clipman

THE CLIPBOARD MANAGER UTILITY
version 3.2
by Dmitry A. Kazakov
(mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de)

The Clipboard Manager utility is a clipboard viewer for the Microsoft Windows 95 or NT. Any time when a Windows application places some text onto the clipboard, the utility tries to convert the clipboard contents. According to the radio button checked on the utility control panel the utility can:

Leave the clipboard contents unchanged;
Format the text in the clipboard;
Sort lines in the clipboard;

With the aid of the Clipboard Manager you can teach your preferable text editor to format or sort the selected text. Just run the clipboard manager. Choose conversion mode on the control panel. Select the text you want to convert. Make `Cut' and immediately `Paste'. Here you are!

The utility was compiled using the Microsoft Visual C++, Borland C++, GCC C++ compilers. However it is a pure Windows application, i.e. it uses neither Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) nor Borland class library. Theoretically it can be compiled by any C++ compiler that supports Win32 API.

The clipboard manager was developed by Dmitry A. Kazakov. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or (at your option) any later version. This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License for more details. You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place - Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307, USA. See the GNU General Public License for more details.

The current version works under Windows 95/98/me/NT/2000/XP/Server 2003. It contains some minor bug fixes of the previous version and also allows building from sources with GCC C++.

Download:

Sources		clipman_3_2.tgz (tar + gzip, you may use WinZip)
Binary, built for x86 32-bit		clipman.exe

Buttons and the front panel

The Clipboard Manager starts minimized. It shows its buttons on the taskbar:

You can use these buttons to change the clipboard formatting mode without task switching.

You open the Clipboard Manager to change the default formatting mode and parameters. The panel of the Clipboard Manager looks like follows:

You can set:

The mode: Do not touch, Format, Sort.
The tabulation size (tells how the tab character is expanded). Initially tab is treated as 8 spaces.
The right margin of the text used for justification. By default it is set to 72.
Up to four prefix-suffix pairs (see below).

You can save the current settings using the Save button.

Formatting

The way the text is formatted is defined by the shape of the first two lines of the text.

For example, let's consider this paragraph. The paragraph indentation is taken from the second line. However the first line indentation is preserved. The formatted text is justified. So the result is For example, let's consider this paragraph. The paragraph indentation is taken from the second line. However the first line indentation is preserved. The formatted text is justified. So the result is

Another case is hanging paragraph text:

Note how the paragraph is formatted when the first line is less indented than the second one. The paragraph indentation is lead by the second line indentation. Note how the paragraph is formatted when the first line is less indented than the second one. The paragraph indentation is lead by the second line indentation.

Hyphenations are correctly processed. Leading tabulators in the first two lines are expanded before text formatting. Other tabulators are assumed to be particular spaces.

Prefixes and Suffixes

On the front panel of the Clipboard Manager you may find four fields for formatting prefixes and suffixes. When a prefix appears in the first formatted line, the Clipboard Manager uses the prefix and the corresponding suffix for formatting. The following example shows how it works:

/* Many C programmers like to arrange the multi- /* line comments using /* as the prefix and */ as the suffix for each line of a comment. If you set /* as a prefix and */ as the corresponding suffix of the Clipboard Manager, this text will be formatted by the following way: /* Many C programmers like to arrange the */ /* multi-line comments using /* as the prefix */ /* and */ as the suffix for each line of a */ /* comment. If you set /* as a prefix and */ as */ /* the corresponding suffix of the Clipboard */ /* Manager, this text will be formatted by the */ /* following way: */

When a prefix is recognized, the Clipboard Manager works so as if the prefix and the corresponding suffix were removed from all lines of the clipboard text before formatting. Formatting the text it adds the prefix and the suffix to each formatted line.

Sorting

Lines in the clipboard are sorted according to their alphabetical order. Tabulators are considered as if they were expanded into spaces before sorting.

Building

The distribution contains an executable built for Intel (x86) platform (clipman.exe). Though you can build it from sources using a C++ compiler. For Microsoft Visual C++, Borland C++ and GCC C++ Cygwin there are ready to use make files:

nmake -f vc.mak (for Visual C++)make -f bcc.mak (for Borland C++)
make -f gcc.mak (for GCC C++ under Cygwin)

Note that gcc.mak shall be used in a Cygwin shell. It will link against Microsoft Visual C++ libraries (MSVCRT). For further information refer to Cygwin documentation.

Last note. Tabs are used in source texts The texts may look a bit strange if your editor has tab stops other than 8.

Changes log

Changes to the version 3.1

Error messages, when appropriate contain Window error information according to the GetLastError value;
The code was cleaned and reworked.