TextConverter

Main Window of the old TextConverter

This page is divided into the six chapters general, files, preview, actions and saving. You can click on one of these topics to jump directly to the appropriate location in this text. If you are searching for a special function, you can search for this function with "CTRL + F" in your browser.

General

The main window of the TextConverter is divided into four areas. Left above, you will find the files area, where all files to be processed are managed, added and removed. Next to that area, in the top right, there is the column "Actions". Here you specify which changes should be made to your files. On the left below, there is the preview. Here, both the original file and the new file can be compared, so that you can check all applied changes before saving. Finally, the box "Saving" in the right below is used to accomplish all of the saving options.

• Convert and Save (CTRL+S): Among the four boxes is the button "Convert and Save". When everything is set properly, you can click on this button to change all the files according to the actions and to save then on the basis of the saving options as a new file or as overwritten old file.
• Small X-Button on each Area: Each of the areas like input, preview, actions and memory options have a small X-button in the upper right corner, with which, the corresponding region can be minimized. This makes it possible to use the program even on small screens and to get a better overview. The current minimized areas appear in the down left of the main window, so that you can maximize the areas again very quickly at any time and the workflow is not disturbed by this task.

Files

In the top left of the main window of the text converter, you can find the files area. This area is used to manage the files, which means adding and removing all the files that should be changed. To add files, it is enough to simply grab it from a folder and drop it on the program. Of course you can also search in folders or open files directly through the function "File > Open Files".

• Files > Open Folder: Click this button to select a folder from your computer. The files from that folder will automatically be added to the list. If you only want to find files of a particular format, use the "Filter" button next to this button to select appropriate formats.
• Files > Enter Key in Folder-Box: You can also write or copy a folder in this box manually. By pressing the Enter Key, this folder is searched for files according to the filter settings.
• Files > Filter: Click on "Filter" to restrict your search in folders on files of a certain formats. A new window opens, where you can set whether you want to search for all formats or a user-definied variety of formats. The various formats are sorted according to some criteria (e.g. web, programming, system, and so on), but can be changed at any time. You can always remove formats from the lost or add new ones. Note the fact that the formats are separated by a comma and no spaces between them are necessary. Furthermore, it is possible to check all found files for readability. This function helps you to separate binary files from text files, which can be displayed and worked on well. This test checks whether the file contains ASCII characters and must therefore not provide perfect results, because even non-text files may contain appropriate characters. Therefore, this function should be used only as a guide. This intervention is also the reason why there are sometimes more files found in the folder than finally appear in the list. Of course, you can also add binary files to work on them, the ASCII-Test can be disabled in the filter window. The filter settings are not related to adding files that are dragged from the folder in the list.
• Files > Search all Subfolders: With this option selected, the search is not only limited to the given folder. All the files in sub folders of the given folder will be found, too.
• Files > Watch Content of Folder: Select this option to keep the list of files in the input area updated. If this function is activate and there are some changes in the specified folder, this changes will also be carried out in the list. For example, if there are some files added or deleted they will also be added to or deleted from the input list. In combination with the function "Search in Subfolders", the application also monitor the sub-directories. It is important that a folder must be specified and you have to activate the function after specifying a folder. Otherwise the function do not work.
• Files > List: This list contains all files that are processed in one pass. If you click "Convert and Save", exactly these file will be manipulated in one step. You can either add files by searching in folders, directly opening or by dragging from a folder. In the list you will find information about the name of the file, the format, the Windows type and the file size and the corresponding file path.
• Files > List > Status Column: The column Status in your file list informs you about the status of your files. All files that have not been processed, are marked with "New". After converting the files in the list for the first time, the status can be "Changed" or "Not Changed" depended on whether the current changes affects the files or not.
• Files > Double Click on List: Opens the Dialog to open one or more Text Files.
• Files > List > Right Mouse Button on Item > Open corresponding Folder: Opens the parent folder of the file.
• Files > List > Right Mouse Button on Item > Change Status of selected Files: Changes the status of the selected files to the status "New", "Marked" or "Not Marked". Marked files can be treated specially. More about that can be found in the section "Files > Marking".
• Files > List > Right Mouse Button on Item > Mark files with Filter: With this function, you can apply a filter to mark your files with the status "Marked" in your file list. You can find all information about that in the issue "Files > Marking" in this section.
• Files > List > Right Mouse Button on Item > Show File Information: Displays the standard Windows file information to the appropriate file.
• Files > List > Right Mouse Button on Item > Copy selected Files to Clipboard: Copies the selected file or the selected files to the clipboard so that they can be stored with Paste (CTRL+V) into any folder on your computer.
• Files > List > Right Mouse Button on Item > Delete selected Files from List: Deletes the selected file or the selected files from the list. The files are not deleted from your computer, but only from the list.
• Files > Search in Files: When you click on this function a new window will open, where you can search for any text in the files currently loaded in the input area of the main window. The search text, you can simply type in the top of the new window. Of course, the text can go over multiple lines and can contain any Unicode and special characters. Below the input box for the search string, you specify whether you want a distinction between uppercase and lowercase letters. If not and you search for a letter like A, the search result will include uppercase (A) and lowercase (a) variants of the same letter or text. The search results are displayed in the list at the bottom of the window, where also the usual information about the files such as format, encoding and so forth are listed. Here you can also receive information about the number of hits found in each file. When you select a file in the list, it is displayed in the main window as original file as well as modified file.
• Files > Search in Files > RegEx Search: Whenever this function is deactivated, the search text is treated as a normal text. If this function is activated, you can use regular expressions in the search box to search your text files for regular expressions. Please note, that the settings from "Settings > Settings regarding Regular Expressions" are used.
• Files > Search in Files > Search in Files: This function starts the search in the files.
• Files > Search in Files > Clear Input: This feature allows you to delete the current text in the input field, so that you can quickly enter a new search text.
• Files > Search in Files > Show Search Term in File: Shows the search term in the file currently selected in the search result (or the first file in the result if no file is selected). If you click once again on this button, the next occurrence of the search term is shown.
• Files > Search in Files > Marking: Uses the selection of the found files to mark files from this selection. It opens the same dialog as if you call "Marking" in the main window, but the range of files is limited to the search result in the "Search in Files".
• Files > Search in Files > Delete Found Files: Deletes all files including the search term from the input list of the main window. Of course, the files are not deleted from your computer. With this function it is possible to produce a selection of files in the list.
• Files > Search in Files > Delete Other Files: This function does exactly the opposite of the previous function. This function deletes just the other files from the list in the main window - the files not including the search term.
• Files > Marking: With this function, you can open a small dialog to set the status of the files in the list to marked or to delete the marking. The advantage of marking is, for example, that you can use the function "Only process the files with status Marked" in the saving options. So you can only work on a selected number of files which have special criteria. In the dialog you can type in some text phrases (more than one phrase can be separated with the character /) that should or should not appear in the file name to be marked. Under this you can select whether the files should be marked, the marking should be deleted or nothing should be done if the file names match the criteria or not. If you want to mark files according to their content, you can do that with the function "Search in Files" under the filelist.
• Files > Delete Selected: Deletes all the selected files from the list. The files are only deleted from the list, but not from your computer. In the first step, all files will be deleted which are selected manually by the mouse. In the second step (if there are no files selected), all files with the status "Marked" will be deleted.
• Files > Delete All: Deletes the entire list, so you can add new files to it. It only removes the files from the list, of course, the files are still present on your computer.

