5. USING PROFESSIONAL PAGE... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The aim of this section is to help you learn to use Professional Page effectively, by showing you the concepts underlying the program, and how to use them. It is assumed here that you have worked through the tutorial, and have a good idea of how to find your way around the Professional Page screen and menus. By the time you finish this section, you should have a much clearer idea of how Professional Page parts work together, and you will be able to take the initiative in terms of starting your own projects. The section is composed of four parts: ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ * "Using Boxes" concerns how boxes are created and used singly, in groups, and in linked sequences or chains. * "Text" is a descnption of how text is created, imported, and manipulated. It is mainly concerned with the text editor, and leaves typographical considerations for discussion in the Design section. * "Bitmap Graphics" covers the use of Amiga bitmap graphics. * "Structured Drawings" describes the use of Amiga structured drawings. * "Printing" discusses how you can output your documents from various PostScript compatible laser printers and typesetting machines. HOW TO USE THIS SECTION ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This section is intended to give a general picture of how the eleMents of Professional Page can be used. It is not a hands-on tutonal like the previous section, nor is it a series of definitions like the Technical Reference. Rather, it is intended to integrate the concepts behind the separate operations. You should refer to it whenever you want to refresh your understanding of Professional Page's conventions. THE PRODUCTION PROCESS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Desktop Publishing" has to encompass the entire "pre-press" world of publishing, which means understanding and managing a variety of skills and a variety of tools outside of Professional Page. For the experienced designer using new technology, or for tne novice wishing to understand the steps involved in putting together a document, this section provides a general perspective on the effective use of Professional Page. Traditionally, publishing involved several distinct steps peformed by people with widely varying skills, separated from each other by craft traditions and technology. The magazine publishing process, for example, often went something like this: Writing - Editing - Layout - Typesetting - Photography and Illustration The editor would commission articles and illustrations for an upcoming issue. The publication's art director or designer established the design standard for the publication. Writers, artists, and photographers produced stories and graphics. Advertisers submitted ads either camera ready or as text and graphics for the magazine's art department to assemble. The editor read the typewritten stories and manually corrected them. The graphics went to the editor, art director, or designer for approval. The edited text was manually retyped into a typesetting machine by a typesetter, who ofen worked for a company separate from the publishing company. The typeset text was output from the typesetting machine as a long strip or column of type, referred to as a "galley". The galley was proofread and corrected, and then the art director or designers would wax the long strips of type and past them onto an art board. Photos and illustrations were enlarged or reduced to the concect size with a stat camera and photos would be "screened", or turned into a pattern of dots instead of continuous-tone photographic print. The graphics were pasted onto art boards, and the finished art boards were sent to the printer's for platemaking and printing. Under the old systern, there was a great deal of repetition and manual labor (for example, a story might have to be retyped two or three times). The typesetting equipment was often too expensive and complicated for a publisher to own "in-house", which meant using an outside company, which often resulted in extra delays, costs, and communication problemS. Many times, people were effectively prevented from publishing high quality documents by the cost and coplexity of phototypesetting and its related services. The Professional Page Method ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ With Professional Page, the production process can be greatly streamlined and made less expensive. For a modest investnent, and with some training and practice, almost any publisher can concentrate most or all of the steps in the production of high quality documents in-house. A designer can have the computerized equivalent of a design studio and a typesetting shop at his or her fingertips. Again, using the example of a magazine, an ideal production process using Professional Page might look like this: Writing - Editing - Layout and Type - Output | | | | Disk Disk Disk Disk |_________| |____________| |_____________| Photography and Professional Page PostScript Printer Illustration | |_____________________| First of all, authors write their stories on personal computers (using word processing programs on Amigas, or on any other computers which can export text to Professional Page. The editor receives the stories on floppy disk, or by telecommunication using a modem, and edits them using a personal computer (again, either an Amiga, or any machine which can export text to Professional Page). The writer or the editor can also put in the typesetting codes or formats stating what typeface, point size, and style the type is to be set in. An author who regularly writes a column for the magazine, for example, can easily learn the few basic codes for formauing his or her own articles. The magazine's art director or designer also uses Professional Page. He or she sets up the "templates", or grids, of the magazine's standard layout, perhaps based on rough sketches created with a pencil and paper. The Professional Page templates are similar to blank art boards. The designer uses Professional Page to rough out pages, reserving space for the ads, and then begins pouring columns of text into the boxes, fine tuning the typographical features, and editing copy to fit. Photos and other artwork can be scanned into the Amiga as bitmap graphics with the Digi-View digitizer (see Appendix C; Using Professional Page with Other Amiga Products). The digitized photos are imported into Professional Page, cropped and resized, given margins and frames as desired, and screened for output as halftones. For many applications. Professional Page completely eliminates the need for a stat camera. In other cases, scanned photos can serve as guides showimg position and cropping for traditionally produced halftones. If the designer wishes to use halftone or line art froml non-computerized sources, he or she can