Application Preferences Dialog - Overview

This dialog lets you customize editor appearance and function. Preference settings are saved between editing sessions.

Preference settings are grouped into three overall categories:

General Preferences in this category let you define how the editor application looks and behaves on your desktop.

When this dialog window opens, General is highlighted in the preference category selection tree and the following general preference settings are visible:

Control Name Description
Show title bars Check this control if you want to display a title bar at the top of each pane within the editing window. If displayed, the title bar shows the name of the pane and contains controls to let you minimize or resize the panes. The title bar of the Editor pane also displays a drop-down list of files currently open for editing.
Highlight selected pane Check this control if you want to identify the currently-active pane with a highlighted border.
Pane History Cache Size The editor can maintain a history list of the most recently-opened files. This field accepts an integer value that controls how many entries can be stored in the history list.
Show logo at startup Check this control if you want the product logo displayed when the editor starts.

Other preference control groups in the General preferences tree are expanded by default and include the following:

Control Group Description
Appearance Changes the controls and window appearance of the editor application to resemble standard user interface conventions for your specific windowing and operating system.
Toolbars Defines if and where the editor toolbar appears in the editing window, how the toolbar buttons display icons and text, and the specific controls shown in the toolbar.
Help Identifies the HTML browser used to display editor help, and where that browser application can be found in your system's file system.
File open Lets you specify default appearance settings for new editing views as follows:
Control Name Description
Sequence numbers:
Numbers column		 Specifies a starting column for the line sequence numbers numeric area. This entry has effect only if:
  • it contains an integer of value 1 or greater, and,
  • the width specified for numeric area is an integer of value 1 or greater
Sequence numbers:
Numbers width		 Specifies the width of the line sequence numbers numeric area. This entry has effect only if:
  • it contains an integer of value 1 or greater, and,
  • the starting column specified for the numeric area is an integer of value 1 or greater
Sequence numbers:
Text column		 Specifies the starting column for the line sequence numbers text area. This entry has effect only if:
  • it contains an integer of value 1 or greater, and,
  • the width specified for text area is an integer of value 1 or greater
Sequence numbers:
Text width		 Specifies the width of the line sequence numbers text area. This entry has effect only if:
  • it contains an integer of value 1 or greater, and,
  • the starting column specified for the text area is an integer of value 1 or greater

If both a numeric part and a text part are specified for the sequence numbers, they must be contiguous.

Source encoding Specifies the character encoding of the file on its originating platform.  You can select an encoding scheme from the list provided or type in a choice of your own.
Editor Preferences in this category let you customize specific appearance and function within the editor.

If you select the Editor preferences category, the following editor preference settings appear:

Control Name Description
Editor profile: You can select an editor personality from the choices provided in this list. Keyboard command shortcuts and editing prefix areas are set according to your chosen personality.
Disable parsing Check this control if you want to disable language-sensitive keyword parsing. Otherwise, the editor will attempt to parse language keywords found in the source code, according to the file name extension of the file being edited.
Push buttons
Apply
Applies the selected editor personality to all files currently open for editing.
Reset
Resets the editor personality back to that which was in effect when the editor was opened for the current editing session.
Default
Sets the editor to the lpex personality.

Other preference control groups in the Editor preferences tree are collapsed by default. If you expand the entries in the Editor preferences tree, the following choices become available:

Control Group Description
filename A filename appears for each file currently open for editing. You can specify editor parsers, sequence number areas, save actions, and file source encoding to be used when working with filename in the current editing session.
Font Defines the font used in the Editor pane.
Color palette Selects a color scheme used for general editing in the Editor pane.
Compare Defines comparison criteria used when comparing files.
Controls Selects which status and informational controls are displayed by the editor.
Tabs Sets tab stops for editing operations in the Editor pane.
Block Selects the block method used to mark text areas in the current file.
Find text Specifies criteria for a text search in the current file, including replacement text if required.
Print Sets specifications for printing, including margins, fonts, line numbers, and tokenizing effects for language keywords.
Save Defines how file-saves handle trailing blanks on lines in your file.
Parsers Assigns a programming language class to a specific parser class.
Parser associations Associates a file name extension to a specific programming language class.
Popup menu Defines items and associated actions available from the Editor pane pop-up menu.
User actions Assigns classes to user-defined actions.
User commands Assigns classes to user-defined commands.
User key actions Assigns user-defined actions to keyboard shortcuts.
User mouse actions Defines mouse events and their associated actions.
User profile Specifies a user profile to run each time the editor is started.

Push buttons at the bottom of this panel do the following:

OK Accepts changes to preference settings, and closes the dialog window.
Cancel Cancels the dialog window. Unless already explicitly applied, changes to preference settings are discarded.
Help Displays this help.