LECTOR LATINUS (c) 2006 Abram Ring Table of Contents 1. Getting started 2. Problems looking up words 3. Using multiple text windows 4. Searching texts 5. Using Find and Replace 6. Using Latnlink to make a linked HTML file 7. Making a logfile 8. Using on-line resources 9. Printing 10. Making or finding more Latin texts 1. GETTING STARTED Question 1: How do I begin? Answer: When you start Lector Latinus for the first time you may need to set up the working directories for Lector Latinus and Words. This is usually done automatically by the installation program. If you see a message such as "You must select the Lector Latinus directory from the Settings Menu," follow these directions: Press the keys ALT and S at the same time or use the mouse to click on the Settings Menu at the top of the window. Then choose "Set Lector Latinus directory" from the menu. A folder selection box will open, and you then just browse your computer to find the desired directory (usually "c:\Program Files\Lector Latinus" for Lector Latinus). After finding and clicking on the directory, simply press the "OK" button. Now open the Settings Menu again and choose "Set directory for WORDS dictionary." Repeat the process above (the usual directory for WORDS is "c:\Program Files\Lector Latinus\Words"). Question 2: How do I start reading a Latin text? Answer: Press the keys ALT and F at the same time or use the mouse to select the File Menu at the top of the window. Then choose "Open file" and a file selection box will open. Browse your computer to find the desired file, select it (by clicking), and press the "Open" button. Then the text of the file will appear in the Lector Latinus window. If you want to open rich text files (.rtf) or Lector Latinus log files (.log), find the box titled "Files of type:" and change to the appropriate file type there. Question 3: What kind of files can I open? Answer: Lector Latinus will open text files (.txt), rich text files (.rtf), and log files (.log) properly. It can open files that do not contain Latin and can open text files without the ".txt" extension. To do the latter, just change the "Files of type:" setting in the file selection box to "All Files". Now all files will be visible, and you just select the file you wish to open. Question 4: What is the purpose of "New file" on the File Menu? Answer: This option makes a blank file in which you can type a sentence or word. Then you can select words normally by clicking on them and look them up in the dictionary as usual. Thus Lector Latinus functions as a basic word processor which allows you to look up Latin words that you type. Later you can save your new file if you wish. Question 5: How do I look up Latin words in the WORDS dictionary? Answer: To look up a word while reading, right-click the mouse once to select a word. If a word is already selected, right-clicking the mouse will look up the word. Therefore, double right-clicking a word will look it up in Words. You can look up multiple words at once. Just select a phrase or a line, click on the QUID icon or press F1, and each word will be queried individually. There is a limitation on the number of words which can be looked up at once; it is approximately 30 words (actually 242 characters). 2. PROBLEMS LOOKING UP WORDS Question: Why do I get a blank screen when I try to lookup a word? Answer: You have not selected a word. Double right-click on a word to select it and look it up. 3. USING MULTIPLE TEXT WINDOWS Question: How do I make use of the multiple text windows? Answer: By default Lector Latinus provides one text window in which you can open up, read, and save a text. By using the option on the File Menu or clicking the toolbar icon with a blue plus-sign you can add a new window (you may have up to 5 open at one time). Then you can switch between windows by using the arrow icons on the toolbar and delete the current window through the option in the File Menu or by clicking the red X icon on the toolbar. You should save your work before removing a text window! This option will allow you to have up to five texts open at the same time, and you can copy and paste between them or just refer back and forth, and the dictionary and other resources are available from any text window. 4. SEARCHING TEXTS Question: How do I use the Text Search feature? Answer: Select "Search Texts" from the File Menu or press F9 the shortcut key. Then type your search term (e.g. "arma") in the box after "Search for". Then if you installed the free Texts, you can press the "Search Texts Folder" button to search all included texts, or you can select particular folders or directories to search (these can be anywhere on your computer). You can change the type of files to search by selecting TXT (text files, the default setting), RTF (rich text), or BOTH. While searching the status bar (at the bottom of the Lector Latinus window) will say "Searching", this message will change to "Ready" when the search is completed. After the search is finished (anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes depending on how many files you search and the speed of your computer), the drop down menu labeled "Results" will tell you which files had instances of your search term and how many instances. Now select any of these results and press ENTER or the "Display Result" button to open the file in Lector Latinus. Then press the next button or press F3 to move to the next instance in the current file. You can get more help for the Text Search by pressing the "Help" button in the Lector Latinus Text Search window. 