Re: Question about replacing words
This WebDNA talk-list message is from 1998
It keeps the original formatting.
numero = 19626
interpreted = N
texte = >>There is no easy solution to this, especially in 2.1. In 3.0 you can break >>a sentence down into separate words and then spit them back out with HTML >>surrounding them if you like. The closest thing you've got in 2.1 (which I >>realize doesn't help you, but it's a kind of similar idea) is [boldwords]. > >I was afraid of this :( With the 3.0 context, what would be ideal is >a conversion.db that would allow for more then single characters in the >from field. Then by simply using the conversion.db I could have unique >conversions per template. It seems that the convertcharacters is exactly >what i need except for the single character limit. > > Any hope for this?>Not in the first release. It's a pretty complex thing to do, and we >wouldn't want to do it halfway. I've had the very same need for nearly two years now -- I first requested this capability in October or November of 1996, yet in all the time since then this feature has apparently never become a priority, no matter how universally powerful and useful it may be.Nearly two years waiting for such a needed feature is a very long time, so you can understand my feeling that PCS will likely never offer it. I've seen one new feature after another being added to WebCatalog over the past two years, but I have yet to see this feature added.The funny thing is, nearly all of the new text manipulation features added have *never* been requested on the talk list -- so I really don't understand how they got on the priority list and added to WebCat's capabilities while my obviously universally useful feature request has been bypassed.Since a similar mechanism already exists within WebCat -- it can currently turn match strings into BOLD words -- it seems a relatively simple matter to employ a similar technique to replace a match string with a different string of characters ... instead of simply surrounding the match strings with
tagsI generally don't ask for features which are already possible within the current capabilities of WebCatalog, even if they might require some complex coding -- because I feel a useful NEW feature is better than a simplified EXISTING feature.For example, this new [!] Comment [/!] context in 3.x is nice -- but it's something we could all have lived without, because it does NOTHING that [hideif 1=1] cannot do just as effectively ...But a string [change] function is something that *cannot* be performed using the currently limited set of WebCatalog text functions -- and that's a MAJOR reason I've been so persistent in requesting this feature for almost two years now ...My original request was for a new context that would work like this:[change from=ABC&to=DEF&case=match] abcABC [/change]Result: abcDEFInstead of creating *this* text replacement feature, we ended up with a SpecialConversions.db feature that's totally useless in ANY situation where a string of characters needs to be changed -- because it can handle only ONE CHARACTER at a time! :(If a context-based approach as I've suggested here were offered as a quick easy way to deal with a single string change, that would be ideal for quick changes -- because then we could quickly define a specific change -- with no databases required.And if more than one match string needs to be changed, then an expanded CustomConversions.db approach would be best, because that would eliminate nesting several [change] contexts in order to perform multiple changes on the same block of text. Still, nesting several [change] contexts would at least make multiple string replacements *possible*, if not the most elegant solution.I think the keyword here is *possible*. All I want it the ABILITY to do this, that's all -- and right now it is practically IMPOSSIBLE to change a string of characters.This seems to be a feature that is long overdue ... :(Sincerely, Ken Grome 808-737-6499 WebDNA Solutions mailto:ken@webdna.net http://www.webdna.net
Associated Messages, from the most recent to the oldest:
>>There is no easy solution to this, especially in 2.1. In 3.0 you can break >>a sentence down into separate words and then spit them back out with HTML >>surrounding them if you like. The closest thing you've got in 2.1 (which I >>realize doesn't help you, but it's a kind of similar idea) is
[boldwords]. > >I was afraid of this :( With the 3.0 context, what would be ideal is >a conversion.db that would allow for more then single characters in the >from field. Then by simply using the conversion.db I could have unique >conversions per template. It seems that the convertcharacters is exactly >what i need except for the single character limit. > > Any hope for this?>Not in the first release. It's a pretty complex thing to do, and we >wouldn't want to do it halfway. I've had the very same need for nearly two years now -- I first requested this capability in October or November of 1996, yet in all the time since then this feature has apparently never become a priority, no matter how universally powerful and useful it may be.Nearly two years waiting for such a needed feature is a very long time, so you can understand my feeling that PCS will likely never offer it. I've seen one new feature after another being added to WebCatalog over the past two years, but I have yet to see this feature added.The funny thing is, nearly all of the new text manipulation features added have *never* been requested on the
Talk List -- so I really don't understand how they got on the priority list and added to WebCat's capabilities while my obviously universally useful feature request has been bypassed.Since a similar mechanism already exists within WebCat -- it can currently turn match strings into BOLD words -- it seems a relatively simple matter to employ a similar technique to replace a match string with a different string of characters ... instead of simply surrounding the match strings with
tagsI generally don't ask for features which are already possible within the current capabilities of WebCatalog, even if they might require some complex coding -- because I feel a useful NEW feature is better than a simplified EXISTING feature.For example, this new
[!] Comment [/!] context in 3.x is nice -- but it's something we could all have lived without, because it does NOTHING that [hideif 1=1] cannot do just as effectively ...But a string [change] function is something that *cannot* be performed using the currently limited set of WebCatalog text functions -- and that's a MAJOR reason I've been so persistent in requesting this feature for almost two years now ...My original request was for a new context that would work like this:[change from=ABC&to=DEF&case=match] abcABC [/change]Result: abcDEFInstead of creating *this* text replacement feature, we ended up with a SpecialConversions.db feature that's totally useless in ANY situation where a string of characters needs to be changed -- because it can handle only ONE CHARACTER at a time! :(If a context-based approach as I've suggested here were offered as a quick easy way to deal with a single string change, that would be ideal for quick changes -- because then we could quickly define a specific change -- with no databases required.And if more than one match string needs to be changed, then an expanded CustomConversions.db approach would be best, because that would eliminate nesting several [change] contexts in order to perform multiple changes on the same block of text. Still, nesting several [change] contexts would at least make multiple string replacements *possible*, if not the most elegant solution.I think the keyword here is *possible*. All I want it the ABILITY to do this, that's all -- and right now it is practically IMPOSSIBLE to change a string of characters.This seems to be a feature that is long overdue ... :(Sincerely, Ken Grome 808-737-6499 WebDNA Solutions mailto:ken@webdna.net http://www.webdna.net
Kenneth Grome
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