leave an empty space in the layout to manually paste in the illustration after the page has been output. Similarly, if an advertiser is supplying camera ready art, the designer simply leaves an empty space for the ad to be dropped into place manually. Columns of galley, or entire pages, can be output from a laser printer at any stage of the process for proofreading and editor or advertiser approval. The final pages can be output from a high-resolution typesetting machine (see "Printing" later in this section). With Gold Disk's Professional Color separator (sold separately) pages can be output as screened and color separated film. Here are the advantages of using desktop publishing with Professional Page: * A complete design and typesetting studio can be set up by a publisher in-house at a fraction of the cost of traditional equipment. * Professional Page and its Professional Color separator offer the most comprehensive capabilities available in a desktop publishing system. * The amount of manual typing, editing, retyping, and keying of text into the typesetting machine is greatly reduced. This saves much time and money. * Proofreading can be greatly simplified by using spelling checkers and by printing out clear legible proofs for correcting. * The number of times that the text has to be output from an expensive typesetting machine can be greatly reduced by using a laser pmter for galley and page proofs. * For some purposes, laser printer output is of sufficient quality to eliminate the need for typesetting machine output. Even if high-resolution typeset output is required, a designer using Professional Page has full control over typesetting, rather than having to rely on an outsjde typesetter to interpret the dummy pages and specs that the designer created and sent with the typewritten copy. Desktop publishing with Professional Page still relies on human skill and artistry, and on traditional writing, editing, and design skills. However, it combines typesetting, design, illustration, and color separation tools in an inexpensive, and easy to use personal computer. The Operating Environment ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ As stated at the beginning of the manual, this program is a "page oriented" typesetting and page assembly program. It allows great flexibility when creating a document one page at a time by not automatically paginating the entire document. Professional Page duplicates in computer form many of the traditional tools and methods of graphic designers. The Screen ~~~~~~~~~~ The screen is your art table, with a representation of your current page on the right hand side of the screen. The normal screen display is 640 by 400 pixels on an ordinary NTSC (North American Video Standard) monitor. Using an "overscan" utility such as "More Lines" (see Appendix C: Using Professional Page with Other Amiga Products), you can display up to 704 by 442 pixels at once, although this takes more memory. PAL Support ~~~~~~~~~~~ Professional Page looks to see if your Amiga has a PAL (European Video Standard) chip. If it does, Professional Page operates in PAL resolution (640 by 525 pixels). Multitasking ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Professional Page supports multitasking, up to the limits of chip and overall memory. This means that you may be able to run other programs simultaneously with Professional Page. In a case where the programs take up a lot of chip memory (such as Professional Page and Deluxe Paint II, or Professional Page and WordPerfect), there nay not be enough chip mleory to support both. Artboard ~~~~~~~~ Any area of the screen outside the current page is known as the "art board". The art board is a convenient area to store parts of the document. If you want to have text flowing into boxes on widely separated pages, you can keep a box with overflow text sitting on the art board until you find a space for it on another page. If you wish to reorganize a page, you can remove parts of the page onto the art board until you need them. Grid ~~~~ You can set up grids on your page to create a consistent, organized framework for positioning text, drawings, and graphics (See the Design section for some examples of grids). Snap to Grid ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Selecting the Preferences/Layout Tools/Snap to Grid sub-item automatically causes boxes or structured graphics you create or move to snap to the nearest grid intersection. Rulers ~~~~~~ There are rulers on the top and the left side of the page, marked out in whatever units of measure (inches, picas, or centimeters) you select using the Preferences/Layout Tools/Units sub-item. Quick Move ~~~~~~~~~~ You can select whether or not you wish to have the contents of the box visible while you are moving a box by turning Quick Move on or off. Tools ~~~~~ There are several general tools (Box Create, Null Pointer, Group, Hand Move, Text, and Mop) that you must specifically turn on and off. For example, if you wish to create a box, you must select the Box Create tool. If you wish to type text into the box, you must select the Text tool. If you wish to move the box, you must select the Null Pointer. This seems simple, but if you forget which tool is cunrently in use, you may become confused. The only exception to this convention is the Group tool, which automatically turns itself off and selects the Null Pointer after you make a group. This happens because Professional Page only allows one group to be active in the document at one time. Tool Pointers ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Several tools have pointers to help you see which one is currently in use. The Null Pointer is an arrow. When you move a box on a page, the pointer turns into a hand. When you move a box onto the art board, the pointer turns into a thumb tack. The Text tool pointer is a vertical line showing the exact point where text will be inserted. The Mop tool pointer is a mop. The Hand Move tool pointer is a hand. The Box Create and Group tool pointers are a set of crosshairs, to allow you to drag your box to the precise location. To let you see the location of the crosshairs, guidelines on the rulers on the top and left of the page show where the pointer is located. On the top right of the menu strip, the exact coordinates of the pointer's location are displayed in the current units of measure. Requesters ~~~~~~~~~~ Making menu selections often causes a requester to appear. The different types of requesters are: File requesters with a standard layout; Warning requesters with simple Yes/No! options; and Specialized requesters. Requesters are one way Professional Page asks for instructions, and presents choices for you to select. Keyboard Shortcuts ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Professional Page allows you to use the mouse to make menu selections, but also offers keyboard