Trick to easily bookmark one or several range(s) of lines, in the current file

guy038

Hi, All,

If you need to bookmark one or more bunch(s) of consecutive lines, all at once, here is my trick :

First put any number of consecutive # symbol(s) at the end of, both, the first and last lines to be bookmarked
Repeat this action for any other range of lines, which needs bookmarking
Use the Mark dialog and search a specific regular expression

So, here is the road map, with a recent N++ release :

Put, for instance, the string ### at the end of a first line to be bookmarked
Put an other string ### at the end of a last line to be bookmarked
Repeat these two points above, for any range of lines, which needs bookmarking ( any number of # symbols is valid )
Now, open the Mark dialog ( Edit > MArk... ) I personally mapped the Ctrl + M to the Mark dialog !
SEARCH #+$(?s).+?#+$
Tick the Bookmark line, Purge for each search and Wrap around options
Untick the Backward direction options, if necessary
Select the Regular expression search mode
Click on the Mark All button

Voilà !

Now, untick the Bookmark line option ( IMPORTANT )
Click on the Clear all marks, again, to delete the red highlighting => Only the bookmarks remain visible
Eventually, you may remove all these # symbols, at end of lines, with the simple regex S/R :

SEARCH #+$

REPLACE Leave EMPTY

Best Regards,

guy038

P.S. :

On reflection, I’d say that it would be nice if, after an Edit > Begin/End Select action, a Ctrl + F2 would bookmark / unbookmark all the lines of that selection !

Of course, in case of a normal selection, a Ctrl + F2 action would just bookmark, as now, the last line of the selection

Alan Kilborn

@guy038 said in Trick to easily bookmark one or several range(s) of lines, in the current file:

Tick the … Wrap around option
Untick the Backward direction option

My experience has shown that, any time the Wrap around checkbox is ticked, the state of the Backward direction checkbox is meaningless.

guy038

Hi, @alan-kilborn and All,

Alan, thanks for this information ! I rarely use the backward direction and rather with normal search mode !

Indeed, when the Wrap around option is ticked, a click on buttons :

Find All in Current Document
Replace All
Mark All

processes current file from beginning to end of file, whatever the state of the Baskward direction option

However, a click on buttons :

Find Next
Replace

does depend on the state of the two independent options Backward direction and Wrap around

As for the other buttons :

Find All in All Opened Documents
Replace All in All Opened Documents
Find All
Replace in Files

obviously, they act on the scanned files, from beginning to end, independently of the state of the options Backward direction and/or Wrap around !

Cheers,

guy038

Alan Kilborn

@guy038

I was a little loose with my “any time” verbage. Your context was the Mark operation, which was what I meant, but said poorly.