Topic awaiting preservation: MAX's HTML Beauty++ 2004 Asylum Edition :-) (Page 1 of 2)

First, I would like to apologize, because I didn't release new version of HTML Beauty on November 1, as it was announced. Unexpected university-related work has kept me busy the last week of October and I didn't have time to finish a couple of necessary things in order to be able to release new version of HTML Beauty. Again, I apologize. Now, let's get to the good stuff, heh...

New version is *almost* ready. And as I've promised, Asylum will have a special preview...

You can get the latest development version of HTML Beauty from the following location: http://www.maxworld.co.yu/ozone/beauty.exe It's a self-extracting archive, so just extract it to desired location and run "beauty.exe". The only things missing in this release are Beauty Scripts and Image Beauty, which will be added by the end of this week when official version will be released (with setup program, btw).

Some of the new features in MAX's HTML Beauty++ 2004 are:

- New GUI with different themes and Windows XP support
- New editor with syntax highlighting for 22 different file types and many advanced editing features (variables are highlighted even inside strings in PHP highlighter, for example), as well as really advanced printing
- Support for Mozilla as Internal Preview browser (in order to be able to use Mozilla, you'll need to install Mozilla from ZIP distribution, because "regular" talkback enabled setup doesn't include necessary dll files, and when you unzip Mozilla ZIP archive, you'll need to go to Command Prompt, navigate to Mozilla's "bin" folder and type "regsvr32 mozctlx.dll")
- Extended Find & Replace have been updated and now are more than 100% faster than before and not to mention advanced regular expressions support with syntax error checking and easy modifiers access
- New Code Library that assimilated existing Tag Library and Keyboard Macros
- Support for new HTML Tidy with advanced accessibility checks
- UTF-8 character encoding support (as well as support for other character encodings, like ISO, Mac, etc.)
- XHTML support and many updates to all Tag Designers
- Advanced preview mappings (file-to-file, file-to-folder, etc.)for extremely easy preview of PHP libraries, CSS files...
- Unlimited number of external browsers, programs, favorite folders, and much much more...

Oh, and here's one handy tip for all PHP developers...

New HTML Beauty can integrate with advanced PHP manual in CHM format (you can get it from here: http://weblabor.hu/php-doc-chm/ )

To integrate it go to Program Options, External Programs and click on Add and enter the following:

Name: PHP HTML-Help
File Name: C:\WINDOWS\hh.exe
Parameters: mk:@MSITStore:php_manual_en.chm::/_function.html#${CurWord}
Working Folder: >Enter the full path where you extracted advanced PHP manual<

Optionally you can choose how to show help window and assign shortcut.

Now, wherever you need to get help for some specific PHP function, just move text cursor to its name and start newly created external program or press shortcut that you've associated with it...

This should be all for now... I leave rest to you to discover, and hope that you'll enjoy in new HTML Beauty!




[This message has been edited by mr.maX (edited 11-12-2003).]

Thanks so much for the preview mr.maX! I can't tell you how much I (as well as many others I'm sure) love this software! It is by far the best editor out there. Looking forward to downloading this new release!

can't wait until the final release it out!

Thanks again!!!

Oh, I do have one question though. I was working last night on a new page. I was working with one CSS file and then started a new one. I went to delete the old one and acedently deleted the wrong one. I thought it just put it in the "Recylce Bin" but when I went to retrieve it...it wasn't there Any way to get it back or just make sure it moves it to the trash?


Later,

C:\


~Binary is best~

[This message has been edited by CPrompt (edited 11-12-2003).]

Outstanding!

Some nice things added to this version include XHTML support, and a REALLY nice tool to convert tags to UPPER or lower case. This might not seem like a big deal, but I have to do a LOT of this to make things XHTML compliant. Now - if it only fixed missing quotes around values......

Very sweet!

Thank you, it sounds great I will give it a try tonight.

