Etext is a drop in replacement for the Tk text widget. Currently there are two differences (if we forget about bugs): addition of another type of text annotation: a block, and addition of an "object-oriented dump" command. Block have an internal structure, but the ultimate elements of this structure are identical to the rows in the text widget. All the editing commands work on blocks as well. The main difference between blocks and other possible annotations of the text widget is that blocks can properly nest in an arbitrary way, and that blocks perform a geometry management over its contents. This geometry management is governed by the code in interpreted language (say, TCL). Most features of blocks can be emulated by sufficiently deep hierarchy of embedded windows, but making this hierarchy easily editable can be a nontrivial exercise. Some examples what can be done by blocks (all this is done in the demo): * wise tabulation, * wise super- and subscripts, * fractions, * radicals, * labeled equations, * editable buttons. The distribution of etext contains replacement tkText*.[ch] files, differences with the base Tk version, and difference of Makefiles to make separate installation smaller. It also contains Makefile.my that can be used for reference purpose. The subdirectory doc contains the pod documentation file and the manpage and hypertext documents produced from this pod. Documentation contains all the supported features of the widget, discusses some features that can be supported in some other release, and mini-tutorial on creating a "pedestal" block. Currently etext is based on tk4.0b3 text widget, and Perl part is based on (patched) Tk-b9.01. Hypertext document is reachable on ftp://ftp.math.ohio-state.edu/pub/users/ilya/etext/etext.html INSTALLATION: Get the distribution (say, from ftp://ftp.math.ohio-state.edu/pub/users/ilya/etext ). Pick up the latest copy of the etext*.tar.gz. Then read INSTALL. TESTING See INSTALL. The following works under tcl, most parts work under perl too. ./wish demo/etext.tcl (the perl demo may be started by make test in the ./eText subdirectory, note that the perl demo has a lot of additional features, like menubar, simple-minded TeX input, saving/loading and others). The nontrivial actions in the resulting widget are bound to keypresses with Control- and Meta- modifiers simultaneously (one may change these modifiers by setting environment variable `kprefix' to, say, `Alt-' or `Control-x> <'). They are: n Reload the source. q Quit r/R switch on/off red foreground on selection. b/B switch on/off blue background on selection. s/S switch on/off small font on selection. c insert empty superSub block around insertion point. f insert empty fraction around insertion point. e insert empty equation with "()" as a label around insertion point. d insert empty radical around insertion point. m insert the "pedestal" block from the tutorial. t insert the "tabulation" block from the tutorial. If selection is active when you create a block with above keybindings, the block is created "around" selection. Additional keybindings: F10 converts selection to a "minimal" block, i.e., block with default geometry management: parts are placed one under another. F1, F2, F3 create some precooked samples of "minimal" blocks, F4 and F5 insert precooked samples of superSub block. Return inside block splits block element in two, Control-Return splits deeper (well, you better look into documentation to understand what it means). Deep split is used in superSub block to denote the boundary between multiple super- and sub-scripts. This means that to separate superscript of subscripts you should press Return, the same for numerator and denominator. It is good to read the documentation before running the demo, but editing of blocks should be highly intuitive. To delete block, select it and delete, do demolish it into components erase a boundary of a block. To join two components erase the boundary between them. Thats all! CONTACTING ME email ilya@math.ohio-state.edu if you find bugs, missing features, misprints and so on. In fact contact me anyway if you tried this widget, I would appreciate your feedback.