Preview

Under the input field in the lower left corner of the main window, there is the preview pane. This is used to view both the files in the list and to display the changes of the files, so that the modified file can be compared with the original one. Both files can be displayed at the same time, side by side. If you select a file in the input list, it is displayed in the preview.

• Preview > Preview (F7): At this point, the preview can be enabled or disabled. If your computer is too slow or the text is too large, it is a good idea to disable the preview. Then all the settings can be made without seeing all changes in the preview immediately. With the keyboard shortcut CTRL+Q it is possible to make a preview, regardless of whether the preview is enabled or disabled.
• Preview > Show File: Only if this option is activated, the old file will be displayed in the area "Old File". If you are working at very big files, it is sometimes not a good idea to load the big files again and again. So, you can disable this function here.
• Preview > Old File, New File: Both the old and the new file can be displayed side by side. The header of the box, the file is displayed in, is "Old File" or "New File", so that you can see, which file it is. On the bottom left of each box, there is an indication of the file path of the appropriate file. Under the New File, the location is displayed, where it will be saved with the current saving options. On the bottom left of the preview area, there are the buttons "Old File" and "New File". You can click on these buttons to activate or deactivate the view of the files. This makes it possible to view only the new file or the old file, so that there is more space in the box for displaying. Under both boxes at the left, there is an information about the file size of the file. This information only relates to the text file, not to an output as an image. When you click into the text, at this point the current line number is displayed. This information is important, for example, if you would like to replace or delete some lines and you do not know what line number it is.
• Preview > Save (CTRL + R): This button only appears after changing the input file manually. Simply type in or delete something from the box "Old File" and you can save these changes with this "Save" button. So it is possible to make some changes on the input files independent from the batch processing. Please note, that no actions or other settings will be applied with this function.

Actions

In the top right of the main window you can select the actions. The actions are the changes, that are applied to the files. An option can be easily enabled or disabled by the check mark in front of it. Regardless of activated or not, each settings can be displayed by clicking the button "Options" behind the action. By default all other actions hide whenever selecting a new one. You can change this behavior in the menu on "Settings > Minimize Actions automatically".

Under some boxes, you can find a small plus sign. With this button, you can expand the appropriate box to have a better overview.