5. USING FIND AND REPLACE Question: How do Find and Replace work? Answer: Find is not currently case sensitive (i.e. a search for "ad" would also find "AD"). Both Find and Replace start from the current position in the text (i.e. wherever you have clicked the mouse or moved to with arrow keys) and move down to the end of the file. More search options may be added later. Note that, if you press enter/return after the word or words you entered in the "Find text" box, the find function will NOT work. If you accidentally press enter/return, just backspace to get rid of the new line that you made; then press the "Find text" button. 6. USING LATNLINK TO MAKE A LINKED HTML FILE Question 1: How do I use Latnlink to create an HTML Latin text with each word linked to an on-line dictionary? Answer: Press the keys ALT and L at the same time or use the mouse to select the Latnlink Menu at the top of the window. Then choose "Make a Latnlink HTML file." A file selection box will open for you to find the Latin text file (.txt) that you wish to convert to HTML. After you select the text file, a SAVE AS box will open. Select the directory and type the file name for the new HTML file you wish to create (for example "aeneid.html"). Question 2: How do I change the settings for the HTML file? Answer: Choose "Set HTML options" from the Latnlink Menu or click the "LATNLINK" button on the toolbar. 1) You can choose the dictionary you want to link to from the pull down menu, or you can manually set the LINK NAME, BEGIN LINK, and END LINK options by clicking inside the appropriate boxes and then typing or pasting in your own link settings. 2) You can toggle between using regular windows and javascript popup windows for the dictionary links by using the "Toggle Window Type" button. Javascript popup windows will automatically be brought to the foreground whenever you look up a new word. 3) You can also toggle between single link texts and multilink texts by pressing the "Toggle Multilink" button. 4) You can change the font for viewing or printing the HTML file by clicking the appropriate buttons. 5) You can toggle the style type between simple and advanced by clicking the "Toggle HTML Style" button. Advanced font settings and javascript popups only work if this is set to advanced. 6) You can change the background color of the HTML by clicking the "Set Background Color" button. 7) When finished setting Latnlink options, press the "Save Options & Make HTML" button. Question 3: What does "check to preserve indentation" mean? Answer: HTML files by default ignore extra spaces. Therefore, if you convert a text or RTF file to HTML, any formatting achieved by spacing will not be preserved. If you check this box, Latnlink will force the HTML to show a space everywhere the original file had one--very useful for indented poetry. It is helpful to check this for poetic texts but not for prose, where it increases the file size and may cause problems. Question 4: Why does my new file not open up properly in my web browser? Answer: 1) It may not have the right file extension. To fix this, just right click on the file and select "Rename." Then add the extension on to the end of the filename (e.g. "filename" -> "filename.html"). 2) Your browser may not be compatible with built-in style sheets. If so, you should get a more recent browser, or select "Set HTML options" from the Latnlink Menu and then set the "HTML STYLE:" box to "Simple" by clicking the "Toggle HTML Style" button. Now Lector Latinus will make a basic HTML file without a built-in style sheet. 3) The computer you are using may not have the font which you selected for the HTML file. Choose a different font when making the HTML. Question 5: Why does the program freeze after I tell it to make an HTML? Answer: It may take a few seconds for Lector Latinus to convert the text into an HTML file. 7. MAKING A LOGFILE Question 1: What is a logfile? Answer: A logfile records every word that you look up during a session. It is a simple text file with the extension ".log" which can be opened in Lector Latinus or any text editor or word processor. It can be used as a vocabulary and forms review quiz after reading a text. Just choose "Stop making logfile" from the Settings Menu when you are finished reading, and then open up your log file in Lector Latinus--you will have to change the file type to "LOG file" in the Open File window. Then go through the list seeing if you can identify the forms and meaning of each word you looked up. If you want to check yourself or are unsure, just look up the word, as usual, with the built-in WORDS dictionary. Question 2: What is a session? Answer: A logfile session begins when you choose "Start making a logfile" from the Settings Menu and select a name and location for the logfile in the SAVE AS file box. The session ends when you close Lector Latinus, when you make a new logfile by choosing "Start making a logfile" again, or when you end it by choosing "Stop making logfile" from the Settings Menu. If you ever want to pick up an old session just choose your old logfile in the SAVE AS box. Then any new words looked up in Lector Latinus will be added to the end of your old logfile. 