J. Stuart J.

quote:

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and a REALLY nice tool to convert tags to UPPER or lower case

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AFAIK that feature was already there ¬_¬

__________________________________


Alevice's Media Library

congrats, you're a bloody genius, and a hella nice guy =)

Jason

Great program, and after an hour of fiddling around I have decided to scrap DW. The only reason I had still been using it was for the internal FTP client anyways.

Some really cool features and definately worth the wait. Great job man.

The only diappointment is that there is only one tip of the day.

Great job mr.Max! Can't wait to test it when I get home tonight.

Any plans on releasing a *nix version of it? I do all my coding on Linux, and with all the new features it looks good enough to replace my trusty Vim for web-coding

_________________________
"There are 10 kinds of people; those who know binary, those who don't and those who start counting at zero"
- the Golden Ratio -

Interesting project. I haven't tested the software yet, but is there or will there be a feature that instantly converts non-standard HTML to W3C standard (X)HTML? This would be really useful.

Edit: Just tested. One gripe I do have is with the tag designer. Shouldn't there just be a single tag designer link in the menu? But that's not my gripe. It would be nice if the insertion of tags from the tag designer would insert them at the start of an appropriate line or in the optimal line. As of now, it inserts the tag wherever the cursor is located.

Also there is a typography issue with the Results bar. The label's base is left-vertical. Vertical labels are easier read right-vertical.

It is an otherwise very interesting product.

[This message has been edited by metahuman (edited 11-12-2003).]

quote:

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Interesting project. I haven't tested the software yet, but is there or will there be a feature that instantly converts non-standard HTML to W3C standard (X)HTML? This would be really useful.

---

That would be SWEET. Along with putting the quotes around unquoted variables, this would save me a LOT of time.

I'm quite impressed with this new version...

I'm very glad that you all liked the new HTML Beauty!

CPrompt, I guess that you deleted the file from Quick Open, right? If so, old Quick Open always deletes files to Recycle Bin (no matter if you're holding Shift key or not, which instructs Windows to permanently delete file), so I really have no idea why the file didn't appear in Recycle Bin. Nevertheless, Quick Open has been replaced in the new HTML Beauty with far superior "Mini Explorer", which behaves exactly the same as Windows Explorer only in a small package...

Ramasax, I've planned to add HTTP/FTP support to the new HTML Beauty, but due to some other time-consuming activities (i.e. University studies), that feature has been postponed to the version 2.1, which will appear probably in March 2004. Oh, and there will be much more tips in the final version, heh...

Veneficuz, unfortunately there will be no *nix version of HTML Beauty. As it is now, HTML Beauty heavily relies on some Windows specific components, and porting it to *nix would be the same as rewriting it from scratch, for which I currently don't have time. Anyway, I plan to investigate possibility of running it under Wine "emulator", and in the meantime you can stick with Vim / Emacs, they ain't that bad, heh...

Metahuman, I don't understand why there should be only one link to Tag Designer in the menu, because there are more than 20 Tag Designers? As far as code placement is concerned, HTML Beauty is text based HTML editor, and therefore it inserts tags where your cursor is located, I don't want to force my coding style to others and implement intelligent code insertion / indenting, because we all have different coding habits. Oh, and if you want to edit existing tags (i.e. add or remove parameters), you can always use right-click tag editing feature (just right click inside desired tag and choose Edit Tag option and appropriate Tag Designer will be opened). Oh, and regarding menus, they are modeled after Microsoft Office applications, which display vertical text on toolbars the same as in HTML Beauty...

Oh, and last but not least everyone who asked about HTML -> XHTML conversion - you could do that even in the old HTML Beauty (I bet you didn't know that)...

HTML Beauty has full support for W3C HTML Tidy utility which can be used for code validation, accessibility checking and code *reformatting*. Here's a brief explanation how you can convert document from HTML to XHTML:

Go to Program Options, HTML Tidy and click on Add button. In the dialog that will appear go to XML tab and check "Output as XHTML" option. There are many other options that you can control, like removing proprietary tags/attributes, code reformatting, indentation, wrapping, tags/attributes case changing, etc. For a full list of available options you can consult HTML Tidy's Quick Reference: http://tidy.sourceforge.net/docs/quickref.html

Now, after you've created the new HTML Tidy profile, open desired document, click on HTML Tidy button in the toolbar and choose the profile you've just created. You'll get the list of warnings and errors that HTML Tidy encountered and if there were no fatal errors, which prevent HTML Tidy from outputting reformatted code, you can see the reformatted code by right-clicking on the Results panel and choosing Show Output option. If you're satisfied with the results you can copy output back to editor or clipboard.