• Actions > Replace Text: This feature will allow you to search for text passages (also multi-line texts) in the original file, and to replace them with other text passages, which can be multi-line, too. Enter the text to be searched for in the box named "Search For" and enter the replace text in the box "Replace By" behind it. Alone with this setting, you can change your files. But if you would like to perform multiple replacements, you need the list under the boxes. Activate the option "Show settings for multiple Replacements" to show the box. Click on "Add" and the current entries of the boxes are added to the box behind and the boxes are emptied. Now, you can write a different rule in the boxes and add this rule, too. So you can perform multiple replacements, as many as you want. First, the software replaces the text in the boxes and after that all replacements in the order of the list are performed. You can use your mouse to move this elements or you can select some items and click on "Delete Selected" (or DEL-key) to delete them. Use the button "Clear Boxes" to delete the content from both boxes and the checkbox "Case-Sensitive" to specify whether you want to search for the exact term or for both lowercase and uppercase words. If you would like to search for regular expressions (RegEx), you can use the option "Use Regular Expression in Search Box". After that it is your choice whether you want to replace the search result with a normal text (deactivate "Use Regular Expression in Replace Box") or to replace the result with another regular expression (activate regular expressions in replace box). By using regular expressions for searching and replacing, you can use backreferences. For example by searching for (\d+\.)(\d+\.) and replacing with $2$1 you can change the order of arbitrary numbers. Another possibilty is to use this function to parse HTML or other forms of data. Learn more about this on the page Regular Expressions. On this page you can find other examples.
• Actions > Replace Text > Manager: If you activate "Show Settings for multiple Replacements", you can see the button "Manager", which shows the Replacement Manager. This manager is shown in a new window and can be used to manage and manipulate lots of different replacement lists. Each line in the middle stands for one replacement in the form <Search Term><Delimiter><Replace Term>. The delimiter can be adjusted under the box. With "From Action List", you can get all replacements specified in the main window and "To Action Lists" sends all actions from the Replacement Manager to the main window, where the replacements can be used. Before sending replacements to the main window, you can specify whether the search term and/or the replace term should be used as a regular expression or not. In the drop down list, all replacement lists that are available will be shown. You can select a list from this drop down list to load it to the box. If you want to save a list, write a new name in the drop down box and use the button "Save". This stores the list under the chosen name in the directory "Replacements", so that the list can be loaded the next time. The function "Reverse List" swaps the current list, so that the replacements will be exchanged with the search terms.
• Actions > Replace Lines: With this function you can replace individual lines from your original file with any other text passage, regardless of the content of the lines or the text passage. Lines can be selected according to line numbers, containing text or containing regular expression and they can be replaced with an arbitrary text (also multi line). In the top box, you have to write the line numbers or the text and under this box, you can select whether it is a line number, text or regular expression. The text passage to be used for replacement, have to be written in the box "Replace By" (also multi-line text passages are allowed). Different lines are seperated with commas, no spaces are neccassary between them (for example "1,2,3"). If you want to know a line number, just click to your original file in the preview and the corresponding line number is displayed under the preview box. If you want to use more than one text passages for replacement, you have to click on "Add" behind the boxes. After that, the content of the boxes is added to the list and you can add some new rules for replacement. In this way, you can use as many texts for replacement as you want. All rules from the boxes and the list are applied on your files. With the button "Delete Selected" (DEL-key), you can delete selected rules from your list and with the button "Clear Boxes", you can reset your boxes to enter a new rule.
• Actions > Insert: With this function it is possible to insert a text passage (also multi-line) at a specific location in the text or the file. First of all, select whether the text should be inserted at the beginning, the end or at a certain character position (1 is the beginning of a line). After that, you can select, whether this choice applies to each line, each file, a certain line (line number) or each line containing a given text. For example, with the selection "At the Start..." and "...of each Line", you are writing the text at the beginning of each line. In connection with "..of each line", you can choose whether the text has to be written exactly in the line or the uppercase and lowercase writing of the text plays no role. Please note, that the text is not automatically added with line breaks. So if you do not want to insert the text in a line with some older text of your text file, you should enter line breaks before and/or after your text passage to be inserted. If you only want to insert one text passage, you do not need the list above. But if you want to insert more the one text, you can click on "Add" and the current rule is added to the list. Now the boxes are cleared and you can enter another rule and do the adding once again. So it is possible to insert texts in different places at one time. For example one at the beginning, two texts at the end and some text passages in the middle of your file at special line numbers. Use the button "Delete Selected" or the DEL-key to remove the selected rules from your list and the button "Clear Box" to reset the box to enter some new text.
• Actions > Delete Text: With this function it is possible to delete certain portions of text. The text passage to be deleted, have to be entered in the box "Delete this text". If you want to delete more than one passages, click on "Add". After that the box is cleared and the text appears in the list below. Now you can enter a new text and add it again. With the button "Delete Selected", you can remove entries from the list, and all entries can be moved with the mouse and with "Clear Box" you can reset the box. Furthermore, you can specify with the check box "Case-Sensitive" whether you would like to search for exact matches or both, lowercase and uppercase words. With the function "Use Regular Expressions", it is possible to search for regular expressions (RegEx) to delete them. With this it is possible to carry out very special searches not limited to inflexible strings.
• Actions > Delete Lines: With this function, it is possible to delete one ore more lines from your text. Simply write the appropriate lines to the box, separated with a comma and these lines will be deleted from your text. Moreover, it is possible to combine several lines with a hyphen. The input "2-6" for example, would delete the lines 2, 3, 4, 5 and 6. There are also inputs like 1,3-5 possible, which would delete the lines 1, 3, 4 and 5. In the second box, you can specify whether and which rows should be deleted from the end of a textfile. Here, you can also make entries like 2,7-9. The difference is, that the lines are counted from the end. With "2", the last but not least line is deleted. With using the third box "Delete all Lines after Line", you can define a maximum line length of you files. All lines after the specified value will be deleted.