equivalents to allow users to make selections more quickly. There are some general shorcuts useful in making selections from requesters. For instance, press RETURN instead of clicking OK to cause a file to load or save and double click on a file name to cause the file to load or save. Many of the keyboard equivalents are grouped to make them easier to remember: * CTRL x: Holding down the CONTROL key and pressing a second key usually selects a non-menu item. * ALT x: Holding down the ALT key and pressing a second key usually alters something. * A x: Holding down the Right AMIGA key and pressing a second key usually a general menu. * F: Pressing a function key selects a text editing item. * SHIFT x: Holding down the SHIFT key and pressing a second key selects everything not assigned to the keyboard equivalents listed above. For a complete list of keyboard shodcuts, see the Quick Reference Card, or Appendix E: Keyboard Equivalents. UNDERSTANDING THE PAGE ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Pages are kept in consecutive order within Professional Page. When the Load/New Current sub-item is chosen the new page is loaded at the end of the document. The Page/Create/From Template sub-item creates a range of pages using the odd or even templates or the appropriate pages based on page numbers. Creatjng a range of pages in the middle of a document shifts the existing pages up automatically. The Page/Create/From Default sub-item also fits a range of pages into the document automatically. The Page/Delete item resequences page numbers upon deletion. The Magnified Page ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ When you are working on a page in one of the higher magnification levels, you may find it useful to be able to see where you are on the page, and to scroll around the magnified page with some degree of precision. The part of the page you are in is indicated by the white rectangle in the Page Position tool. There are three ways to move around a magnified page: * Select the Hand Move tool and use it to drag the visible part of the page around the screen. * Use the white rectangle on the Page Position tool to drag the visible part of the page around the screen. * Use the cursor keys to jump around the page. One press of a cursor moves the visible part of the page four inches in the selected direction. Pressing SHIFT/cursor jumps to the end of the page in the direction selected. Pressing CTRL/cursor jumps to the end of the page in the direction selected. Changing Pages ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Page Number gadget has two ways of changing the current page. Click the Up or Down arrows to select the next page or the previous page, respectively. Pages can also be selected by using a keyboard entry. USING BOXES ~~~~~~~~~~~ A box is a container of text, bitmap graphics or structured graphics. Boxes are the building blocks of your finished documents. The box is an amazingly flexible and powerful tool, and when you have made yourself fully proficient with all its uses, you will be able to use Professional Page very profuctively as a versatile, high quality page design system. This sub-section is devoted to the uses of the box in conjunction with the text, graphics, and drawings it can contain. What is a Box? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A box is a precisely defined area which can serve as a container for text, bitmap graphics, or structured drawings. A box can exist anywhere on a page, or on the art board. The Anatomy of a Box ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The box appears on the Professional Page screen with a rectangular solid or dashed outline. The outline is solid in the active box (the last one that the mouse was clicked on), and all other box outlines are dashed. Every box has eight handles on it, one in each corner and one in the middle of each side of the outline. These handles can be used to resize the box by clicking on a handle with the Null Pointer and dragging. The only time a box does not have handles is if it is a locked box. The appearance of the box outline changes when a box is made part of a group. A box containing text or a bitmap graphic can be automatically given a perfectly fitted frame using the Box/Alter/Active/Frame gadget. Boxex can also be given margins of clear space to separate them from other boxes using the Box/Alter Active/Margins gadget. Creating Boxes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Boxes can be created with the Box Create tool of the tool palette, or by means of the Auto Box feature. When you have created as many boxes as you need, be sure to turn off the Box Create tool by selecting the Null Pointer. Otherwise, you will continue creating boxes whenever you press the left mouse button. Moving a box ~~~~~~~~~~~~ There are several ways to move a box. The most simple is to grab it using the Null Pointer. The pointer turns into a hand shaped icon if the box is on the page, or into a thumbtack shaped icon if the box is on the art board. Drag the box around the page or the art board to where you want it and release. Positioning the Box ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Positioning boxes with the mouse is very intuitive, but may not be precise enough. Professional Page offers several tools for positioning the box more precisely. They are: Rulers and Coordinates, The Box/Alter/Active Position gadgets and the Preferences/Layout Tools/Grid and Snap to Grid gadgets. Using the Rulers ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Rulers are on by default, and unless you specifically turn them off they will be visible on the top and the left side of your page. As soon as you start moving the box around the page, the precise location of the top left hand corner of the box is indicated by the ruler lines along the top and the left side of the page. The exact coordinates of the top left hand corner are also displayed on the nght of the menu strip. Snap to Grid ~~~~~~~~~~~~ You can lay out a grid on your page using the Preferences/Layout Tools item, and turn on Snap to Grid (see the discussion of the Layout Tools item in the Technical Reference section, and the parts of the Design section concerned with the use of grids). From then on, whenever you create a box, it will automatically adjust itself to fit its corners to the nearest grid line intersection. If your grids are measured in 1/2 inch increments, you can drag your box to approximately the right location and size. When you release the mouse button, the box will snap to the nearest grid intersections. The Active Box ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Only one box is "active" at a given time. The active box is the one most recently clicked on with the mouse pointer. The active box is where most user-initiated operations take place (for example, enterig text, drawing, loading graphics