For the record, this feature was available since version 1.3.5 Build 2083, which was released on June 5, 2000 And now it got even better by supporting new HTML Tidy accessibility checks.

Oh, and I would like to know did someone try the new Internal Preview with Mozilla? Also, did you try different GUI themes in HTML Beauty (Program Options, Appearance)? And, did you try my tip about PHP manual integration?




[This message has been edited by mr.maX (edited 11-12-2003).]

mr.maX: Thanks for the info on the deletion of files. Sounds good!

quote:

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Oh, and I would like to know did someone try the new Internal Preview with Mozilla? Also, did you try different GUI themes in HTML Beauty (Program Options, Appearance)? And, did you try my tip about PHP manual integration?

---

1.The internal preview with Mozilla: worked well. Didn't have any problems with it.
2.Different GUI themes: yep, tried them all. I dig the Office XP and the...can't remember the other one. The one with the silver gui.
3.PHP manual. Not yet. I was just getting everything set the way I have Beauty ME and kind of "ran out of time". Gonna do that tonight.

Thanks again for this great software! FOR FREE!!!

Later,

C:\


~Binary is best~

mr.maX: i found my new default editor! thank you so much for that great piece of software. btw i also downloaded 2 copies of the old version for our training company at school today. I am looking forward to to see the official version, so that i might install the software on more machines

YOU ROCK! BEAUTY ROX!

Lookin' nice Max. I have a couple questions/comments:

1. Is there a way to force the text to wrap? I hate having my text extend way out.

2. It would be nice to have an "Apply" button in the preferences dialog so you can see what your changes will do before you leave the dialog.

Great looking changes, I might finally switch my default editor.

:::11oh1:::

Righto, can't find F11/Word Wrap in this one

The main menu bar is really cluttered with all the tag designer drop down stuff, there's a way to get rid of the tabbed bar, but I like that, I wish I could get rid of the duplicated drop downs on the main menu

I've had a problem with the dialog boxes in Beauty ME and it carries over to this one as well... on a dual monitor setup the dialogs popup right on the monitor split, very irritating having to drag every dialog box over before using it.

completely moot paragraph to follow, left in for comedic value:
The gutter has no line/border seperating it from the actual text editor area and if I try to resize the gutter via Tools/Program Options/Editor/Gutter/width: it makes no visible difference. Apparently it's keyed on characters tho. It's much too wide/space wasting. In the end having the line numbers snugged up against the markup/code is very distracting at the moment, maybe something I'd get used to eventually tho. If they were left aligned and the space was on the right, even that would be an improvement, but a borderline would be best I reckon. EDIT : ah, my default Win background color is set at 224/223/227 instead of white and it's making this problem: any chance of darkening that borderline a weeee bit? I'm sure a lot of people that stare at monitors all day have something other than white as their default background. Pretty please?! =) EDIT AGAIN : and then Jason found the color changing options for the gutter, thus making the biggest paragraph completely moot

I see the side tabs for code/preview/F8/F9 are gone, that's a little odd but no big deal, I never used the tabs, but if you did it to concerve space the gutter mention above took it back

Looking forward to the full blown release, BTW, the skins all work proper (XP bein my choice) and the Mozilla preview works fine, and the PHP chm integration thing is reeeeally cool

Jason

[This message has been edited by JKMabry (edited 11-12-2003).]

Sounds like some really great stuff Max.

I'll have to give this another try. =)

One quick question - with the syntax hihglighting, is there support for multiple languages within the same file? Like a PHP file with HTML in it, or an HTML file with a style sheet in the head?

