WorkSpace
The WorkSpace area occupies the upper left area of the main program window. It is the area where you will create, edit, open or save your tab-indented lists.
If you need more room in the WorkSpace at any time, you can hide the 'Extensions' and/or the 'Tools' areas by clicking 'View > Hide Extensions' or 'View > Hide Tools' in the Menu Bar. Shortcuts are also provided for these commands by pressing 'Control+Shift+E' and 'Control+Shift+T' on your keyboard.
The Workspace can have multiple tab-pages open at once. To start a new page, click 'File > New Page' in the Menu Bar, or press 'Control+N' on your keyboard. Each page is identified by a tab above it, which contains the filename, or an abbreviated version of it. The full filename with its path is always shown on the very top of the window. Hovering over a tab will also show the path plus filename in the Status Line.
The tabs are colored in six different colors, dependent on whether they are currently Selected, Altered, marked as Read-Only, or a combination of the above. These colors are defined as 'WorkSpace Tab Color 1 - 6', and their current values are shown on the 'Extra > Options > Colors 1' page, which you can access from the Menu Bar. Like any of the other forty program-colors, they can be changed by defining them within a Custom Theme.
The WorkSpace has four margins on the left of the screen. They are (L-R):
1/ The 'Line Numbers Margin'. This shows a line number for each line of the file that you are currently working on, starting at 1. The Line Numbers Margin can be hidden at any time by clicking 'View > Hide LineNumbers' in the Menu Bar, or by pressing the shortcut command 'Control+Shift+L' on your keyboard.
2/ The 'Bookmarks Margin'. Clicking this margin lets you add or remove a Bookmark for the line of interest. See the Bookmarks page for more information about Bookmarks.
3/ The 'Errors Margin'. After an Error 'Status Check' has been performed, any lines that contain an error will have an Error Marker added to this margin. Note that you can quickly select a line by clicking and dragging in the 'Errors Margin'.
4/ The 'Hierarchy Margin'. After a Hierarchy 'Status Check' has been performed, the resultant Hierarchy Markers will be added to this margin. Clicking a Hierarchy Marker will hide or show the branch associated with that level of hierarchy.
The main text area of the Workspace acts like a normal text-editor, except that the following coloring-schemes are applied:
1/ Bracket Highlighting: This is (optionally) applied to any text that has been enclosed with a matching set of square, curly, round, or diamond brackets. Text within brackets is often used for special purposes within a tab-indented list: i.e text within square brackets is often classed as a 'Category', and text within curly brackets is often classed as a 'Synonym', and so Tab-List Tools colors these features to make them easier for you to spot and work with. Bracket-highlighting can be turned on and off quickly by clicking 'View > Hide Formatting' in the Menu Bar, or by pressing the shortcut command 'Control+Shift+F' on your keyboard. You can also turn highlighting on and off for individual bracket-types in the 'Misc' section of the 'Options' window.
2/ Whitespace Highlighting: This is (optionally) applied to any text that contains a tab-character or a space character. It makes creating and editing a tab-indented list much easier. It is also easier to spot errors if you have it turned on. If you are a regular typist you may automatically start adding spaces rather than tabs. Whitespace Highlighting lets you spot the difference straight away. Tabs are indicated as right-facing arrows with a background that is a different color from other text. Spaces are indicated as a tiny dot in the center of the line (to differentiate them from periods) and with a background that is a different color from other text. Whitespace Highlighting can be turned on and off quickly by clicking 'View > Hide Whitespace' in the Menu Bar, or by pressing the shortcut command 'Control+Shift+W' on your keyboard. By default, the width of a tab 'arrow' is set to be the equivalent of 8 spaces. You can change this width by accessing the 'Extra > Options > Misc' page from the Menu Bar.
The current line that the caret (cursor) is on is highlighted a slightly different color from the surrounding text. Its highlighting will override any highlighting added by the Error-Checking, Duplicates, and other routines. The option to have the current line highlighted can be turned on or off in the 'Extra > Options > Misc' page, by altering the 'Caret-Line Highlighting' setting.
You can change the colors used for all of the highlighting settings, plus many others, by selecting one of the pre-defined 'Themes' or by editing one of the three Custom Themes.
Right-click a page in the Workspace for Undo and Redo commands, if needed.