and drawings). You can locate the active box easily by selecting Box/Show Active. The active box will flash in green for a moment. Active Box Positioning ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ In the Box/Alter/Active requester, there are four Position settings. Type in the locations of the top left corner, the width and the height, and the box will be resized and located as required. Filling A Box ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A box must be empty before it is filled with any imported element whether text, graphic or structured drawing. You must first select it as the active box (see Project/Import in the Technical Reference section). Mopping a Box ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To delete the contents of a box while leaving the box intact, select the Mop tool from the general tools palette, and click on the box you wish to empty. A warning message will appear, asking for confirmation, and the contents can be deleted (see Tool Palette/Mop in the Technical Reference section). Deleting a Box ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The active box can be deleted by selecting the Box/Delete item. If the box has contents, a warning message will appear, following which the box and its contents disappear. Howvever, in the case of bitmap graphic boxes, this is only true if the box was not cloned. For examlple, if the box was cloned several times, the warning message will only appear if you are deleting the last copy of the box. In the case of a text box, if all the contents of the text file are in the box, a warning message will appear, after which the box, and the contents will be deleted. If the text file extends through a series of linked boxes, no warning will appear if you delete a box, until you delete the last box in the linked series (see Box/Active/Delete in the Technical Reference section). Grouping ~~~~~~~~ Grouping means that the boxes designated as a group can be moved as a unit, keeping their position relative to each other. Any combination of text, graphic, and drawing boxes can be designated as a group. Using groups can save you a lot of time. For example, if you want to reorganize the layout of a page, you can remove a large part of the page onto the art board, empty, or replace the remainder of the page layout, and then move the group back onto the page. Creating a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Select the Group tool from the general tool palette. The Group pointer is a set of crosshairs. Go to the upper left hand corner of the area whose boxes you wish to group, and draw a group outline around the collection of boxes. When you release the mouse button, the Group tool switches off, and reverts to the Null Pointer. All completely enclosed boxes will be made into a group. Adding to a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Hold the SHIFT key and click on a box. The box must be on the art board or the same page as the main group to be added to it. Removing a Box From a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Hold the CTRL key and click on a box. Cloning a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Select the Group/Clone item and all boxes in the group are cloned. Only the visible box contents are copies, including all graphics and text. Article chains are not copied. Once the group is cloned, the original group is forgotten, and the newly cloned boxes form a new group. Deleting a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Select the Group/Delete item and all boxes that are part of the group are deleted. A warning message appears if any of the boxes has any contents. Forgetting a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Select the Group/Forget item and the group is forgotten (ungrouped). At this point, no group exists. Aligning a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Selecting the Group/Align item and one of Top, Bottom, Right or Left, correspondingly aligns the group with the active box. (See the Technical Reference section for details.) Centering a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Select Group/Center and one of the sub-items and all members of the group are centered vertically, horizontally, or both with the center of the active box. Merging a Group ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Select Group/Merge and all structured drawing boxes in a group merge together into one box. This allows sizing and moving of the structured graphics as a single unit. NOTE: A merge cannot be undone. Linking Boxes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Boxes may be linked together into a series or chain of boxes to allow you to flow text articles across a page or pages. Only text boxes can be linked. To line one box to another, use the Link tool. Make the first box of the article active and select the Link tool. Click on the second box in the series, then the third, and so on. The text will flow to fill the boxes, until all the text has been poured. If there is more text than can be accommodated in the linked series, the last box will have its lower right hand corner highlighted by an L-shaped handle. (See the Technical Reference section for information on the Link tool.) Unlinking ~~~~~~~~~ A series of linked boxes can be unlinked by selecting the Unlink tool and clicking on a box. The box in the series prior to the one clicked on will be the last box in the preceding series. The box clicked on and any subsequent boxes in the series will now be a second, separate linked article chain. Deleting a Linked Box ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You can delete a linked box by clicking on it to make it the active box, and then selecting the Box/Delete item. The box will desappear without a warning requester, because as long as there is at least one box in the series still intact, the text isn't deleted from memory. When you go to delete the last remaining box in a series, a warning requester will pop up asking for a confirmation. When the last box is deleted, the text contents will be deleted as well. Layering Boxes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Boxes are layered one on top of each other based on the order of their creation. The last box created is automatically placed on top. To change the order of boxes, use the Box-to-Back gadget to move the active box to the back of all other boxes. Use the Box-to-Front gadget to bring a box to the front of other boxes. Auto Boxes ~~~~~~~~~~ Boxes can be created automatically using Auto Box. The size of this box is determined by where you click. Boxes created by Auto Box take on the width of the column where the click was made. They are made as tall as possible without running over any other box in the column. A box is created (using the Auto Box technique) when: * in Box Create mode: the left mouse button is clicked while the