SNAP TO IT!  

                Using the PD utility "Snap" for text cut & paste


                               by John Knight


   Ed: See John's Bio-pic in his other article this issue - "Amiga_Upgrades"
  in the ARTICLES drawer.


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   I have recently seen comments within Megadisc articles about how you can
  get text into your word processor or text editor, without having to retype
  it, by saving an article being displayed under FULLVIEW and then copying it
  in to wherever you want.

ANOTHER WAY

   There is another way which can save you heaps of time, too! This concerns
  the use of a utility called SNAP. SNAP allows you to save sections of text
  (and graphics, too!) so that they can be used in your favourite text
  editor, word processor, etc. Of course, you don't always have any other
  method available, and so SNAP comes to the rescue.

WHERE D'YA GET IT?

   SNAP is available on Fish 524 and also on MISC 118A, although I got mine
  from a bulletin board. Documentation is very extensive and will explain
  the many features of SNAP. At first you may be overwhelmed by the numbers
  of components in the SNAP directory, but really you only need "SNAP" itself
  (and the documentation), so don't let that put you off. Anyway, after
  installing it in your Startup-Sequence, you can transfer text from anywhere
  you like, even from a mainframe computer - I do it, in order to write my
  work-related magazine.

HOW'S IT WORK?

   If you can display it, you can SNAP it. The method is quite simple and
  the instructions will tell you all, but essentially all you do is hold
  down the left Amiga key and use the left mouse button to "draw" a box
  around the section of text you wish to trap. Now you change windows so
  that you are in your text editor, hold the left Amiga key and press the
  right mouse button.  Everything you "SNAPped" will now be typed into that
  window.

SNAP IS SMART

   SNAP is smart enough to be able to automatically detect the offsets of
  letters so you don't have to fiddle around setting them, as you had to with
  SNIPIT. (The latter required x and y offsets to be supplied which were
  likely to be different for each screen displayed. These had to be
  determined by trial and error. SNAP does it all automatically). SNAP can
  also work on a selection of larger fonts.

GRAPHICS TOO!

   When SNAPping graphics, a small window is created with the graphic inside.
  Inside this window, is a disk icon which, when selected, allows you to save
  the graphic you snapped. It will call for a filename to be entered.  Great
  for building up Clipart bits and pieces from larger pictures. It's easy to
  remove Bart from the rest of the Simpsons this way.

LIMITIATIONS

   As stated, if you can display it, you can SNAP it. Apart from very large
  font sizes, which are very rare anyway, the only other real limitation is
  that you can only SNAP a screen at a time. Not much of a limitation really
  and I doubt whether much can be done about it, either.

USEFUL

   I would classify SNAP as one of the most useful utilities around, and
  if you're not using it, you're really missing out on a great time-saving
  utility. I use it all the time.



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