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366 lines
16 KiB
Plaintext
366 lines
16 KiB
Plaintext
Introduction to the World of ELinks
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-----------------------------------
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The goal of this introduction is to explain the basic concepts in ELinks,
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give an overview of how to get started and serve as an entry point to many
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of the (undocumented) features of ELinks. It won't tell you all the
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details, but should hopefully give you an idea of how things work and make
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it possible for you to even figure out how to go further.
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Although ELinks is text-based, the user interface has many of interaction
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methods normally found in graphical environments. There are menus, dialogs
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with buttons and hierarchic list boxes with folders. Care has been taken to
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make the interaction between various dialogs consistent, so the controls
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will quickly become familiar to new users.
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The user interface can be controlled using both mouse and keyboard, but
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currently it is only possible to configure keybindings. Looking back, the
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key-controls have been more advanced than the mouse support, but during the
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0.10 prereleases the mouse support has been much improved. You will now find
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find stuff like contextual menus when right-clicking in different document
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zones.
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Overview of the User Interface
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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The main user interface of ELinks consists of the document view and dialog
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bars displaying the information such as the title of the currently viewed
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document, all opened tabs and the browsing status. The 3 bars are elaborated
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further below.
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The most important dialogs that you will meet include the Main, Link and Tab
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menus and the different managers. The menus serve as entry points to the
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actions available from different contexts, while the managers let you check
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the state and control the various subsystems, such as loaded cookies and the
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global history. The utility menus and the manager tools are investigated
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further below.
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The document viewer in ELinks provides a feature-rich set of ways to browse
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documents. That is, multiple options exist for navigating, searching and
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displaying documents and you will hopefully figure in time what works best
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for you. The basic browsing possibilities are presented below.
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ELinks is highly configurable, so if there is something that you would like
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to change, it is most likely possible. The best overview of the many options
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are given in the `elinks.conf(5)` man page. Keybindings are discussed in the
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`elinkskeys(5)` man page. It is not always up-to-date, so you should also
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check the keybinding manager and the overview of all the configured
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keybindings given in the Help -> Keys dialog. The Keys dialogs serves as a
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good introduction to the most common keybindings.
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The Title, Tab and Status bar
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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The title bars main purpose is to display the title of the current document.
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Documents bigger than can be displayed with the current screen size are
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divided into subpages. In this case the current document position is
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indicated in the far right of the title bar as a suffix to the actual
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document title. The syntax is: ( current-subpage / total-subpages ), an
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example is `(4/9)` that indicates the 4th subpage of 9 subpages.
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The tab bar by default is only visible when 2 or more tabs are open. It is
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divided into slots containing the trimmed title of the tabs' loaded
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document. Between each tab is a separator. The current tab is highlighted
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and all tabs that has not been viewed after being loaded are highlighted as
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fresh. Tabs are explained in details in the tabs.txt file.
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The status bar has multiple purposes. Most of the time it will contain the
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URI (and title) of the currently selected link. If a link is followed,
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connection information is shown in the status bar. When using cursor
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routing, the status bar will show the coordinates of the cursor when a link
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is not followed.
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The Main, Link and Tab Menus
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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The Main Menu gives you access to many of the features of ELinks via
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submenus and serves as a good entry point for performing actions on the
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different objects of interest, such as links, documents and tabs. The Link
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menu and Tab menus are more specialized and targeted to a specific context,
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such as link handling or managing the tab bar. Actually, the Link Menu is
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accessible from the Main Menu as a submenu.
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Once you have familiarized yourself with the menus, you will have a good
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chance at gradually learning the most common keybinding, since all the
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configured keybindings are shown as right aligned text. Menu entries can
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also be quickly accessed using hotkeys. Hotkeys appear highlighted in the
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menu entry text. For example the key-combo "Alt-v i" will open the document
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info dialog accessible from the View sub menu in the Main menu.
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The Managers
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~~~~~~~~~~~~
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The managers let you control the state of subsystems, such as cookies and
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the global history. They are accessible from the Tools or Setup submenu in
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the Main Menu. The managers consists of an area showing a hierarchic listbox
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and buttons at the bottom. Below, a view of the cookie manager is shown.
