Editing titles

Create a new TitleDriver data file by importing text from another source, see Importing text.

Entering and editing a single title's text:

Click on the Edit text & format tab in the Operator's window. The currently selected title will appear in the edit field. You may only edit one text column at a time. If your data file contains multiple columns of text, use the "Preview/edit column" popup menu to select which column you wish to edit, or click anywhere on the column you wish to view.

When you are finished editing a title you must click the "Enter changes" button, or use the enter key.

A title's text always appears in the list as a single line. You may format that title to use two (or more) lines when presented on screen. You will generally want to choose the point at which the on-screen text wraps to a new line. You do this by inserting an asterisk (*). 

Direct editing of text cells in the the list:

TitleDriver by default always requires a couple of extra clicks to accomplish a text edit. That was designed intentionally to prevent  inadvertently changing title text. However, sometimes you do need to be able to quickly get in and paste new entries or such.  And so in the Edit text & format tab, you'll see on the far right a padlock icon. Click on the icon to toggle the cell lock/unlock function for direct editing of text in the cells of the list.

The Currently selected title... menu:

While you are in the Edit text & format tab, use the Currently selected title menu to insert new titles,  delete titles and perform other operations on the selected title.  Note that the command "Split selected text to a new title below" will only handle the currently selected column, and so if you are working on a multi-language data file, you will then have to manually perform the same "Split selected text..." operation for those other languages, to complete the new title.

Character count:

At the left of each title's edit field you will see numbers that show you the current number of characters (including spaces) in each line of that title.

Automatic line-wrapping is not applied at this point.  Automatic wrapping will be applied (if needed) when the text appears on screen. A maximum number of characters-per-line may be specified in the Settings > Display Windows tab. If you exceed the maximum number of characters specified, there is a warning message when you enter that text.

The Preview Window:

The Preview window is freely resizable to fit your Operator's display area, and is only a rough approximation of what will appear on Display Window(s). When you use the resize control at the bottom right of the Preview window, a small field will display the exact size of the window in pixels.

Applying text styles:

Select the word or phrase to be styled by clicking at the beginning and dragging the mouse to the end of the selection.

Then click one of the style buttons: B for Bold, I for Italics, and U for Underline. 

See help topic "Formatting text."

Finding and replacing text:

Use the Edit menu "Find & Replace..." command to search all text for a word or phrase, or perform global replacements in a file.

Copying and pasting all fields of a title:

While you are working in the Edit text & format tab you may use the Copy command in the Edit menu to copy all four columns worth of the currently selected title, format commands and title number. 

You may then use the Paste command to put those fields into any other title you select.  When you paste into the new title, the number field will not be overwritten if a title number already exists.

Clearing style data from an individual title:

Occasionally title text can be edited in such a way that the underlying style data  (i.e. bold, italic, underline)  can become garbled. These errors may be invisible in the edit field, and may produce inconsistent results. 

 Use the Clear style data command in the Currently selected title popup menu (located in the "Edit text" tab) to clear all style data, and start again carefully applying style to words and phrases.

Diacritical marks & Special characters:

     -Typing Diacriticals directly:

There are shortcuts which allow you to enter characters with common diacritical marks from the keyboard. The secret is to type the Option key combination first, followed by the character you want under the mark. If you type the Option key combination followed by a space, you'll get the diacritical mark alone.

For example:

Type Option-`, then e, to get è. 

Type Option-u, then u, to get ü.

Option-`: ` grave accent  

Option-e: ' acute accent (é)

Option-i: ^ circumflex 

Option-u: " umlaut 

Option-n: ~ tilde 

Option-c: ç cedilla

Note that this assumes you are using the American or other Western keyboard layout as your system keyboard layout.

   -Entering diacriticals and special characters via the palette:

Use the Edit menu command Emoji & Symbols to display the palette.

Double-click on characters in the palette to add them to the text edit field. 

If your  palette is only displaying emoticons, access the full character palette via the small icon at the top of the palette.

  -Entering and editing non-Roman scripts

TitleDriver can produce text in any Unicode script set: Cyrillic, Hebrew, Chinese, Japanese, etc.

Use the International Systems Preferences panel to configure alternative keyboard layouts. Switch to the desired keyboard layout when you wish to input nonstandard scripts. This method can also be used to find Roman letters with diacritical marks. I.e. in System Preferences> Keyboard>Input sources click the checkbox "Show input menu in menu bar." Now that the keyboard input menu is visible (usually the U.S. flag) you may choose the "Show keyboard viewer" to use a virtual keyboard. Note that the keycaps change to show which diacritical or special character will appear when you're holding down the shift, control or option keys.

Text may be displayed in a vertical formal (as with Chinese): See formatting text.

-Working with multi-language data files:

Use the "Show number of text columns" popup menu to view all of the columns you're working with, and then resize each column in the Operator's window as you prefer by clicking in the main list's header directly above a column divider. 

  Next: Formatting text