Curious, and can't download it to check at the moment since I'm at work...

work approved screenie of syntax highlighting features - this has received quite a lot of attention since the last version, wonderful.

Jason

mr.maX:

One tag designer option -> window with tabs for various tags

Since, for some odd reason, you're modeling the application after Microsoft software, this would be the way to go instead of cluttering the menu.

Shuuuuuuuuuwing!

That Tidy 'trick' is WAY cool! I've seen sometimes it doesn't correct code, but I'll noodle with it a little more. But it's definitely a start!

I couldn't get the Mozilla internal preview to work. The box is grayed out, and I have Mozilla 1.5 installed.

One thing I did notice, and I might be overlooking some setting, is that you can't right click on some tags and get the tag designer. This includes div, area, and style (that I've noticed so far).

ooof, one other irritant that has carried over from Beauty ME, the preview feature apparently doesn't use the Windows host file? I run an Apache server with many virtual web roots and I edit me Windows host file to point them to the proper place so that when I type the hostname into a browser, say "foo" it takes me to http://foo on my apache server. If I am working in beauty on foo/products/widgets.php that uses an absolute path like img src="/images/widget.jpg" I get no joy in the preview window in Beauty. Beauty shows me file:///X:/foo/products/widgets.php instead of http://foo/products/widgets.php and of course it doesn't show the parsed php or correctly display images referenced with absolute paths because /foo means file:///X:/foo instead of http://foo

that make any sense?

that fixable?!

Jason

~moves to own comp to start download

__________________________________________
"Art has to be forgotten. Beauty must be realized."
Piet Mondriaan

Krets, editor that's used in new HTML Beauty doesn't support soft word wrap (some code is already implemented, but I can't enable it, because it's not fully tested yet). Previous versions of HTML Beauty do have a word wrap option, though. As far as "Apply" buttons are concerned, I'm not a very big fan of them, and I doubt that you'll see every change you've made without closing Program Options dialog. Anyway, I'll see what I can do about this...

JKMabry, I've decided to move all sub menus that were under HTML menu in previous versions of HTML Beauty to the main menu bar so that HTML Beauty users can access all Tag Designers with one less mouse click. As far as dual monitor setup is concerned, I've just hooked up the second monitor and you're right, it's a problem, but I've found a solution so that all HTML Beauty dialogs appear in center of the main window or in center of primary monitor (this will configurable option). I couldn't find a way to move Windows dialogs like Open / Save and message dialogs, so that will have to wait for 2.1 version. Side tabs were removed, because some users who still use 800x600 resolution needed that space for internal preview, so the gutter didn't eat it, because it's visible only in editor and not in preview. Instead of those side tabs, there's a new button in the main toolbar (hand with finger on a switch).

DL-44, HTML Beauty was always able to highlight JavaScript / CSS and recently PHP in one same file, too. New HTML Beauty comes with HTML Multi-Highlighter, that's able to highlight all those languages in the same file. And for version 2.1 I also plan to extend it to ASP (since new HTML Beauty can highlight VBScript files).

Metahuman, there are 28 Tag Designers, and having one giant dialog with 28 tabs won't look that good.

Pugzly, HTML Tidy won't generate output if it finds some errors (i.e. missing attributes that are required according to W3C specs) that prevent it from generating proper output. You can force it to always (if possible) generate output, by selecting "Force output on error" option in HTML Tidy profile (Misc tab). Regarding Mozilla, did you properly register mozctlx.dll as I explained in my first post.

JKMabry (again), HTML Beauty by default sends current file (with full path) to the web browser. IE allows you to type foo in address bar, because it assumes that everything is located on the web and adds http:// prefix automatically. I've realized that behavior in HTML Beauty prevents you from previewing PHP libraries, CSS files, etc. and that's why I've implemented advanced preview mappings, which you can use to map local files and folders to the remote addresses. For example if you want to map "X:\foo" folder to "http://foo" you need to define the following mapping (Program Options, Mappings) - from: "X:\foo" to: "http://foo/${FileNameRelativeSlash}" (without quotes, of course). You can also map your whole X drive since that's how you organized your stuff, by mapping "X:\" to "http://${FileNameRelativeSlash}". There are many combinations that you can achieve, like file to file mappings, file to folder mappings, folder to folder, and not to mention the various ${} options like in the example from above.

holy moly, mapping mapping "X:\" to "http://${FileNameRelativeSlash}" as suggested works as advertised, I'm almost gonna cry. Give us a hug...