CTRL key is held. An empty box is created. * in Link mode: the left mouse button is clicked while the CTRL key is held. A text box is created and linked to the currently active box. * in Text mode: the left mouse button is clicked while the CTRL key is held. A text box is created for text editing. TEXT ~~~~ Professional Page is a page design and layout program, and is not intended to compete with dedicated word processors. Rather, Professional Page is designed to work with text from a wide range of both word processors and text editors, whether generated by the Amiga or by other computers. Once a document is created, there is a need to be able to edit or create new text without exiting the program. Professional Page handles text in the following manner: * Text can be imported into Professional Page as ASCII files, or in the formats of particular Amiga word processors such as WordPerfect, TextCraft Plus, Scribble!, and others. * Professional Page accepts native style parameters of word processor files, such as: italics, bold, underline, tabs, and others. * Special formatting codes may be embedded in the text at the word processor level. These codes are interpreted by Professional Page as instructions for such characteristics as typeface, point size and leading. * Professional Page has its own WYSIWYG (What-YOu-See-Is-What-You-Get) text editor which fnctions as an adjunct to the page layout and typesetting features. Professional Page's text tools allow you to manipulate imported text and to compose text while working on a document. The typographical controls are mentioned briefly in this section (see the Design section for more information.) Pre-planning Your Text ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To make the most productive use of Professional Page, the computer, and your time, you can do a little advance plaming to ensure that word processed files come into the program in their most useful form. You may ask the author or editor of an article to insert the basic typographAcal specifications (point size, typeface, and leading as a minimum) for you, using the Professional Page formatting conventions (see Appendix F: Formatting). Formatting at the writing or editing stage is easy to do, and will save everyone both time and money. Text File Translation ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ If you are using a text file from an Amiga word processor not specifically suppoded by a Professional Page (or from a computer other than an Amiga), you should test how cleanly a file from that particular computer or word processor comes into Professional Page in generic mode. Some may import more easily than others. Some word processed files may be imported with unwanted characters or control codes. Try to avoid surprises, especially if you're working to a deadline, by conducting tests ahead of time. Importing Text ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Typically, users tend to use a favorite word processor. Therefore, the Preferences/Text Format item only needs to be set once. If you must import a file from more than one word processor into a document, just change the Text Format to the appropriate setting just before you import them. Once the file has been imported into Professional Page, it sits in the paste buffer for processing. ASCII files ~~~~~~~~~~~ Word processed files from non-Amiga sources can be brought into Professional Page in generic ASCII format. It is helpful to have the particular word processor save the contents in plain ASCII (text only), rather than its native form. ASCII files can be transmitted via a modem or a null modem cable from another computer. Native Style Parameters ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Styles (bold, italic, etc.) are imported into Professional Page from all supported word processing packages. This speeds up production by eliminating the need for you to manually insert style parameters. Embedded ASCII Codes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Any writer or editor can produce galley by inserting typographical formatting codes into a word processor file. This greatly reduces the operator's burden of inserting typographic codes manually after the text is imported. Any text editing terminal thus becomes part of Professional Page's production process. Text Editor ~~~~~~~~~~~ The text editor is invoked in Professional Page by selecting the Text tool from the general tool palette and clicking into a text box. Professional Page uses a "point and shoot" format to input and edit text. Click in the text box where you want to place your text cursor and you are ready for editing. You can perform block operations by marking a block and manipulating it. A block of text is some portion of your text which you have delined for the purpose of changing a specific characteristic in some way. Buffers ~~~~~~~ Aside from the screen itself, Professional Page has two additional internal buffers to hold text -- the paste buffer and the undo buffer. These buffers oeerate in conjunction with block operations. The paste buffer is used to temporarily hold text in "Cut and Paste" operations. The undo buffer temporarily holds deleted blocks of text. Creating A Block ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ While in Text mode, there are several ways of marking a block. A marked block is highlighted on the screen in reversed text. The following methods can be used: * Move The Text pointer to the word, and double click to mark a single word. * Click in a box and select the Edit/Select Box item to mark the visible contents of the entire box. * Click in a box and select the Edit/Select All item to mark the contents of an entire series of linked boxes. * Click on the beginning of the box you want marked with the Text pointer and drag the pointer to where you want the block to end. All text between where you started to drag and where you released the pointer will be marked as a block. * To mark a block extending from one box to another, or across several pages, click with the Text tool where you want the block to start. Move to the end of the block (which can be several boxes or several pages from the beginning), and click while holding the SHIFT key. All text between the two clicks will be defined as a block. Block Operations ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Once you have marked a block, you can manipulate the block in several ways with the items in the Edit menu. Cut ~~~ Selecting Edit/Cut deletes the block from the page and places it in the paste buffer. Copy ~~~~ Selecting Edit/Copy places a copy of the block into the paste buffer without deleting the block frorn the page. Paste ~~~~~ Click on the spot where you want to insert a block from the paste buffer, and then select Edit/Paste. The block will be inserted just before the text cursor position. Unmark Block ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Selecting Edit/Unmark Block umnarks the marked block. Save Block ~~~~~~~~~~ Selecting Edit/Save Block saves the marked block to disk as an ASCII text file. All typographical information is translated to imbedded formatting commands before saving. See Appendix F: Formatting Text. NOTE: This is the only way that you can easily save a Professional Page document as text only, and as such it is a valuable technique to use if you wish to break a long text file up into several shorter files, or if you wish to re-edit a document in a word processor and re-import it into Professional Page. Select Box ~~~~~~~~~~ Selecting Edit/Select Box marks all the visible contents of the individual text box as a block. Select All ~~~~~~~~~~ Selecting Edit/Select All marks all the contents of a series of linked boxes as a block. Find and Replace Operations ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The find and replace operations have two functions. They can be used to find and modify text strings in the conventional sense or they can be used to find and replace text with specific typographical characteristics. Typographical codes (see Appendix F: Formatting Text) are only applied to the first character of the string in the find operation. The replacement strig can contain any number of embedded formatting codes. For example, you can search for all occurrences of the BOLD strig "PPage" (by using BPPage") and replace them with Italic underlined Helvetica "Professional Page" (by using "\I\U\ffProfessional Page"). Find ~~~~ Selecting Edit/Find finds the next occurrence of a particular string. You have the option of search direction and whether to ignore the case of the string. Replace ~~~~~~~ Selecting Edit/Replace replaces a specified strig with another specified string. You have the option of search direction, whether to change one or all occurrences of the search string, and whether to query each change. Find Next ~~~~~~~~~ Finds the next occurrence of the search string in the indicated direction. Replace Next ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Replaces the next occurrence of the search strig with the replacement string. A query is made if it was selected as a option in the Replace item. DELETE OPERATIONS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A marked block is deleted by: * pressing the backspace key. * typing a characteR. * using the paste operation. The marked block is placed in the Undo buffer and the typed character or pasted block is placed in the location of the previously marked block on the screen. To get the deleted block back, place the text cursor and press the ESC-key. The deleted block will be placed in front of the cursor. Text Boxes ~~~~~~~~~~ All text must be placed into an empty or text box. Once text has been placed into an empty box, Professional Page marks that box as a text box, and will not allow you to put a graphic or a drawing into it. Conversely, you cannot enter text into a box already containing a graphic or a drawing. Text boxes can, however, be overlaid on top of graphic and drawing boxes. Text boxes can be located on a page or on the art board. Viewing Text ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Professional Page displays text on screen using special screen fonts whjch simulate serif and sans serif fonts. Screen fonts are displayed with reasonable accuracy for all available fonts found in the fonts directory. Text whose fonts do not have a screen representation will not display correctly in form, but will be scaled to take up the correct amount of space on the screen. For example, to display 30 point Times on the screen, Professiona] Page will scale the closest available font (likely 24 polnts), to the correct size. Upon output, the text will be printed in the proper font and size. Text can be viewed letter by letter in the hjgher magnification levels. In the lower levels of magnification, text will be "greeked", that is, shown as lines rather than letters. Colored Text ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Text can be colored using the Ink Color item in the Color menu. Colors can be created with the CreateColor requester or loaded from an already established color database on disk (see the Color section). Transparent and Opaque Text ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Text boxes can be selected as either transparent or opaque by selecting Box/Alter/Active and clicking on the Box Opaque-Transparent gadget. Text in a transparent text box can be overlaid on bitmap and structured graphic boxes wjthout showing the box and its outline by using this gadget. Halftone Screens on Text ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To cause text to be output as a screened halfone, select Color/Ink Color, and pick a gray value for the type. Select Preferences/Print Specifications/Halftone Screen to speci@y the Density (lines per inch) and (in degrees) for the halftone. BITMAP GRAPHICS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Professional Page allows you to make use of any compatible bitmap graphics. Graphics can be any size, ranging from one pixel to 1024 by 1024 pixels (depending on available memory), in any resolution mode (Low, Medium, Intelace, or High), and with any number of colors from 2 to 4096 at one time. See rippendix E: Examples of Graphics. Black and White Output ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Graphics can be output as black and white halftones in sixteen gray scales from any PostScript compatible laser printer or typesetting machine. Color Separated Output ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ With the Professional Color separator color graphics can be color separated onto positive or negative film, or onto positive or negative resin coated paper from a PostScript compatible typesetting machine such as a Linotronic 100 or 300 typesetter. Screen Display ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Color bitmap graphics are not displayed on the Professional Page screen in color. An eight gray-tone representation of the graphic is created. The full-color information remains stored on the original data disk. Importing ~~~~~~~~~ An empty active box must be available on the page to receive the graphic (see Project/Import/Bitmap Graphic in the Technical Reference section). Default Size ~~~~~~~~~~~~ When the graphic is imported, it appears at a default size of 75 pixels per inch (for example, a 640 by 400 pixel picture will fill the whole widdh of an 8.5 inch page). The graphic can then be rescaled or resized. Altering the Graphic Parameters ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Yu can crop, resize, frame, and screen your bitmap graphics in Professional Page. As well, you can run text around the graphic box, or lay black and white or colored text over the graphic. If you wish to alter some feature of