8. USING ON-LINE RESOURCES Lector Latinus incorporates a number of free on-line resources. These resources are maintained by various other individuals and organizations and may not always be working properly. To use these, you will need to have an internet connection. Question 1: How do I use the searchable on-line resources? Answer: Lector Latinus provides access to the free searchable resources on its toolbar. Select the searchable resource from the drop down menu on the toolbar, type your search term in the box after the "search for" button, and finally press enter or press the "search for" button. Lector Latinus will open the search results page in your default internet browser. Question 2: How do I use the non-searchable on-line resources? Answer: Lector Latinus provides access to a number of free on-line resources through the On-line Resources toolbox. Press the "WWW INFO" button on the toolbar or select "Access on-line resources" from the Help Menu. Question 3: Can I change, delete, or add resources? Answer: Yes, but you must directly edit the configuration files, and so this is not for computer novices. I plan later to add an option to alter these settings from within Lector Latinus. Question 4: How do I edit the configuration files for the on-line resources? Answer: DO NOT DO THIS IF YOU ARE A COMPUTER NOVICE!!! YOU MIGHT DISABLE THE RESOURCES. All the configuation files are stored in the Lector Latinus directory. Open the appropriate file in Lector Latinus, a word processor, or an editor. The file searchmenu.cfg has the searchable resources, resourcesmenu.cfg has the non-searchable resources, and dictsmenu.cfg has the on-line dictionaries used with the Latnlink function. You may simply type in your changes and save the files when finished, but you should read the following pointers: After opening a configuration file you will see a list of titles and urls. The format is different for each file. For the searchmenu.cfg file, each entry has one line for title, one for the beginning of the link, and one for the end of the link--every entry MUST have THREE lines. For the resourcesmenu.cfg file, all the entries are separated into categories by lines which begin with one asterisk (*); these lines serve as titles for the categories. Each individual entry has one line for title and one line for the link address--every entry MUST have TWO lines. For the dictsmenu.cfg file, each entry has one line for a short title, one for a longer title, one for the beginning of the link, and one for the end of the link--every entry MUST have FOUR lines. Also after the last line of the last entry in each of these files, there MUST be ONE blank line (just press ENTER once at the end of the last entry). If you want to restore the old settings, just copy default_searchmenu.cfg, default_resourcesmenu.cfg, or default_dictsmenu.cfg over the appropriate file. These default settings files are read only and cannot be changed. 9. PRINTING Question: Why does the printer selection box say pages 1 to 500? Answer: The printing function of Lector Latinus has not been fully implemented yet, and so it does not show the actual number of pages in the file. However, you can print the whole file or select pages even now. Further printing functionality will be added later. 10. MAKING OR FINDING MORE LATIN TEXTS The Lector Latinus CD contains a "Texts" folder which has a large library of Latin texts in the public domain. You can open these on the CD or copy them onto your hard drive, where they may be altered and saved. Question: How do I find and add new Latin texts to Lector Latinus? Answer: Lector Latinus will open any texts you have saved as RTF or TXT either on your hard drive or on any other Windows-accessible media such as a CD or memory stick. You may also type in new texts and save them using the "New file" and "Save file as" options on the File Menu. However, if you have Latin texts in formats (HTML, DOC, etc.) that are not supported by Lector Latinus, you can use Copy and Paste functions (usually in the Edit menu of Windows programs) to transfer the Latin text from other programs directly into Lector Latinus. Then simply save the new file and view it in Lector Latinus. Places to find electronic texts of Latin works include: http://www.thelatinlibrary.com (classical, Christian, and medieval texts in HTML format) http://www.gutenberg.org/browse/languages/la (various authors already in text file format) http://www.forumromanua m.org/literature/index.html (catalog of texts found on the internet, usually in HTML or text format) http://www.fh-augsburg.de/~harsch/a_chron.html (clasical, medieval, and Neo-Latin texts in HTML format) http://www.fh-augsburg.de/~harsch/a_alpha.html (alphabetical index for the above site) http://www.uni-mannheim.de/mateo/camenahtdocs/camena.html (Corpus Automatum Multiplex ELector Latinusum Neolatinitatis Auctorum - This site is in German and has a large number of Neo-Latin texts, both poetry and prose, in HTML format.) http://www.grexlat.com/nexus/cone.html (click on the option "Bibliothecae" for a long list of sites which host Latin texts of all sorts: Christian, liturgical, musical, scientific, legal, diplomatic, etc.)