Other thoughts regarding the "ReWrap Text to (Clipboard or 72) width" of the old "TextFX" plugin

mpheath

@guy038 The testing looks better.

If the Change History -> Show in text option is checked then can see changes to a character for more detail. No need to retest and repost images to show the indicators.

A change of the regex pattern to:

Find:

(?-s)^(?=.{79}).{1,78}\K\x20(?!\R)

Replace:

\r\n

and then press the Replace All button.

It does replace less as it does not capture and so only the \x20 space is matched. Unfortunately, it will read the line to length of 79 and then read the line again if line is 79 to continue the pattern so might be slower then your previous tested pattern. The (?=.{79}) is needed to ensure shorter lines are not matched for wrapping. The (?!\R) is probably optional to have in the pattern as it is limited to detecting trailing spaces. Since the pattern uses \K, then the Replace button is not expected to function properly to step through the replacements.

The text comparison in my testing shows the regex patterns achieve equal results which seems to be fortunate. That test was done on license.txt.

guy038

Hi, @mpheath and All,

@mpheath, from your advice, I finally chose the following process :

First, run a Edit > Blank Operations > TAB to Space option
Then run the regex replacement below, where C represents the maximum number of chars after you want a line-break :
- SEARCH [\x20\r\n]*\z|(?-s)^(?=.{C+1,}).{1,C}\K(?:\x20*\R|\x20+)
- REPLACE \r\n for Windows files or \n for Unix files
Finally, run a Edit > Blank operations > Trim Trailing Space option

Remarks :

I began the regex with [\x20\r\n]*\z which will replace possible mixed range of spaces and new lines, at the very end of current file, with a single line-ending
I used the (?-s)^(?=.{C+1,}) ( instead of the (?-s)^(?=.{C+1}) as it seems slightly faster within huge files !
Compare to your regex, I still wanted to consider all spaces, possibly followed with a line-break. So, the part .{1,C}\K(?:\x20*\R|\x20+)
Note that the final Trim Trailing Space action is necessary because of this specific case with a splitting after column 40

12345678901234567890123456789012345     ABCDE

12345678901234567890123456789012345     
ABCDE

Now, let’s try it out with a concrete example :

Double-click on https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/2701/pg2701.txt => The text of the novel Moby Dick or The Whale should appear
Go to the second occurrence of the string CHAPTER 1. Loomings.
Select from this line to the line END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MOBY DICK; OR, THE WHALE, excluded
Paste it in a N++ new tab and name it Moby_ORG.txt

So, the Moby.ORG.txt file should begin and end with :


Call me Ishmael. Some years ago—never mind how long precisely—having
little or no money in my purse, and nothing particular to interest me
on shore, I thought I would sail about a little and see the watery part
of the world. It is a way I have of driving off the spleen and
regulating the circulation. Whenever I find myself growing grim about
...
...
...
...
unharming sharks, they glided by as if with padlocks on their mouths;
the savage sea-hawks sailed with sheathed beaks. On the second day, a
sail drew near, nearer, and picked me up at last. It was the
devious-cruising Rachel, that in her retracing search after her missing
children, only found another orphan.

In other words :

Line 1 EMPTY
Line 2 FIRST line of text
Line 20,707 LAST line of text
Line 20,708 = \z

As this file seems already wrapped to 71 chars, I decided to do, FIRST, an intelligent un-wrapping !

I verified that there was no tabulation, nor any trailing space in the Moby_ORG.txt file
Then I noticed that 43 lines began with one or two space characters, without any real utility. So, I ran the Edit > Blanck operations > Trim Trailing Space option
To get a correct un-wrapping process, we need to use the following regex S/R :
- SEARCH (?-s).+\K\R(?=.+) ( Do not insert a ^ character between the parts (?-s) and .+ ) of this regex ! )
- REPLACE \x20
Finally, I saved the changes and renamed the Moby_ORG.txt as Moby_To_Wrap.txt

So, the Moby_To_Wrap.txt file begins and ends as below :

Call me Ishmael. Some years ago—never mind how long precisely—having little ...

There now is your insular city of the Manhattoes, belted round by wharves as ...

Circumambulate the city of a dreamy Sabbath afternoon. Go from Corlears Hook ...
...
...
...
...
“AND I ONLY AM ESCAPED ALONE TO TELL THEE” Job.

The drama’s done. Why then here does any one step forth?—Because one ...

It so chanced, that after the Parsee’s disappearance, I was he whom ...

