Rich Text Tips, Tricks & Techniques

1. Rich Text Tips, Tricks & Techniques Ben Langhinrichs President, Genii Software Ltd.

2. Introduction: Ben Langhinrichs • President - Genii Software Ltd. • Founded in 1992 (OS/2 utilities) • First Notes product in 1995 • IBM/Lotus Business Partner since 1995 • Based in Cleveland, Ohio, U.S.A. • Customers in 49 countries • Author, poet, book reviewer

3. Genii Software – Current Products Coexistence Solutions • CoexEdit: Notes/Web editing coexistence • CoexLinks: Notes/Outlook e-mail coexistence Rich Text Tools • Midas Rich Text LSX • Midas Rich Text C++ API • @Midas Lookups (free)

4. What is valuable about rich text? • Rich text expands the reach of information • A picture is worth a thousand words • A doclink provides easy access to related information • A table creates meaningful structure around information • An anchor provides a position in extended data • A button provides an action to use on the information • A collapsible section provides a summary of long data

5. What is valuable about rich text? • Rich text expands the reach of information (cont.) • A layer allows juxtaposition of information • A hide-when formula provides conditional access • A text attribute provide emphasis • An embedded view provides window into related data • A horizontal rule separates data • A bulleted list highlights specific points • An attachment adds non-Notes data to a document

6. What is valuable about rich text? An application without rich text is like music with just one note.

7. Tips – How to use rich text more effectively • A picture is worth a thousand words, and other such nonsense • How to show what is needed and no more • Rich text is like a web page, not a book

8. Tips – How to use rich text more effectively • A picture is worth a thousand words – not always • Use graphics sparingly, and to better effect • A graphic can be a comma, or a period. • People came to see information. Does the graphic communicate information? • Use graphics as key to where to find information • Use graphics to communicate and identify information

9. Tips – How to use rich text more effectively • Show what is needed, and no more • If they have to scroll, there is too much information • Sections, tabbed tables, hide-when formulas • Hide everything but the summary – drill down for more • Link to the source, don’t repeat it

10. Tips – How to use rich text more effectively • Rich text is like a web page, not a book • Don’t store everything in one rich text field • Rich text is for showing data, not always for storing it • Computed text can look up external data • Ever see a web page without links?

11. Demo: Tips

12. Tricks – Getting attention and exploiting it • Personalized Communication • People like to be spoken to • Help the user relate by using their information • Be careful not to fool them, but just to draw them in

13. Demo: Personalized Communication

14. Tricks – Getting attention and exploiting it • Progressive Disclosure • Simple examples are tabbed tables and sections • With a little work, the progression can be better controlled • The first information shown should be minimum necessary • Sometimes there can be multiple stages to drill down into

15. Demo: Progressive Disclosure

16. Tricks – Getting attention and exploiting it • Active rich text • Forms are made of rich text • Forms can contain script and code – so can documents • In read mode, changes can be made but not saved • Use of SaveOptions can be effective as well

17. Demo: Active Rich Text

18. Techniques - Programmability • What is available in native Notes/Domino? • What is available with Midas Rich Text LSX? • Business Scenarios

19. Rich text with native classes • LotusScript rich text classes (IBM’s legacy) • Added ability to create some rich text in R5 • Added ability to modify some rich text in ND6 • Did little else in ND6.5/ND7/ND8/ND8.5 • Manipulating via DXL • Added ability to export/import in ND7 • Fixed many issues in ND8 • Fixed many issues in ND8.5 • Committed to real round-tripping as goal, but reality falls somewhat short

20. What adds value to programmability? • Value is added when we add higher level abilities features and functions • Value is added when we improve the ease with which each is accomplished

21. Business Scenarios • Valid Links • Parsing Documents • Text Templates/Mail Merge • Cross Referencing/Annotations • Custom Data Display

22. Valid Links Business Problem: A company has thousands of links in documents created over a period of years, and no easy way to determine which are still valid. • Each document may/may not have links • Links may go to the current db or other • Validation requires reading link attributes • Report needed for all inactive links, tracking the current document, link and problem

23. Valid Links Rich text solution: Use native rich text classes in Notes 6 and above to follow links and create a report of links which cannot be followed. • Cycle through each document • Cycle through each doclink (if any) • Read doclink properties • Retrieve document by UNID (or not) • Create entry in report if not retrieved

24. Demo: Valid Links

25. Parsing Documents Business Problem: A compound document needs to be broken up into its component parts and each made into separate document. • Document may come through e-mail or from an imported Word document, etc. • Some delimiter or delimiting condition • Document id from content • Text attributes, colors, graphics and other rich text elements should not be lost

26. Parsing Documents Rich text solution: Use the Midas classes to parse rich text and separate out the components • Search for the delimiters • Create a new document • Copy the delimited portion to the new doc • Shift to the next delimited portion

27. Demo: Parsing Documents

28. Text Templates/Mail Merge Business Problem: A standard template of formatted information is prepared, and keywords or tags need to be found and replaced • The same template is used repeatedly • Pre-defined tags • Data from address book or other source of iterative data. • Text attributes, colors, graphics and other rich text elements should not be lost

29. Text Templates/Mail Merge Rich text solution: Use FindAndReplace or the Midas classes to search and replace delimited tags • Cycle through source data • Copy the template to a new document • Search for tags and replace with "this" data • Move on

30. Demo: Text Templates/Mail Merge

31. Cross Referencing Business Problem: You have documents with large amounts of text and want to provide cross reference links to associated information, glossary terms and contacts. • The associated information is kept in this database or elsewhere • There may be thousands of terms, but very few hits • Some data is not in Notes • Different eyes may need to see different associated links

32. Cross Referencing Rich text solution: Use the Midas classes to perform automatic context cross-referencing • Point at a view • Define the action, type of hotspot, that is desired • Work on an open document without saving • Use customer specific views

33. Demo: Cross Referencing

34. Custom Data Display Business Problem: A lot of information is available, but it is hard to analyze and understand the relevance and relationships. • Resources and sessions are tagged, and the tags should allow a correlation • The user should not have to skip from page to page, as the original session is important • Reader patience is limited, so a degree of culling is required • Security concerns make it desireable to keep data in Notes

35. Custom Data Display Rich text solution: Use Midas to create reports using existing Notes features in innovative and attractive ways, all within Notes, • Create bar charts using tables with variable width/height graphics • Use Notes features such as tabbed tables to consolidate data • Use colors and styles to improve appearance of reports • Store reports in rich text for easy mailing • Reader fields can be added to Notes documents

36. Demo: Custom Data Display

37. More information • http://twitter.com/blanghinrichs • http://GeniiSoft.com – Company website • http://GeniiSoft.com/showcase.nsf/EC2011 • http://GeniiSoft.com/showcase.nsf/GeniiBlog • http://MyComfyChair.blogspot.com – reviews of books for kids

38. Q&A: Are we done yet?