• Actions > Delete Lines > Delete Lines containing more or less Characters than: With these two fields, you can define a deletion rule depending on the length of the line content. Depending on which box you are using, all lines with a higher or less number of characters than specified are delete - or you can use both fields to cut from both sides.
• Actions > Delete Lines > Delete or keep lines containing this text: Beyond deleting lines according to line numbers, it is also possible to delete or keep lines containing a specified string. Use the box under the two input fields to use this function. Under the box, you can specify, whether lines containing the entered text should be deleted or kept (and lines not containing the text should be deleted). For instance, if you write "ab" into the box, with "delete and keep other lines", all lines containing the string "ab" will be deleted. If you choose "keep and delete other lines" instead, all lines containing "ab" will be kept and all other lines will be deleted. With the option "Only if Line begins with this Text" , the detected lines have to start with the text, you have entered. If the text is somewhere in the middle of the line, the line will not be detected as containing this text. With "Differ between Upper and Lower Case Chars", you decide whether the search should be carried out independent from lowercase and uppercase writing. If this option is not activated, "ab", "AB", "Ab" and "aB" will match when searching for "ab". If the option is activated, "ab" will only match "ab". The option "Don't care about empty Lines" causes that blank lines will not be attached and deleted, although they are not containing the entered string. With this, you can keep paragraphs in your files. With "Interpret text as regular expression", the entered text will be treated as regular expression. For this reason, the options "text begins with" and "upper and lowercase" will not be taken into account. For example, the regular expression [A|a]nd would delete or keep all Lines containing an "And" or an "and". The last option is "Consider each Line in Textarea individually". With this option, you can use this function with more than one criteria. Each criterium or element is written in its own line. For example, you can enter "and" in the first line and "ab" in the second line, to delete or keep all lines containing "and" or "ab". With this, you can delete as much lines according to specified criteria, as you want.
• Actions > Delete Lines >Delete Lines containing only White Space: If this option is activated, all lines containing only white space like spaces and tabs will be deleted from the file. Completely empty lines, which do not contain any character will be kept. To delete such empty lines, use the option "Delete empty Lines" directly under this option.
• Actions > Delete Lines > Delete empty Lines: If this option is activated, all lines will be deleted from the text file, which are completely empty and which do no not contain any characters. With this function, lines containig only spaces or tabs will be kept. If you would like to delete lines containing only whitespace (spaces, tabs), too, you can use the option "Delete Lines containing White Space" above this option.
• Actions > Delete Lines > Delete double Lines: If activated, all double lines having the same content will be deleted so that each line will only be once.
• Actions > HTML Actions > Remove all HTML Tags/Rewrite HTML to Text: With this function you can delete all HTML tags like <br>, <strong> or <title> from any HTML document. Also headers and scripts will be deleted. Tags like <br> or </p> result in line breaks. So you can extract or parse the pure text from any HTML page by using this function.
• Actions > HTML Actions > Replace Named Entities: For some special characters, so-called Named Entities are used on web pages. For example instead of Ä, the combination &Auml; is used. The Text Converter supports two functions. One to replace all characters with their named entities and one to replace alls named entities with the original characters (this is called Reverse in the program). The options "Replace Named Entities" and "Replace Entities Reverse" include all characters without the characters that have a special meaning in HTML, that are <, >, & and ". If you also want to replace this characters, use the separate options "Replace HTML characters" or "Replace HTML characters Reverse".
• Actions > HTML Actions > Delete unnecessary Characters: Removes all characters from your original file, which are not necessary for displaying this page in a browser. Unnecessay characters are tabs and line breaks, for example. This feature allows you to save date volume.
• Actions > HTML Actions > Create Links for E-Mail Adresses: This function automatically creates links for E-Mail Adresses found in your text files. For example, the adress name@domain.com will be rewritten to <a href="mailto:name@domain.de">name@domain.de</a>.
• Actions > HTML Actions > Create Links for Web Pages: This function automatically creates links for web pages in your text files. Adresses like domain.com, www.domain.com and http://www.domain.com with arbitrary additions like domain.com/page.html, domain.com/page#sublink and so on will be detected and rewritten in the form <a href="http://www.domain.com">domain.com</a>.
• Actions > Line Actions > Sort Lines: Sorts the lines in alphabetical order. In the box behind this option can be specified, if sorting in ascending order (abc) or descending order (cba) should be executed. If you want, you can activate the option "Sort from Position/Text". If this option is activated, the lines will be sorted from the given position or the text and the characters before this position or text will not play any role. So, as an example, you can order the strings "1c", "2b", "1a" from position 2 and the new order will be "1a", "2b", "1c". If the option is not activated, the lines will be sorted from the first position (like typing position "1" in the box). In the same way, you can sort lines according to arbitrary texts. If a line does not contain this text, this line will not be sorted.
• Actions > Line Actions > Line Numbers: Provides the original file with line numbers. In the box you can set a custom start of this census. Moreover, it is possible to write with the option "Write only every Fifth Line Number", which only writes every fifths line number, which is the common practice for line numbers. A useful addition to this function is the "Wrap Text" function directly under this function.
• Actions > Line Actions > Wrap Text: The number in the box behind this option is the maximum length of a line. With this option enabled, each line is shortened in the way, that it is not longer than that number. The line is then wrapped to the next line. This function is useful for example in combination with the line numbers or to an output as an image file, as only wrapped lines can be properly numbered and without wrapping, your image could be very wide. If your text is still wrapped, you can use the function "Re-Wrap: Remove Existing Line Breaks" to remove the current wrapping before wrapping the text again in your length. This function is explained in the next point.