In other words :

Line 1 EMPTY
Line 2 FIRST line of text
Line 4,884 LAST line of text
Line 4,885 = \z

The second line of your script is always :

local maxLineLength = 78

And the Settings > Preferences... Margins/Border/Edge > Vertival Edge Settings only contains the 78 value

Then I copied the Moby_ORG.txt file three times, as Moby_Regex.txt, Moby_Lua.txt and Moby_Ctrl-I.txt and I applied :

Your script against the Moby_Lua.txt file,
The Edit > Line Operations > Slipt Lines option against the Moby_Ctrl-I.txt
The following regex S/R against the Moby_Regex.txt
- SEARCH [\x20\r\n]*\z|(?-s)^(?=.{79,}).{1,78}\K(?:\x20*\R|\x20+)
- REPLACE \r\n

Upon comparison, it turns out that these three files are completely different ! Compared to the Moby_Regex.txt file , I noticed that your Moby_Lua.txt sometimes grasps :

More than it should, as, for example, in the lines :

“Who-e debel you?”—he at last said—“you no speak-e, dam-me, I kill-e.” And so saying with a wrapping after 84 chars

“Oh, I don’t mind ’em, sir,” said Archy; “I knew it all before now. Didn’t I hear ’em with a wrapping after 85 chars

Less than it should, as, for example, in lines :

the Stoics to enable you to grin and bear it. But even this wears off in, with a wrapping after 72 chars

knowingly, would thereby render yourself liable to a criminal, with a wrapping after 61 chars

Not important, though. Just in case you would work on your script a little more !

Now, using this long text ( the Moby_To Rewrap.txt file ), I confirm that the regex, below, exactly mimics the Ctrl + I feature :

SEARCH (?-s)^(?=.{78})(?:.{1,76}\x20|.{77})\K

REPLACE \r\n for Windows files or \n for Unix files

However, note that the Edit > Line Operations > Split lines operation leaves a trailing space on all lines of a paragrah but the last one !

I think that further investigation would be useless and I’ll personally just use the method, shown at the beginning of this post, when I need to wrap any text !

Best Regards,

guy038

Oh, I almost forgot something important :

When you select some text or all contents of a file and execute the Edit > Line Operations > Split Lines option :

The View > Word wrap must be OFF
The View > Show Symbol must be OFF

Alan Kilborn

@guy038 said:

just use the method, shown at the beginning of this post, when I need to wrap any text

For clarity for future readers of this thread, which method is this one?

When you select some text or all contents of a file and execute the Edit > Line Operations > Split Lines option :

The View > Word wrap must be OFF

The View > Show Symbol must be OFF

And, because I’m currently away from my Notepad++ and can’t try it myself, why are these "must be OFF"s?

guy038

Hello, @alan-kilborn,

You said :

For clarity for future readers of this thread, which method is this one?

I was referring to these steps :

First, run a Edit > Blank Operations > TAB to Space option
Then run the regex replacement below, where C represents the maximum number of chars after you want a line-break :
- SEARCH [\x20\r\n]*\z|(?-s)^(?=.{C+1,}).{1,C}\K(?:\x20*\R|\x20+)
- REPLACE \r\n for Windows files or \n for Unix files
Finally, run a Edit > Blank operations > Trim Trailing Space option

You then said :

And, because I’m currently away from my Notepad++ and can’t try it myself, why are these "must be OFF"s?

I must apologize because I was mistaken ! I did some other tests and it happens that the status of the View > Word wrap does not matter

But I confirm that showing the line-endings chars breaks the correct spliting of text when using the Edit > Line Operations > Split Lines option

STR :

In Settings > Preferences... > Margins/Border/Edge > Vertical Edge Settings insert the value 78 , ONLY
For clarity, just uncheck the View > Word wrap option and the View > Show Symbol option
Paste the beginning of the License.txt file, below, in a new tab :

COPYING -- Describes the terms under which Notepad++ is distributed.
A copy of the GNU GPL is appended to this file.

IMPORTANT NOTEPAD++ LICENSE TERMS

Copyright (C)2021 Don HO <don.h@free.fr>.  This program is free software; you may redistribute and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; Version 3 with the clarifications and exceptions described below. This guarantees your right to use, modify, and redistribute this software under certain conditions.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public License for more details.

******************************************************************


GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
Version 3, 29 June 2007

Copyright (C) 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc. <https://fsf.org/>

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license document, but changing it is not allowed.

Preamble
The GNU General Public License is a free, copyleft license for software and other kinds of works.

The licenses for most software and other practical works are designed to take away your freedom to share and change the works. By contrast, the GNU General Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change all versions of a program--to make sure it remains free software for all its users. We, the Free Software Foundation, use the GNU General Public License for most of our software; it applies also to any other work released this way by its authors. You can apply it to your programs, too.

Now, in the new tab, select all this text with Ctrl + A
Run the Edit > Line Operations > Slipt Lines or Ctrl + I option

=> You should get the text below :

COPYING -- Describes the terms under which Notepad++ is distributed.
A copy of the GNU GPL is appended to this file.

IMPORTANT NOTEPAD++ LICENSE TERMS

Copyright (C)2021 Don HO <don.h@free.fr>.  This program is free software; 
you may redistribute and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General 
Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; Version 3 with 
the clarifications and exceptions described below. This guarantees your 
right to use, modify, and redistribute this software under certain 
conditions.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT 
ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or 
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public License for 
more details.

******************************************************************


GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
Version 3, 29 June 2007

Copyright (C) 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc. <https://fsf.org/>

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license 
document, but changing it is not allowed.

Preamble
The GNU General Public License is a free, copyleft license for software and 
other kinds of works.