your graphic box, make sure the box is active, and then select the Box/Alter/Active sub-item. In the requester, you can adjust the Location, Margin, and Graphic Scale of the graphic (see "Box Menu" in the Technical Reference section). Location ~~~~~~~~ The precise position of the box on the page can be determined by typing the location of the top left corner of the box and the box's width and height in the requester that appears when Box/Alter/Active is selected. Frames and Margins ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Bitmap graphic and text boxes can be supplied with a structured drawing frame. Professional Page will draw the frame in whatever line weight, pattern, ink color, and fill color that has been selected from the Draw and Color menus. All boxes can have margins for white space along the inside edge of the frame. Frames and margins are specified in the Box/Alter/Active sub-item. Cropping ~~~~~~~~ Using the handles on the graphic box, you can adjust the box to cover or reveal as much of the graphic as you wish. If you need to move the graphic within its box, drag the graphic around with the pointer while holding the ALT-key down. This moves the graphic around inside the box without moving the box outline. Sizing ~~~~~~ To resize the graphic box, hold down the ALT-key and change the size of the box by dragging a handle. Sizing can also be done by changing the Graphic Scale in the Alter Active Box requester. Storage ~~~~~~~ Unlike text files or structured drawings, the acutal bitmap graphic isn't stored as part of your document. Whenever you load or print the document (whether in black and white or color separated), Professional Page will ask for the original graphic file from its original data disk. Aspect Ratios ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You may find that there is a difference between the aspect ratio of your bitmap graphic on the Professional Page screen and its appearance on the output. They may appear slightly condensed (see "Printing"). You can correct this by adjusting the Graphic Scale gadget in the Box/Alter/Active sub-item. For example, graphics created in the Medium (640 by 200 pixels) or Medium Interlace modes (320 by 400 pixels) will appear on the Professional Page screen distorted but can be corrected using the Box/Alter/Active Graphic Scale gadget. STRUCTURED DRAWINGS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ What is a Structured Drawing? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Structured drawings are images created from components that are mathematically defined. These components can be lines, arcs, and curves, each with line weight, line pattern and pattern attributes. Structured drawings are printed at the maximum resolution of the output device, such as 300 dpi from a laser printer or as high as 2540 dpi on a laser typesetter. Structured drawings are often used for computer aided drawing and design (CAD). Structured drawings are also ideal for a designer or typographer. They quickly create clean shapes such as lines, cmcles, and patterned fills. Importing Aegis Draw Plus Files ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Structured drawings can either be imported into Professional Page from the Amiga CAD package Aegis Draw Plus, or can be Created with Professional Page structrred drawing tools and Color and Draw items (see Project/Import Structured Drawing item and the Draw menu in the Technical Reference section). An imported structured drawing file requires an empty active box to be imported successfully. The drawing is fit into the box as large as possible and in the correct proportions. The box can be resized manually using the mouse, but to avoid distorting the aspect ratio it is a good idea to use the Box/Alter/Active sub-item. Colors ~~~~~~ A multi-colored drawing will be displayed with the xProfessional Page screen palette of up to eight colors. Professional Page documents can have a total of 127 colors defined for use in structured drawings or text. (See the Color section for more details.) Professional Page Drawing Tools ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The Drawing Tools subpalette of the Tools palette contains six drawing tools. They are: * Line Tool: A line is drawn by clicking where the line is to start and dragging to the end poAnt. * Rectangle Tool: A rectangle is drawn by clicking for one corner and dragging to the opposite corner. * Ellipse Tool: A ellipse is drawn by clicking for the center and dragging to the corner of the box that will contain the ellipse. * Bezier Curve Tool: A Bezier curve is drawn by clicking and dragging a line to represent the start and end points of the curve, then moving the pointer to "pull" the curve in a rubberband fashion, and then clicking to anchor the curve. * Free Hand Tool: A freehand drawing is made when the left mouse button is depressed. * Polygon Tool: A polygon (series of continuous line segments) is drawn by clicking on a series of points to which line segments are connected. Double click to complete the polygon. When drawing with Professional Page drawing tools, each drawing operation creates its own box. You can group several structured drawings and merge them into one box. Drawings can be freely grouped and merged together, but they cannot be subsequently "un-merged" (see "Group Menu" in the Technical Reference section). Constraining Keys ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ When using Professional Page drawing tools, holding down the ALT-key constrains the shapes drawn by the tools. Constraining causes the following reactions: * the Straight Line tool draws only at 45 degree increments. * the Rectangle tool draws only squares. * the Ellipse tool draws only circles. * the Bezier Curve tool places endpoints at 45 degree increments to each other. * the Free Hand tool is unaf&ected by the constraint. * the Polygon tool always produces closed polygons. Using Attributes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Structured drawing elements can be created with attributes like Line Weight, Line Pattern and Fill Pattern from the DRAW menu as well Line Color and Fill Color from the Color menu. The Frame gadget in the Box/Alter/Active item automatically draws a structured box outline around a bitmap graphic or text box. Attributes of a structured element can be determined in two ways: * In Drawing mode: After selecting a drawing tool from the drawing tool subpalette, Draw and Color menu attributes can be set so that the next element drawn takes on the attributes. * In Null Pointer mode: The attributes of the active box are in the Draw and Color menus. Attributes are flagged with a checkmark beside the applicable item or sub-item. For those cases where there is no checkmark, select the sub-item to bring up a requester, and the value in the requester will reflect the value for the active box. Changing