• Actions > Line Actions > Re-Wrap: Remove existing Line Breaks: Sometimes you have some line breaks in your text, you do not want to have. For example, if you have wrapped a text and you want to get the unwrapped text back or you want to wrap your text with a new line length and you have to remove the old line wrap before. With this function, you can do that. In the first option "In the last xx characters of each line", you can enter a number. This number indicates the characters at the end of a line which will be searched for line breaks to remove. For example, if you text have the line lengths 35, 37 and 40 and you are searching the last 10 characters, in the first line the last 5 characters, in the second line the last 7 characters and in the third line the last 10 characters will be searched, because the third line is the longest line. The option "Insert Space instead of Line Breaks" avoids situations like that "text<linebreak>text" -> "texttext". Instead the result will be "text text". With the option "Detect correct Line Breaks", not all Line Breaks in the range will be removed automatically, because sometimes they are correct. For example if a sections ends in this range, you do not want to delete this line break indicating a new section. Line breaks will be detected as correct ones whenever the first word of the next line fits in the current line (but is wrapped in the original text) or the next line is empty.
• Actions > Line Actions > Remove Whitespace/Blanks on the left/right (TrimLeft/TrimRight): If you activate both or one of these options, in each line the whitespace from the left and/or the right of the line is deleted. This is, for example, spaces and tabs. With this function, a line " abc " would be rewritten to "abc".
• Actions > Upper and Lower Case: This feature allows you to change the letters of the original file. It is possible to convert the entire file in uppercase or lowercase letters, you can leave the file as it is or you can write all words with a capital letter. The function "Random Mixture" makes it possible to write the text in a mixed mode, so that upper and lower case letters change by chance. This function is often used by people, thinking they appear cooler with this writing style. With activating the option "First Character per Line Upper Case", the first character of each line is written in upper case letters, independent from the other upper and lower case options.
• Actions > Join Files: With this action it is possibly, to hang all files currently in the list on each other to save them as a single file. The first file name in the list is used as the name of the new file and the new file is saved in accordance with the saving options as usual. So, for example, it is possible to type a new name for the joined files in the box "File Name" in the saving options. The order of the files added to each other corresponds to the order of the files in the list in the input area. You can use your mouse to move the files to another position in the list, if you would like to change the order.
• Actions > Join Files > Apply Actions for each File individually: If this action is activated, all actions are carried out at every single file one by one. This concerns only options which refer to certain lines such as line numbering or deleting or adding lines at positions. For example, if you would like to number the lines and this action is activated, each file is numbered by itself and if this action is not activated, the line numbers will be carried out for the whole new file from the begin to the end.
• Actions > Join Files > Insert Line Break between Files: With this option you can insert a line break between the files to be joined. With this you can ensure that there are no positions in the file where the first and the last word of a file is sticked together. If this option is deactivated, the files will be joined without any character between them.
• Actions > Join Files > Write this Text in front of each File: If you choose this option, the text in the box is written in front of every single file. For example, you can realize more space (line breaks) or separating texts between the individual files. If this option is not activated, the files will be joined directly without any character between them. You can activate the option "Insert Line Breaks between Files" to foreclose words that will be sticked together.
• Actions > Join Files > Preview: Show individual Files in Preview: This option does not refer to the saved file, it only concerns the representation of the files in the preview. If this option is not activated, in the preview the new file is shown in its full length with all single files. If this option is activated, in the preview only the current selected file is shown, although the files are appended later. This has the advantage, that you can have a better overview than the overview would be with the long file.
• Actions > Split Files: With this action it is possible to separate files at a determined place to store the parts as single files. These parts will be saved numbered as new files. The text is divided at the text passage given in the box. For example, you can type line breaks or some words (also multi-line) in this box. Please take into account that the separation cannot be represented in the preview.
• Actions > Split Files > Split at Search Text exactly: If this option is activated, the files will be splitted exactly before or after the search text. If the splitting is carried out before or after the search text, is defined by the option "Keep the Search Text at the Beginning/End of New File". You can also activate both options to keep the text in both of the splitted files.
• Actions > Split Files > Split at next Linebreak: If this option is activated, the files are not splitted exactly at the search text. Instead, the Text Converter looks whether a line contains the search text or not and then it is splitted at the beginning or the end of this line. If the splitting is carried out at the line break before or after the search text, is defined by the option "Keep the Search Text at the Beginning/End of New File". Again, you can also activate both options to keep the text in both of the splitted files.
• Actions > Split Files > Use Regular Expression (RegEx): If this function is deactivated, it is only searched for the normal text, which is written in the box at the moment. After activating this function, you can write a regular expression in the box to split the text files at this. With this, you have the possibility to divide files, for example, at a date or another special and variable format string.
• Actions > Split Files > Keep Search Text at the Beginning/End of New File: If none of these options is activated, the text on which the file was splitted will not occur again in the new files. If the option "at the End" is activated, the search text will be kept as if the file was splitted after the search text. If the option "at the Beginning" is activated, the search text will be kept as if the file was splitted before the search text. If both options are activated, the search text will occur at the end and the beginning of the files.
• Actions > Split Files > Remove Whitespace from Beginning and End: If this option is activated, the whitespace (spaces, tabs, line breaks) will be removed from the beginning and the end of the new file. So, the new file will directly begin and end with the text and there will not be any spaces or linebreaks that possibly has occurred in the original file.
• Actions > Split Files > Apply Actions for each File individually: If this option is activated, all actions are carried out one by one at every new single file. If this option is deactivated, all actions are carried out in the unchanged long original file before splitting. This option is important at all actions which refer to lines. For example, if you want to insert text at special lines or the lines shall be numbered. If this function is activated and you would like to insert a text at the beginning of the file, the text is inserted at the beginning of every single new file. Instead, if the option is not activated, the text will be inserted only at the beginning of the old undivided file.
• Actions > Split Files > Minimum length of one File: If you wish that no files will be stored under a certain number of letters, you can specify here the minimum number of letters. With the entry "3" all the files would not be saved, which would have only 0, 1 or 2 characters as content after splitting.