Jason

This sounds really good Max. I'll have to try it out when I get home (stuck on a mac at the moment), does HTML bueaty have the ability to create your own syntax highlighting files? As I didn't see "Lingo Script" in the screenshot Jason posted.

Max - fantastic. I have to say that is the only issue I have with the current editor that I use.

I don't like my editors to be too fancy - I take a very staunch minimalist approach to such things.

But I do have to say that I like what I am reading here, and will definately have to give this a go.

=)

Max you simply rock...

I only wish It had actionscript syntax highlighting , then I could ditch my other text editors.

--tiki


-tiki, cell 478

i want old themes back *tears* I gotta have that absurd look on anyone's face looking over my shoulder. Speaking of themes, I never figured out how to make my own -- I think it was said it was possible a while back.

Regardless of that, you have improved on many little details that I was frustrated with over the years. Bravo

Shine and shine. :: [Cell=992] :: [See my team's 30 second animation]

mr.maX: Neither does 28 menu options prefixed with "Tag Designer -". There should be a single Tag Designer window with some way to access all the different tagger options without cluttering the menu. I'm sure you can figure it out.

Cameron, at this moment HTML Beauty doesn't support custom syntax highlighting. All highlighters that are used in the new HTML Beauty are based on complex parsers, so it will take much more than simple syntax files with keywords and comments definitions (like some other editors allow you to create syntax highlighting based only on keywords) to create proper syntax highlighting. I may consider adding support for Macromedia languages in the future (or sooner if someone makes me an offer I can't refuse, heh ), though...

DL-44, I hope that you'll switch to HTML Beauty!

Tikigod, HTML Beauty currently doesn't have syntax highlighting for Macromedia ActionScript (this may change in the future, as said above), but since ActionScript is based on ECMAScript it's very similar to JavaScript you can extend file types recognized as JavaScript files, so that Action script get highlighted as JavaScript files (you won't notice big difference, except a few keywords that may not be properly highlighted).

Bmud, all image sets were removed, because they kept some people away from HTML Beauty (they mostly considered them as offensive, so they're gone and new HTML Beauty will also have a separate web site, away from my wallpapers and other stuff). After I release the final version, you can contact me via e-mail, if you want to see all those splash screens again...

Metahuman, I'll see what I can do, but I make no promises.

And now for status update - Beauty Scripts have been merged from the old HTML Beauty, so Image Beauty is only thing that's still missing, but it will be merged by tomorrow, in order to have a final release ready for this weekend.

And here's one tip - new HTML Beauty can automatically highlight matching brackets ( {, [, ( and optionally < ). You can enable this option, by going to the Program Options, Editor, Options...

I would also like to invite other inmates, who didn't try the new HTML Beauty, to do so...

Hey metahuman, if it bugs you that much you have two choices:

1. Don't use it. You're not paying anything to use this editor so if something bugs you that badly just leave it alone.

2. Write your own editor. Max has already told you his thought process for the design. We already know you don't like it, if you think that you can design a superior editor by all means do so.

We already know you don't like the way the tag editing is setup so can you please just drop it?

Honestly I think this is a very good editor but I'm not going to switch my default just yet. The word wrap thing really bugs me. I know it probably seems trivial to some but for me it's an important feature. The second thing is that there's no FTP support. I use the FTP feature in EditPlus all the time and not having it in Beauty is too big a deal to me.

If there's another way to grab files from the net that I am missing please let me know.

:::11oh1:::

[This message has been edited by krets (edited 11-13-2003).]