attributes in the Draw and Color menus changes the structured drawing or box frame to the current attribute settings. NOTE: A quick way to duplicate drawing parameters for creating additional elements is to select the box with the necessary attributes before selecting one of the drawing tools. The drawing tool will take on the attributes of the active box. The Draw Menu ~~~~~~~~~~~~~ This menu displays the drawing tool parameters for structured drawings. Line Weight ~~~~~~~~~~~ Line weight is the width of line that a structured drawing is drawn with. There are seven predefined settings, ranging from None to four points. There is also a Custom sub-item which allows you to select any line weight up to 127 points in 1 /2 point increments. If you select Custom, a Line Width (Pts.): requester appears. Delete the current line weight setting from the text line, and type in the line weight necessary. Line Pattern ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Several predefined line patterns are available in the Draw/Line Pattern item. Any line pattern used by an Aegis Draw Plus drawing can be imported as a part of the drawing. Fill Pattern ~~~~~~~~~~~~ Several predefined fill patterns are available in Draw/Fill Pattern item. As with Line Pattern, you cannot create a custom fill pattern but you can import fills created with Aegis Draw Plus. In Professional Page, fills larger than a screen in the higher magnification modes, will not be displayed, but will print properly. Fills are always displayed in lower magnification modes. Color Menu ~~~~~~~~~~ All of the structured drawing tools can be colored using the Ink Color or Fill Color items in the Color menu (see the "Color" section). NOTES ON USING STRUCTURED TOOLS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Tracing From Bitmap Graphics ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ A bitmap graphic can be brought into Professional Page and used as a template for a structured illustration, diagram, or map. Simply draw over the outlines of the graphic as desired, using the various drawing tools, and then mop the graphic box to get rid of it. Merge the elements of the structured drawing into one box, and finish it with type, fills, or patterns. Using Snap to Grid ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ To get different line segments to join neatly, adjust the Snap to Grid at a line setting, and set it On. It will be much easier to get the ends of lines or curves to join neatly if they are automatically snapping to the same grid intersections. Freehand ~~~~~~~~ It is difficult to draw smoothly with the Freehand tool, since it is sensitive to even slight deviations of the mouse or drawing tablet. Rather, use Bezier curves or straight lines when possible. PRINT ~~~~~ It js easiest to learn and use Professional Page if you have easy access to a printer to output your pages regularly as you create them. Output Service Bureaus ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ If you do not own a PostScript compatible laser printer or typesetting machine, you can find instant printing or typesetting shops in most major centers which will sell PostScript output or rent output time. If an output service does not have an Amiga to hook up to their printer, it is possible to transmit a Professional Page file as an ASCII PostScript file to whatever personal computer the output service uses (such as a Apple MacIntosh or an IBM PC) which can then send the file to the printer. If you find yourself using a number of output services, make sure that the output service you are using is loaded with all the fonts you need. Different companies have different selections of fonts. Collect different output bureaus' typeface samplers, and refer to them regularly (see the Design section for information regarding the selection of typefaces). PostScript Compatibility ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Professional Page will output to any PostScript compatible laser printer such as the QMS PS 8OO+ and the Apple LaserWriter, or to a PostScript compatible typesetting machine, such as a Linotronic 100 or 300 that is equipped with a PostScript RIP (Raster Image Processor). Connecting Your Amiga to a Printer ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ For more informmation, see Appendix D: Connecting Your Amiga to a Printer. Setting Printer Specifications ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Professional Page gives you a wide variety of printing options, including halftone screening, a variety of film and paper sizes, and page rotation. There are three menus that affect printing: Project, Page, and Preferences. Some parameters affect the entire document, while others afrect individual pages. Printer Specifications in the Preferences Menu ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Adjust the Preferences/Printer Specifications item to let Professional Page know what kind of output you want from the printer. You can specify the size of paper or film, whether it is sheets or rolls, whether you want to print positive or negative, and right reading or reversed. You can also specify the density and angle of halftone screens for printing graytones, color bitmap graphics, colored text, and structured graphics. Printing a Document or a Page From the Project Menu ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Select the Project/Print item to output pages to a PostScript printer. The Print item has three sub-items: Current Page, Entire Document, and Thumb Nail. For all of these sub-items number of copies, where to send the PostScript output, automatic or manual feed, proof mode, and whether to override custom specifications is requested. Project/Print/Current Page will print the current displayed page. Project/Print/Entire Document will print the document; allowing you to specify the range of pages to print (default is the entire document). Project/Print/Thumb Nail will print either 4, 9, or 16 pages onto one output page. Changing the Printing Specifications of a Single Page ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You may find it useful to change the print specifications of a particular page. You can rotate individual pages, and adjust the scale and position on the output page or film. In the Page/Alter/Current requester, select the Output Print Specifications gadget. The requester contains a Page Position gadget for viewing the size and orientation of the page. The printer output dimensions are indicated by a white rectangle. You can also select the X and Y position, and scale the page. Type the numerical values for Position, Scale, and Rotation (in degrees) into the appropriate text lines, and press RETURN after each entry. The outline of your modified page will be superimposed over the white rectangle of the printer's output dimensions to show you what the page will look like when printed.