• Actions > Constants: If this function is activated, the constants written in the list will be replaced by their corresponding text in all input fields or also in the entire file. For more information about this feature and its available constants, see the page about placeholders for the TextConverter.
• Actions > Constants > Start of Numbering: Here you can specify at which number the numbering of the constants %num%, %numf% and %numfa% should start.
• Actions > Constants > Apply in whole File (not only in Actions): If this option is acitve, the constants will not only be replaced in the actions but also in the entire file, for example if there where constants in the file before. The constants %numf% and %numfa% are only working when this option is active, because technically they refer to the entire file. If this option is not activated, only the constants in the actions will be replaced.
• Transcription and Transliteration: With this function, it is possible to convert a text from one writing system to another one, for instance Cyrillic letters to Latin letters. In the box "Profiles", you can choose one of the pre-defined profiles, but you can also create, apply and save your own profiles with "Customize". In the profiles box, there are some transliterations and transcriptions available, which are partly ISO standards but also language specific English and German transcriptions. You can choose pre-defined profiles for the writing systems Latin, Japanese (Hiragana and Katakana), Hebrew, Hindi, Thai, Cyrillic, Greek, Georgic and Arabic. More information about the techniques of transcriptions, the difference between transliterations and transcriptions, as well as the available profiles, you can read in the section Transcriptions.
• Transcription and Transliteration > Invert Transcription (Re-Transcription): Inverts the current transcription. For instance, if your choice was "Georgic - Latin (ISO 9984)", the Latin letters will be converted to Georgic letters and not the other way around. With this function only one list can be used for both directories.
• Transcription and Transliteration > Create Upper Characters from Source: Often, there are no differences between upper and lower characters, so that it is not necessary to create own rules for both. If your transcription rule consists only of lower characters, you can choose this option, to complete your rules with the upper characters according to the rules of the lower characters.
• Transcription and Transliteration > Create Lower Characters from Source: Often, there are no differences between upper and lower characters, so that it is not necessary to create own rules for both. If your transcription rule consists only of upper characters, you can choose this option, to complete your rules with the lower characters according to the rules of the upper characters.
• Transcription and Transliteration > Rewrite Umlauts (e.g. Ä -> AE): Often, other writing systems have no own characters for Ä, Ü, Ö and ß. With this option, the umlauts are replaced with AE, UE, OE and SS before the transcription, so that also these characters can be transformed.
• Transcription and Transliteration > Customize: In the new opening window, you can manage and create own transcriptions and transliterations. It is also possible to edit existing profiles to save them as new ones. All transcriptions are saved in the directory "Transliteration" in the folder of the Text Converter. All transcriptions saved in this folder are loaded when starting the Text Converter and can be found in the box "Profiles" in the main window, so that they can be applied immediately. Also in the case of saving an own list, this list appears in this box in the main window, so that you can choose the rules from there. In every line of the file (you can also edit the files with the editor), there is one transcription rule, which is separated with the character |. For instance, the line A|B means, that A is replaced by B in the text. The lines are processed from the first to the last line, so that related letters should be written at the top of the file, so that they will not be replaced by single letters (CH|X should appear before C|K and H|J). The list you want to work on or a complete new list, can be edited directly in the window or you can add single elements with "Add" (Element|Transcription). If your list is completed, you can choose a name in the box above the list and you can click on "Save". Then the rules are saved in the folder "Transliteration" under the chosen name. The button "Inverse List" creates an inverted list of the current list, so that all of the rules are turned to the other way around (for example A|B turns to B|A).
• Actions > Line Breaks: Different operating systems are using different characters for line breaks. Because of that, under circumstances, it is not possible to display a text file created by Linux or on a Mac on a Windows operating system correctly. With this function, you can change the line breaks of a file easily, so that you can interchange files between different operating systems much more easier. For example, you have received some files created on a Linux system, you can use this function to show the files on Windows correctly. First of all, the function has to know, which character is used for a new line in the corresponding file. This can be done automatically by the TextConverter (in the head of the function) or you can choose the character used for the line break in the first box manually. After that you can choose the new kind of line break in which the old line breaks should be altered. If you select one file in the file list, the detected line break of the file is displayed in the window. This is important for all functions and actions depending on lines, because all of those actions are using the line break detected or selected in this field. If you do not know anything about this topic or you would like to know more about this function and line breaks, you can go to the topic New Line. On this page, anything is explained and you are informed about the options you can select in the boxes.
• Actions > Line Breaks > Only change if new LB differs from old one: If this option is activated, the application checks whether the detected or old line break is the chosen new line break. If this is the case, there will be made no changes. The line break character will one be changed if it is necessary. This function makes sense, because otherwise the CR in CRLF could be replaced with CRLF, so that there will be CRLFLF in your file or something like that.
• Actions > Line Breaks > Use Windows Line Break in Preview: Normally, in Windows CRLF is used as a line break and because of those, the text only wraps at the point of this characters. The TextConverter can also work with other characters for line breaks like LF or NEL and display these characters as line breaks. If this is option is not activated, in the preview, the detected or selected character for a line break will be displayed as Windows line break, so that you can have a look at the file as if the line break is interpreted correctly. If you deactivate the option, the preview looks like any other normal Windows application in which only the Windows line break is displayed as a line break. That means, only the Windows line break they be displayed as a new line. For example, if you want to change some files with other line breaks to Windows line breaks, you can deactivate this option. Then, in the old file the line break should not be visible and in the new file, you can see the line breaks. That means, if you change your files in this way, the file will be able to be displayed correctly in other Windows applications, too.
• Actions > Encoding: If you open this action, on the one hand, you can see in which encoding the files will be saved and on the other hand you can show a new window, in which you can only change the encoding of the files without applying any other of the actions.
  