Post got scrambled for me -- just replying to fix it.

wait wait wait, are you saying there will be no word wrapping?! period? That would suck.

Jason

well, i'm a new HTML Beauty user... and i'm quite impressed. most definitely considering making it my default editor....as soon as i work out how important word wrap is to me. it may seem silly, but i HATE having to scroll to the right to see text...and it's a huge waste of time imo.
would like to also be able to right click in the extended find/replace text area.
other than those two things i really like it! i'm still 'exploring' so i'm sure there's loads of lil things that i haven't found yet.
i dig the mapping and the php manual!

all in all....it rocks!

__________________________
Cell 1007::

I'll elaborate about word wrap feature more than I did above... Word wrap feature does *exist* in the editor, but it isn't completely developed and properly tested. It works fine, with some minor painting glitches (i.e. line numbers can get out of sync in some occasions) and some editing features don't work in word wrap mode (trim trailing spaces is one that comes to my mind). Due to lack of time I can't test this thoroughly and that's why I've decided to hide this option from users. Now, that some of you mentioned that you need word wrap feature, I may add a hidden registry option, which will enable word wrap to be selected, but I'm not going to provide any support if you use that option and I don't guarantee that everything will work as expected (at least not yet). Personally, I never use word wrap when coding, only time when I use word wrap is when reading readme text files in MS Notepad...

Krets, I've said above that HTTP/FTP support was planned, but due to my university studies that feature had to be postponed to version 2.1, which will be available next year. BTW Recently, I've been using FileZilla FTP client a lot, you may give it a try...

Lacuna, editor in the Ext Find & Replace dialogs is the same as in main program window, and that's why you don't get regular windows popupmenu. If I find some time I may add it...




[This message has been edited by mr.maX (edited 11-13-2003).]

[This message has been edited by mr.maX (edited 11-13-2003).]

quote:

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If I find some time I may add it...

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bah...not a big deal really, just thought i'd mention it.

__________________________
Cell 1007::

I have been a VIM/notepad user exclusively. I've ignored past offerings of HTML Beauty in the past thinking, "Notepad is good enough for me. I don't need no fancy-schmancy editor."
Yesterday I downloaded HTML Beauty++ 2004, mostly to waste a little time at work. I have been so stupid these past years. HTML Beauty is awesome. Already I have no idea how I lived on notepad alone.

I have two complaints:
1)Tools -> Program Options -> Editor ->Options
second column "Keep cursor X postion through lines" should read "Keep cursor X position through lines"

2) I am a little annoyed by the message that says my .htaccess files can not be added to my project because they are not web-related files.

That's it. Minor, to say the least. I'm so super impressed.
Excellent work, Mr. Max, and thank you for your work.
I will promote HTML Beauty to every web developer I meet.

Mobrul, typo in options dialog has been fixed, thanks for noticing it.

As far as your second issue is concerned, it's easily fixable Project Management accepts all file types that have "Web related file type" checkbox checked in options dialog. So, just add ".htaccess" as additional file mask to some file type (i.e. you can extend Plain Text file mask to "*.txt;.htaccess") and make sure that "Web related file type" option is checked. That's all, project management should accept your .htaccess files now...

BTW Project Management will be greatly improved in the future versions of HTML Beauty. I plan to switch to treeview (like snippets and code library), so that you can create sub-folders and better organize things. Oh, and there will much more new project-related features besides the treeview...

I agree with Max on the word wrapping - it's pointless when writing code. I always use it when reading/writing plain text files, but that's it....


Max - do you have a clear timeframe when we can expect the "finished" release of this version? (or did I miss that somwhere in the posts above....?)



[This message has been edited by DL-44 (edited 11-14-2003).]

krets:
The same goes without saying: if you don't like my criticism, don't read it.

Wow, I guess I'm definitely going to have to download this and give it a try...

On the word-wrapping issue, I am another non-wrapper. I can't stand word-wrapping when I'm writing code, actually--I indent my code to help me keep track of the hierarchy, and word-wrapping screws that up.


___________________________
Suho: www.liminality.org