Soft line-endings in BBEdit / TextWrangler

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clc

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Dec 5, 2008, 3:46:56 AM12/5/08
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Hi all

I work in layout and in my world there are two types of line-endings.
Soft returns and hard returns.

Soft returns denotes a line break in InDesign and is done via 'Shift
+Return'.
Hard returns denotes a parapraph ending in InDesign and is done via
'Return'.

These differences in line-breaks lets InDesign apply a great deal of
stylesheets automagically for me.

I was thinking of using BBEdit to clean up some scripts before pouring
them into InDesign for layout, but both BBEdit and Textwrangler
doesn't seem aware of the two different keypresses.

Is there a way to set it so that these two keypresses are interpreted
differently?

thanks.

- clc

Semper Fidelis

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Dec 5, 2008, 2:14:00 PM12/5/08
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clc~

Right, in BBEdit there's no such thing as a "Soft Return," per se. In
BBEdit, only the "Hard Return" exists, and that is done via the Return
key. You use it when you want to force a line to end, and two
consecutive Hard Returns delimit adjoining paragraphs by creating a
blank line between paragraphs. Everything else either is wrapped, or
not wrapped, depending on how you've set up things in BBEdit's
Preferences.

BBEdit's "soft wrap" is handy. It lets you view your text as blocks of
wrapped words without needing to insert a Hard Return to force text to
a new line. In BBEdit 8.2.6, which is what I use, a soft wrap can be
made to conform to a page guide, a window width, or a character width
via Editor Defaults of BBEdit's Preferences.

Happily, BBEdit remembers your Editor Default settings on a file-by-
file basis, which means you can create files with differing wrap
characteristics. You could create files that had no soft wrapping,
files that wrap to an arbitrary page guide, files that wrap to a
window width, and files that wrap to a character width you specify.
The next time you open any of those files that were created using
different wrap settings, BBEdit faithfully displays them according to
your wrap/no-wrap specifications that were in effect when you created
the file.

For your purposes, you may want to work with BBEdit in soft wrap mode
but then use the Text Options pop-up menu to turn off soft wrapping
right before you save the file. That way you'll be able to quickly
spot, and remove, any unwanted Hard Returns in your text before you re-
import the text into InDesign. (However, you'll still have to tell
InDesign where to insert Soft Returns in the imported text.)

HTH!

~Semper Fi, Mac!

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

Todd Ruston

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Dec 5, 2008, 7:46:15 PM12/5/08
to bbe...@googlegroups.com
On Dec 5, 2008, at 12:46 AM, clc wrote:

> I was thinking of using BBEdit to clean up some scripts before pouring
> them into InDesign for layout, but both BBEdit and Textwrangler
> doesn't seem aware of the two different keypresses.
>
> Is there a way to set it so that these two keypresses are interpreted
> differently?

Assuming it's worth the effort, it sounds to me like you'll want to
format the text file as InDesign tagged text prior to import into
InDesign. This will let you encode special characters for InDesign's
interpretation.

http://support.adobe.com/devsup/devsup.nsf/docs/54161.htm
http://desktoppub.about.com/od/textacquisition/a/tagged_text.htm
http://livedocs.adobe.com/en_US/InDesign/5.0/tagged_text.pdf

- Todd

clc

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Dec 6, 2008, 11:08:02 AM12/6/08
to BBEdit Talk
thanks for the replies Todd and Semper.

I used the Story Editor in InDesign to reformat the text with the help
of some regex. Worked like a charm, but I'll check out the Tagged Text
later. Thanks for the tip.

Soft wraps are not enough Semper, because the diference between a soft
and a hard return are different characters.

- Christian

Semper Fidelis

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Dec 6, 2008, 1:37:00 PM12/6/08
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Christian~

Yes, I'm aware that a soft return (\x0A) and a hard return (\x0D) are
distinct keystrokes having different effects.

Until Todd replied to your email, what I didn't know was that InDesign
had tagged-text capability (I probably should have guessed as much,
given that I've extensively used FrameMaker, Adobe's predecessor to
InDesign, and FrameMaker has tagged-text capability.) Todd's answer,
of course, cuts right to the heart of the matter. Good for Todd.

~Semper Fi, Mac!

= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =

clc

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Dec 7, 2008, 5:58:58 PM12/7/08
to BBEdit Talk
Hi Semper, hope I didn't offend you..
hard to come across correctly in writing.

Gonna check out Tagged Text. It seems smart

- christian
> >>http://support.adobe.com/devsup/devsup.nsf/docs/54161.htmhttp://deskt...
>
> >> - Todd
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