• Actions > Encoding > Saving Encoding: Here you can see at a single glance, in which encoding the files will be saved, if you click on "Convert and Save" at this moment. If you click on "Change", a dialog opens in which you can change the saving encoding. An overview over all formats which are possible, you can see on our page for Unicode file formats.
  
• Actions > Encoding > Only change encoding: If you only want to change the encoding of files without applying any other action, you can click on "Change Encoding". A new window opens, in which you can select the encoding, the files should have. An overview over all encodings can be found here. If you click on "Change Encoding" after selecting an encoding, the encoding of all files currently loaded in the list in the main window, will be changed to the selected encoding.
• Actions > CSV Editing (only Text Converter CSV): With this function you can work on arbitrary CSV files in many ways. First of all, you have to select the characters which are separating the values in your CSV file and which character is the one for a new line (for example ";" and "%linebreak%"). After that you can select one ore more of the actions you would like to apply. Behind each action, there is a button "Options", with that you can adjust the settings for the corresponding action. Most actions have their settings in the window "CSV Editing". Here, it is always the same: First, you have to select a column at the top of this windows. After that, you can select an action under this. The actions are explained in the next points. In each action tab, there is a button "Add". You can use this button, if you would like to apply more than one action. The button moves the action down to the lost, so that you can enter a new action. All items from the list will be applied to your CSV file when the corresponding action is selected in the main window. The actions from the list can be moved top and down with your mouse and they can be deleted with "DEL". If you activate "Only apply actions from this list", only the actions added to he list will be applied. If this option is not active, both the actions from the list and the actions from the top will be applied. Click on "Apply" to get a preview of your actions in the file in the main window.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Field Delimiter: Here you can specify a field delimiter character such as a double quote " (character that is used to surround the fields between the separator), that is used for reading and writing the CSV files. Leave the field empty to read the CSV sourced without field delimiter.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Use Field Delimiter always / never / if necessary: This options are referring to the saving of the CSV files. You can select whether the CSV files should be stored completely without field delimiter, if the field delimiter will be used for each field or only if necessary (in case that the field contains the separator). As a field delimiter, the character specified in the input field "field delimiter" is used. Select an option differing from the original file in order to reformat the file.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Shortened Data Set: With this option, you can edit shortened records. To save memory, at a shortened data set, a value that is already in the field a line above, will not be written again into the line. If this option is activated, all empty fields in a line will be filled with the value from the line above.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Search and Replace (only Text Converter CSV): With this function, you can replace text in a columns of a CSV file. Write the string you want to search for in the box "Search For" and the string you want to have instead of this in the box "Replace with". Optional, you can search case-insensitive or you can use regular expressions in the search and/or replace fields.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Insert Text (only Text Converter CSV): With this function, you can insert a text into a column of a CSV file. Enter the text into the box "Text" and select a position for the insertion. It is possible to insert the text before or after the existing text or you can specify a position for the new text. The position is the number of characters from the beginning. With the option "If cell is empty", you can fill each cell without any content with the new text, while "If cell is not empty" is overwriting each cell containing something with the new text.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Writing and Format (only Text Converter CSV): Changes the writing and the format of columns in CSV files. Select one of the options to change the writing to uppercase or lowercase letters or to remove spaces.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Calculations (only Text Converter CSV): Carries out calculations in columns of CSV files.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Change Column Order (only Text Converter CSV): With this function, you can change the order of the columns in a CSV file. Simply move the elements in the list top or down with your mouse to change the order of the columns and click on "Apply" to see the results. If there are not enough elements in the list and you would like to move higher columns, click on "+" to add further columns.
• Actions > CSV Editing > Delete Columns (only Text Converter CSV): With this function you are able to delete columns from CSV files. Just type the number of the column to be deleted into the field. Multiple columns can be separated by a comma. Example: "2" - to delete the second column or "2,4" to delete the second and forth column.

