the localisation issue back in the hands of the user

I'll look to do a not quite what I was looking for auto-text in the mean time and await any future developments.

[ChrisRead]

Ok, this is a 3AM idea, but may be a way to minimise my guilt over the .ORD being English

The idea was to basically make the suffix configurable a bit like how you allow the column widths to be configured by a user. So, they'd be able to set a suffix for each terminal digit (0..9).

I had a look at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ordinal_i ... r_suffixes to see how other languages do it, and came to the conclusion that they are similar although I haven't delved in to any irregular cases, so the idea might be feasible, I'm not sure. I also looked for language packs or multilingual version of AS to get an idea of what may need to be supported, but didn't find any.

The same configuration method might also work for written forms of numbers, but as you point out there are various ways that they could be written depending on user preference. However, it could be made a template issue to decide how the number was written given the ability to configure the text to use for the core numbers and the availability of the maths functions to carve the number up and output it in any of your examples. I need to think about that more, and it's all just semi-conscious randomness, so treat as such.

[NickWalker]

I think really supporting other languages is a bit beyond my skillset (I was only any good with computer languages at school) and something I can think about in the future if I start to get lots of complaints about it.

I noticed that your template shows errors - you'll need to escape the { characters by repeating them twice so that AS doesn't think you're creating a keyword entry.

I do have a version of AS ready for you to test if you're happy to give it a try. [Edit-Downloads removed]. Changes since v7.1.3 are:

• Added new auto-text functions ADD, SUB, MULT, DIV to allow integer calculations on numerical values. These may be helpful in particular to use in conjunction with RTF-WIDTH values. Inspired by conversations with Chris Read.
• Added new auto-text function TITLEF which capitalises the just the first letter of the expression.
• Added new auto-text function WORDNUM which changes a positive integer (up to four digits) to an english form - there are 6 different formats to choose from. This was suggested by Chris Read.
• Fixed issues where { } \ and tab characters were not displayed correctly in rich text format. This problem was reported by Chris Read.
• Fixed various issues with tables including where numbers or widths of cells differed between different rows.
• Added an extra paragraph to the auto-text template help page to recommend that duplicates of templates are made, rather than editing the standard ones. This was a result of a conversation on the FHUG forum.

You'll need to look at the help to see how the WORDNUM function works.

[ChrisRead]

The language thing only stemmed from your comment about ORD being English, so I wondered if you had some plans or it was simply an "in an ideal world" thing. It seems the latter.

Yes, I forgot that the template in that thread was slightly older than what I had as I have changed the { to [ because \[ is the escaped version, but neither \{ or {{ wanted to work and gave errors.

Ok, off to download and play with the new goodies.

[ChrisRead]

Ok....
The functions appear to work as expected, you are a star. I just need to work out what to do with them

The WORDNUM is nice, more than I expected, and likely of use to other brave souls doing their own custom templates. I'd only originally thought about individual numbers rather than as a date thing, and manually building the string. Maybe I'll be back to you on that one when I find a reason to need it:)

However, when I came to using AS itself, I found the focus lost issue is now present on the main screen and even more of a pain as it will affect normal users (not sure if it is a 7.1.3 issue too). I found this because I'd picked a couple (doing a marriage as test as that's what my template was for). It was fine but I when I typed in the address or occupation (and probably the other fields) with a character, it jumped the focus to the Text window, and also duplicated the whole template again so there were two copies. This does not occur if you turn off the auto check box first.

Let me know when you need 7.1.5 testing

[ChrisRead]

Hmm, more intriguing.
It seems the focus problem on the normal app is only occurring where a template includes a table (maybe) such as mine. I tried another (1837-) and initially I thought it did it too, but when I went back round the loop it didn't happen, so I'm confused.
Here's my template.

<table="6000">
<row> {RTF-TITLE}<font="Old English Text MT","script",0><fs="+4"></b><align="c">Parish Register of a Marriage</font></fs> {RTF-TITLE.OFF}</row>
<row> {RTF-HEAD}<align="c">MARRIAGES Solemnised in the Parish of {RTF-HEAD.OFF}{PLACE.SHORT}{RTF-HEAD} in the Year {RTF-HEAD.OFF}{YEAR}{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>