The licenses for most software and other practical works are designed to 
take away your freedom to share and change the works. By contrast, the GNU 
General Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and 
change all versions of a program--to make sure it remains free software for 
all its users. We, the Free Software Foundation, use the GNU General Public 
License for most of our software; it applies also to any other work released 
this way by its authors. You can apply it to your programs, too.

Now, undo, with Ctrl + Z, the last action in order to return to the unwrapped text again
Click on the ¶ icon or run the View > Show Symbols > Show All Characters option
RE-select all contents of the new tab
Run again the Edit > Line Operations > Slipt Lines or Ctrl + I option

=> This time, you should get this text :

COPYING -- Describes the terms under which Notepad++ is distributed.
A copy of the GNU GPL is appended to this file.

IMPORTANT NOTEPAD++ LICENSE TERMS

Copyright (C)2021 Don HO <don.h@free.fr>.  This program is free software; 
you may redistribute and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU 
General 
Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; Version 3 
with 
the clarifications and exceptions described below. This guarantees your 
right to use, modify, and redistribute this software under certain 
conditions.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT 
ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or 
FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public License 
for 
more details.

******************************************************************


GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
Version 3, 29 June 2007

Copyright (C) 2007 Free Software Foundation, Inc. <https://fsf.org/>

Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim copies of this license 
document, but changing it is not allowed.

Preamble
The GNU General Public License is a free, copyleft license for software and 
other kinds of works.

The licenses for most software and other practical works are designed to 
take away your freedom to share and change the works. By contrast, the 
GNU 
General Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share 
and 
change all versions of a program--to make sure it remains free software 
for 
all its users. We, the Free Software Foundation, use the GNU General 
Public 
License for most of our software; it applies also to any other work 
released 
this way by its authors. You can apply it to your programs, too.

And, obviously, these two texts are quite different !

Test done with a portable N++ v8.9.8 - 64 bits installation !

Best Regards

guy038

Alan Kilborn

@guy038 said:

I confirm that showing the line-endings chars breaks the correct spliting of text when using the Edit > Line Operations > Split Lines option

So then this is a Notepad++ bug, correct?

guy038

Hi, @alan-kilborn and All,

I suppose so ! But have you checked this behavior for yourself ?

BR

guy038

Coises

@Alan-Kilborn said:

So then this is a Notepad++ bug, correct?

Considering that Notepad++ just uses Scintilla’s SCI_LINESSPLIT, it’s more of a Scintilla bug, if that project would consider it a bug. The documentation says that function finds split points “in a similar manner to line wrapping”; line wrapping also treats line endings as part of the line when they are visible.

However, I suppose Notepad++ could temporarily turn off showing line endings before doing the split.

guy038

Hi, @alan-kilborn, @coises and All,

From the scintilla description, below :

SCI_LINESSPLIT(pixels pixelWidth)
Split a range of lines indicated by the target into lines that are at most pixelWidth wide. Splitting occurs on word boundaries wherever possible in a similar manner to line wrapping. When pixelWidth is 0 then the width of the window is used.

I made a try putting ONLY the 0 value ( instead of 78 ) In Settings > Preferences... > Margins/Border/Edge > Vertical Edge Settings. Well, it happens that for any value ≤ 2, the spliting occurs after 2 characters
I also tested with, for example, the value 220, which was larger than my physical screen. However, even in this case, the spliting occurs after 220 chars and not at the window’s width !

Of course, for these additional tests, line-endings were not enabled !

Oh, my God : I forgot to test with the Settings > Preferences... > Margins/Border/Edge > Vertical Edge Settings window completely empty ! Well, in this specific case, the spliting does occur at the window’s width and takes in account the possible increase or decrease in the ZOOM factor !

BR

guy038

Alan Kilborn

@guy038 said:

But have you checked this behavior for yourself ?

I have not; I’ve been away from my PC.

If it’s a bug, either Scintilla or Notepad++, it seems like it should be reported and made official?

Coises

@guy038 said:

Oh, my God : I forgot to test with

If you are interested in such things, you’ll find some very curious results using proportional fonts. When Vertical Edge Settings: Background mode is checked, the highlighting for overlong lines is based on counting characters; when it is not checked, the edge position is (or positions are) based on the width of a space in the default font. (You can see the difference by having a file with sufficiently long lines open, setting a proportional font, then opening Preferences to the Margin/Border/Edge panel, setting a single vertical edge, and toggling Background mode.)

The Notepad++ Split Lines command bases its division on the width of a capital “P” in the default font multiplied by the (last) edge column, and hence doesn’t match either.

Scintilla sets edge markers based on columns (counting in background mode, using the width of a space character otherwise), so there isn’t a lot Notepad++ can do about that. Scintilla does splitting based on pixel widths; there might be a fair argument for Notepad++ doing its own splitting instead of using Scintilla’s when splitting is based on an “edge” with Background mode checked. Except for the visible line ending oddity, splitting by view width (that is, when there is no edge) works as one would expect. Why Notepad++ uses the width of a capital “P” to get the width to which to split lines when Scintilla uses the width of a space to draw the edge line, I can’t guess.