Saving

The last box in the main window, located on the right below cares about saving the files. Here you can specify whether the files should be overwritten or whether they are saved as new files to a certain folder, under a certain name an in a certain format. For example it is possible to save the text files as image files.

• Save > Overwrite Original File: This will overwrite the original file with the modified file. As a rule we do not recommend this function, because the original file can not be recovered, if it is overwritten. You should save the file always as a new one, if you want to use the old files for another time.
• Save > Save as a New File: Choose this option to save the file as a new file.
• Save > Folder: Here you can set the folder, in which the files will be saved. You can either select a folder on your computer or write a folder in the box. In the box, it is also possible to choose some constants. With the constant "<keep>", the original folder of the file is kept, even if there are text files from different folders in your list. If you type in "%folder%/new", the constant %folder% will be replaced with the old folder and a new folder "new" will be made for the changed files in the original folder. Of course, with this constant it is possible to create lots of folders in different folders, if the files from the list are not in the same folder. In this case a new folder is created in every folder with files in the list.
  
• Save > File Name: Here you specify the new filename of the file. Also in this field, constants can be used. Besides "<keep>", which keeps the old file name, especially the constant %name% is interesting. This constant is replaced with the old file name of the text file (without extension). For example with "%name%-1" in the box, every file name will be appended with "-1". The original file foo.txt will be saved as foo-1.txt after the conversion. The constant %num% provides a continuous numbering of the files in the order they appear in the list. Thus, the first file has the number 1, the second file is designated by 2 and so on. With the constant %0num% you can also number the files continuously, with the exception, that leading zeros are used. For example, if there are 100 files in the list, the numbers will be 001, 002, 003 up to 100. The constant %abs% additionally is replaced by the absolute number of files in the list. As an example, the entry could be "%0num%-%abs% %name%". If the old file is "foo.txt" and if there are 1500 files in the list and foo.txt is a the 13rd position in the list, the new name will be "0013-1500 foo.txt". With the constant %firstchars%, you get the first characters of the corresponding file. So it is possible to use the first characters of the file as file name. Of course, you can all constants mentioned above use together and you can combine them with each other and with other texts. Have a look at the file name preview under the new file to see how your file name will look like.
  
• Save > File Format: Here you can choose a file format, with witch the file is saved. You can either keep the original file format with "<keep>", you can type in a user-defined file format or you can choose one of the given formats from the box. If you select the file format .gif, .jpg and .bmp, the text will be saved as a graphic in the appropriate format. With this option , it is particularly recommended to use an automatic line break (Actions > Line Actions > Wrap Text) so that the images are not too wide. Any other file extension will save the text as a text file with this extension. So, you can write any file extension you want in the box.
• Save > Delete Original Files: If this option is activated, the original files will be deleted after saving the new, changed files. Attention! The original files can not be restored after deleting. You should only use this function if you do not need the original files any more. This function will always be deactivated after loading settings and configuration files, so that you can not use this function without manually select it.
• Save > Only process files with status "Marked": If this option is disabled, all files that are currently in the file list, will be processed and saved. If this option is activated, only files with the status "Marked" will be processed and stored. So, you can apply changes only to a range of the currently loaded files and you do not have to delete and load all files whenever you want to work on files which a special name or special content from your file list. Because, you can mark files according to the file name or according to the file content. Simply click on "Marking" under the file list or search for files with a special content with "Search in Files". Of course, you can also change the status of one or more selected files with a right click on the file in the list.
• Save > Only save in case of a change: If this option is active, the file will only be saved if the content or the encoding has changed. Otherwise, if the option is not activated, the file will always be created or overwritten, even if the new file is identical to the old file.