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+------------------------- Cookie manager -------------------------+
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| [-]- bugzilla.elinks.or.cz |
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| | |-- BUGLIST |
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| | `-- LASTORDER |
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| [+]- kerneltrap.org |
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| [+]-*dictionary.reference.com |
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| [+]-*bjork.com |
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| [-]- www.google.com |
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| `-- PREF |
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| [ Info ] [ Add ] [ Edit ] [ Delete ] [ Save ] [ Close ] |
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+------------------------------------------------------------------+
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Each item is either a folder or a leaf. A folder is displayed with a `[-]`
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or `[+]` before the name telling whether the folder is currently open or
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closed. Nested items are displayed indented compared to the folder they are
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nested in. In the cookie manager example above "bjork.com" is a folder and
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"PREF" is a leaf.
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Items can be "marked", which makes it possible to select a group of items
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and perform an action on them, such as deleting all marked items. If any
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item has been marked the currently selected item is ignored when performing
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the action. Marked items are displayed with an asterisk ('*') prefixing the
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name.
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The buttons make it possible to perform actions either on selected or marked
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items or on all items in the manager. Buttons named 'Clear' and 'Save' are
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performed on all items; 'Clear' will delete all items and 'Save' will update
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the runtime state file associated with the manager in the `~/.elinks/`
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directory. Most buttons presses will query you before completing the
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action.
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At any time, both the currently selected item and button are highlighted.
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The same goes for marked items. Most manager dialogs also maintains the
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state, so that when you reopen the manager later it will have the same items
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selected and the same folders opened or closed.
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The basic default controls for managers are the following:
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`--------------`--------------------------------------------------------------
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Keys Action
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Up/Down Select the item above/below.
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'*' Toggle marking of a item.
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Space Open and close folders.
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Left/Right Select the button to the left/right.
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Home/End Select the first/last item.
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Enter Press the currently selected button.
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Esc Close the manager dialog.
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Some managers also supports searching, either by pressing the 'Search'
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button or by pressing '/'. By searching the empty string, all hidden items
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from the previous search will be shown again.
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LED status indicators
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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As an optional feature it is possible to have tiny LED-like status
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indicators shown at the bottom-right of the screen. They are used for
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displaying an overview of the current browsing state, ie. whether you are
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currently talking through a SSL-secured connection, what is the current
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input mode (normal or insert), JavaScript errors etc.
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An example display may look like: `[SIJP--]`. Each position in the LED
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display is associated with the following state:
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`--------------`--------------------------------------------------------------
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Symbol Description
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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'S' Whether an SSL connection was used.
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'i'/'I' The state of insert mode for text-input form-fields: 'i' \
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means modeless, 'I' means insert mode is on.
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'J' A JavaScript error has occured.
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'P' A JavaScript pop-up window was blocked.
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- Unused.
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- Unused.
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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`-` generally indicates that the LED is off.
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The above information is also available in the LED dialog available by
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either clicking on the LED display or via the Help menu.
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Navigation
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~~~~~~~~~~
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ELinks provides various ways to navigate documents. Depending on how
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documents are structured, it can be a great help to change navigation style.
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The navigation styles can roughly be divided into page-oriented,
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link-oriented and screen-oriented. They overlap in many ways, so this
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separation is mostly used as a mean to present them.
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Page-Oriented Navigation
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^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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This involves scrolling documents horizontally and vertically. Documents
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can be scrolled page-wise, where the next or previous subpage will be
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displayed. It is also possible to scroll documents in steps, either
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line-wise (vertically) or column-wise (horizontally). The step size can be
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configured and by default is 2 lines and 8 columns. Alternatively, whole
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documents can be scrolled to the start or the end.
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The basic default controls:
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`--------------`--------------------------------------------------------------
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Keys Action
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Insert/Delete Scroll up/down line-wise. (vertically)
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PageUp/PageDown Scroll up/down page-wise.
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'['/']' Scroll left/right column-wise. (horizontally)
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Home/End Scroll to the start/end of the document.
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Link-Oriented Navigation
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^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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For hypertext documents, access to the links makes it more practical to
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navigate by jumping between links in the document. There are two ways to do
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this; either you can move between links relationally or by number. Using
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relational link navigation it is possible to focus the next/previous link or
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move in a directional manner to the link in a certain direction such as
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left/right/up/down.