<table="4390|405|485|720">
<row> =LINKIND[{KEYPERSON.ID}%{KEYPERSON.FULL}] | <align="c">{RTF-HEAD}of {RTF-HEAD.OFF} | <align="c">=IF[=EQUALS[{KEYPERSON.RESIDENCE.PLACE}%{PLACE}]%this%the] | <align="r"> {RTF-HEAD}Parish{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>
<table="6000">
<row> =IF[=EQUALSNOT[{KEYPERSON.RESIDENCE.PLACE}%{PLACE}]%of {KEYPERSON.RESIDENCE.PLACE.SHORT}%] {KEYPERSON.MARITALSTATUS} {KEYPERSON.OCCUPATION}{RTF-NORMAL.OFF}</row>
</table>
<table="485|3905|405|485|720">
<row> {RTF-HEAD}and{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | =LINKIND[{SPOUSE.ID}%{SPOUSE.FULL}] | <align="c">{RTF-HEAD}of{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | <align="c">=IF[=EQUALS[{SPOUSE.RESIDENCE.PLACE}%{PLACE}]%this%the] | <align="r">{RTF-HEAD}Parish{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>
<table="6000">
<row> =IF[=EQUALSNOT[{SPOUSE.RESIDENCE.PLACE}%{PLACE}]%of {PLACE.SHORT}%] {SPOUSE.MARITALSTATUS} {SPOUSE.OCCUPATION}</row>
</table>
<table="1620|840|2190|1350">
<row> {RTF-HEAD}were married in this{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | Church | {MARRIAGETYPE} | <align="r">{RTF-HEAD}with Consent of{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>
<table="3595|485|1200|720">
<row> | <align="c">{RTF-HEAD}this{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | {DATE.DAY.ORD}| <align="r">{RTF-HEAD}Day of{RTF-HEAD.OFF} </row>
</table>
<table="980|5020">
<row> {DATE.MONTH.FULL} | {RTF-HEAD}in the Year {RTF-HEAD.OFF} =TITLEF[=WORDNUM[{YEAR}%6]]{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | </row>
</table>
<table="1420|690|3890">
<row> | <align="c">{RTF-HEAD}By me{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | <align="l">=IF[{MINISTER}%{MINISTER}%=IF[{ASSOCLIST[Minister].COMMA}%{ASSOCLIST[Minister].COMMA}%=IF[{ASSOCLIST[Priest].COMMA}%{ASSOCLIST[Priest].COMMA}%=IF[{ASSOCLIST[Rabbi].COMMA}%{ASSOCLIST[Rabbi].COMMA}%]]]]</row>
</table>
<table="3200|200|2600">
<row> {RTF-HEAD}This Marriage was solemnised between us | {{{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | =LINKIND[{KEYPERSON.ID}%{KEYPERSON.FULL}]</row>
<row> | {RTF-HEAD}{{{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | =LINKIND[{SPOUSE.ID}%{SPOUSE.FULL}] </row>
</table>
<table="1580|200|4220">
<row>{RTF-HEAD} In the Presence of | {{{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | {ASSOCLIST[Witnesses].COMMACR}</row>
</table>
<table="460|485|5055">
<row> {RTF-HEAD}No.{RTF-HEAD.OFF} | {OTHER} | </row>
</table></font>

[NickWalker]

I think it's this font change that's doing it: <font="Old English Text MT","script",0> but I need to work out why. Best to just stick to the {RTF-NORMAL}/HEAD/TITLE anyway.

The WORDNUM is nice, more than I expected, and likely of use to other brave souls doing their own custom templates. I'd only originally thought about individual numbers rather than as a date thing, and manually building the string. Maybe I'll be back to you on that one when I find a reason to need it:)

You can still use it that way I think as the function will take individual numbers (any whole number from 1 to 9999)

[ChrisRead]

I did wonder about the <font> and <fs>, but in principal should be valid.

• I removed all the font and other extra format related stuff on that first row, but I still got the problem.
• I removed the whole first table and the problem stopped.
• I put back it back with just the top row and the problem was back.
• Removed first row and put back the second row and problem went away. So, problem is with first row
• So put first row back in again and problem returned.
• Removed all the font and other format related stuff on that first row and changed first row to use {RTF-HEAD} instead of {RTF-TITLE} and the problem went away.
• Changed back to {RTF-TITLE} and problem returned, so indicates an issue with {RTF-TITLE}
• Changed first row to use {RTF-HEAD} again and added font stuff back and problem returned, so there is an issue with <font> as well.
• Removed <font> and problem remained. So, <fs> is causing a problem.
• Also removed <fs> and problem went away.
• Put <font> back and problem returned. So, <font> is causing a problem.

Summary:
{RTF-TITLE} causes a problem on its own
<font> causes a problem in its own
<fs> causes a problem on its own

Make of this what you will, good luck.

[ChrisRead]

Tried something else.
I changed the {RTF-HEAD} font in the settings to something other than Default. Doing so makes the problem occur until put back to Default.

[NickWalker]

It's the font change or size change in the first cell of a table that seems to be changing the focus, which is why the TITLE is a problem (because it has a size change). Don't worry about posting any more issues regarding this issue, I'm looking at it.

Thanks

Nick

[ChrisRead]

Force of habit to figure out way to reliably reproduce problems. I'll leave it your hands as you have a handle on it. I wasn't sure it it was a single problem or several related ones. I guessed that TITLE had font & fs somewhere inside, and were the common factor.

[NickWalker]

I found the problem I think, please try this version Chris: AS 64 bit v7.1.5 or AS 32 bit v7.1.5

[ChrisRead]

Ok, 7.1.5 seems to have fixed the problem of jumping focus on the main input screen.

I'm sure you didn't wake up today expecting three releases in a day.

I'll carry on playing around while I work out the best way to use the maths to try and make the tables work even when changing the column size definitions. First I'll perfect the one I was doing as a fixed one, as I'm still learning.

I'll have to experiment to get an idea of how to make it work in a sensible and predictable manner with the defined column(s).