In an earlier post, Software Review: TextPad 5, I listed five tips for getting the most out of TextPad. Here are five more:

Tip #6: Generating Sequence Numbers - Sequence numbers can be generated via the Search and Replace function by including “\i” (without the quotes) in the replacement string. For example, say that you have a list of items with hyphens for bullets, and you want to number them instead.

- This
- That
- Another

Highlight the lines, and then bring up Search and Replace. With the “Regular expression” box checked, and the scope set to “Selected text” replace “^- ” with “\i. “. (The caret before the dash means that the dash must be at the beginnig of the line.)

1. This
2. That
3. Another

Tip #7: Opening Files in the Same Folder - The General section of the Preferences dialog has a handy option called, “Working folder follows active document.” This means that if one file is currently being editing and the Open dialog is brought up in order to open a second, the dialog box will automatically start out in the same folder as the first file. If more than one file is already open, then whichever file currently has focus determines the current folder.

Tip #8: Make a Best-Of Clip Library - The clip libraries are plain ASCII files (*.TCL). So, it’s easy to work with them en masse. For example, the “HTML Characters” library and the “HTML Tags” library could be combined into a single “HTML Characters & Tags” library and then weeded down to only those characters and tags that are of interest.
IMPORTANT: The first line of each TCL file is a serial number (”!TCL=6000, “) and it must be unique for all of the TCL files in your clip library folder. So, be sure to change it to some other random number whenever making a copy of a TCL file.
Tip #8a: Quickly Edit Clip Library - To quickly edit the source text of any clip libary, select that clip library in the Clip Library pane. Then, right-click on the library name and select “Edit book.”

Tip #9: Use the Caret Convention for Surround-Style Snippets - In the clip libraries, there are two choices for how each snippet is inserted. One way is to replace the current selection (or simply be inserted at the cursor if nothing is selected), and the other way is for it to surround the current selection. Normally, there wouldn’t be any way to tell the difference between snippet types when using a clip library, so the convention is that surround-type snippets have a trailing caret symbol (^) in the name. When defining your own snippets, it is highly recommended that you continue to follow this naming convention.

Tip #10: File Names Without Extensions - If you want to be able to create files with names that do not have a filename extension (such as Unix shell scripts), then you’ll need to changes the Default File Extension setting (Configure | Preferences | File ). The factory setting is “txt”, which means that whenever you try to save a file as “foobar” it will actually get saved as “foobar.txt”. (This settng has no bearing on working with an existing file and using Save. It only applies to using Save-As, or the first-time Save of a new file.)

Related articles:

• Software Review: TextPad 5
• 4 Macros for Entering “Running” Notes
• Custom Context-Sensitive Help for Whatever You Are Editing

Read more: Windows, Productivity