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In order to navigate using link numbers, you have to first toggle link
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numbering on; this will prefix all links with a number using the notation
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[number]. `[23]` indicates link number 23. When link numbering is enabled,
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pressing any number key will pop up a "Go to link"-dialog where the complete
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link number can be entered. By pressing Enter the entered link number will
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be focused, but only if it is a valid link number.
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Note: it is also possible to jump to links by searching the link text; check
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the documentation on searching.
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The basic default controls:
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`--------------`--------------------------------------------------------------
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Keys Action
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Up/Down Move to the previous/next link.
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'.' Toggle link numbering.
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Enter/Right Follow the current focused link.
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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No keys are by default configured for directional link navigation.
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Position-Oriented Navigation
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^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
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Positional navigation (sorry, bad word) uses the either the position of the
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cursor or the mouse click to navigate the document. If you are familiar with
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the w3m text-browser you will be familiar with cursor routing. Basically,
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you move the cursor around -- kind of like a mouse -- in the document area
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of the user interface. When the cursor is over a link, the link is
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highlighted, and when the cursor moves outside the current document view, it
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will cause the document view to scroll.
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The possibilities when using the mouse to navigate the document depend on
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what terminal you are using. In some terminals, it is possible to scroll by
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using the mouse wheel. Scrolling is however also possible by clicking in the
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edge areas of the document view. Highlighting links can be done by clicking
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on a link but waiting to release the mouse button until the link is no
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longer under the mouse pointer.
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No keys are by default configured for cursor routing.
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Forms
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^^^^^
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The status bar will indicate the type and name of the field.
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Input text/Password fields::
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These will be displayed as `________`.
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Note that passwords will be obscured using `*` characters.
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Status bar will display something like "Text field, name q",
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or "Password field, name password" for password fields.
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Textarea boxes::
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These will be displayed as multiple lines consisting of `_`.
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Status bar will display something like "Text area, name comment"
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Buttons::
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These will be displayed as `[ Go ]`.
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Status bar will display something like "Submit form to ...",
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"Post form to ..." for submit buttons.
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Checkboxes::
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These will be displayed as `[ ]` or `[X]`.
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Status bar will display something like "Checkbox, name c, value 1".
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To set one just press ENTER on it.
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Radio buttons::
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These will be displayed as `( )` or `(X)`.
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Status bar will display something like "Radio button, name radio1".
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To set one, you may use ENTER.
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Select lists::
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These will be displayed as `[first item____]`.
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Note that if multiple attribute is used, these are displayed as a
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group of checkboxes instead.
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Status bar will display something like "Select field, name list"
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To select one entry, press ENTER, then navigate using UP/DOWN, then
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press ENTER again.
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Searching
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~~~~~~~~~
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Searching is by default available by pressing '/'. This will open a search
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dialog with a input text field for entering the search terms and checkboxes
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to control how searching is performed. You can indicate whether matching
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should be case sensitive and whether regular expressions or normal searching
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should be used.
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It is also possible to make an incremental search, also called type-ahead
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searching. You can search either the whole document text or only link text.
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The latter can be useful if you see a link deep inside a page and want to
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get to it quickly.
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Matches of the search term will be high-lighted. After having performed
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document text search all matches will be high-lighted. To get rid of this
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high-lighting you have to ``search for the empty string'', that is open a
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search dialog and just press Enter in the input field.
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Previous search words are saved in the search history, so they can easily b
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found and used later. Browsing the history will replace the current entered
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search terms.
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The basic default controls for searching are the following:
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`--------------`--------------------------------------------------------------
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Keys Action
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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'/' Open search dialog
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'?' Open search dialog for backwards searching
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'#' Start incremental link text search
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'#/' Start incremental document search
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'n'/'N' Show next/previous match
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Tab Show next match (only for incremental searching)
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Up/Down Insert previous/next search word from history (only when the \
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input field is selected)
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------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Hints and Odd Features
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
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Note: This is still a work in progress and from here on an below
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everything is marked TODO!
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- Numerical action prefixes. Example: 3<Down> jumps down three links.
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- How to move forward in the document history ('u').
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- Toggling color modes, plain/html and image link rendering.
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- Link numbering.
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- Insert mode in text-input form-fields.
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- Menu searching.
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///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
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///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
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