Stone Design Forums

Since Create takes advantage of Apple's Cocoa objects and frameworks, upgrading to Tiger means that Create gets an upgrade in features as well. I thought we could list the new features Create inherits in Tiger in this thread. Here are changes and new features regarding the text features of Create and any Cocoa application.

#1:
In text fields, you can now make non-contiguous selections of text. Double click on a text field to edit it, then simply hold down the command (apple) key when selecting text.

#2:
There's no more 1/2 second delay when dragging a text selection around to move or copy it. If you have some text selected (double-click on the text field to be in text editing mode), just start dragging that text around, and it immediately will show up under your cursor.

#3:
I'm not sure if this is actually new, but just in case. If you hold down the option key while in text editing mode, you are presented with a crosshair that will pick any text characters you cross in that text field.

#4:
While in text editing mode in Create, the contextual menu for any text selection has three new options: Search in Spotlight, Search in Google, and Look Up in Dictionary.

The first opens up a Spotlight window with results, as opposed to the Spotlight field in the upper right corner.

The second opens up a new window or tab in Safari and delivers results from Google.com. It seems to do this in the background though. No Safari window came to the foreground when I did it, and I had to check Safari to see if anything happened. It did it, but you have to go looking for the results window I guess.

Finally, the third option will open up the new Dictionary application and open a new window with the definition in it. If you have multiple words selected, it will only look up the first word in the selection. If you have the first word only partially selected, it will still look up the entire word. But wait, there's more! If you go to your Dictionary.app's preferences, you can change the option to open up the Dictionary application for the definnition and choose to see the definition in a tooltip below the word in question. What's ncie about this is that not only do you not have to leave Create to read a definition, but you can also view synonyms by choosing the thesaurus instead of the dictionary in that tooltip. If you want to see more info in one place (the size of the tooltip widow is fixed, so long definitions have to scroll), you can choose to see the definition and the thesaurus entires in the Dictionary.app from within the tooltip.

Thefollowing tips are actually text editing shortcuts that are in previous Mac OS X releases (and even OpenStep I believe), but I've gotten the impression that a lot of people aren't aware of them. Again, you have to double-click on a text field to enter into text editing mode; these don't work on a text field whenit's acting as an object.

Control-e moves the cursor to the end of the paragraph.
Control-t transposes the letters on either side of the cursor. (I luurve this one -- two "u"s!)
Control-y deletes your selection if you have text highlighted.
Control-o inserts a return carriage wherever your cursor is. If you have text highlighted, the text will be replaced by the return carriage.
control-p moves the cursor up one line. (p= previous line)
control-a moves the cursor to the beginning of the paragraph.
control-d forward deletes a character, that is, deletes the character to the right of the cursor.
control-f moves the cursor forward one character (doesn't affect the characters themselves).
control-h backward (regular) deletes a character, that is, deletes the character to the left of the cursor.
control-k deletes everything to the right of the cursor within the paragraph.
control-v moves the cursor to the bottom of the text field -- but inside the last punctuation mark. Hm.
control-b moves the cursor one character to the left (doesn't affect the chacters themselves).
control-n moves the cursor down one line.

Oh, and undo (command-z) works within all text fields and selections.

So has anyone else noticed new or different behavior in Create since they've upgraded to Tiger?

And - numbered/lettered/ordered lists! Look for the new popup on the Text Ruler!

<opens new doc in Create>

Ooh... aah...

I thought I would add this text tip for both Panther and Tiger owners, though I think it has been discussed in another thread:

Auto-complete words by typing command (apple)-esc after you start typing. for example, if I type "ent" and press command-esc, I'm presented with a list in that spot of all the words in the dictionary that begin with "ent", and I can continue typing to narrow the results or pick one of the words from the list.

I like, I like very much.

Is there any way to set the default indent?
Could the tabs that apply to lists be a different colour, so I can pick them out from the other tabs?
I find I often have to drag off some tabs when I start a new document, does anybody else find this?

Thanks, guys, for the heads up on new features. That just makes me drool all the more for Tiger. It won't be available in Chile untill sometime in June.

If it makes you feel any better, I've had the DVD on my computer desk at home for at least a week, but I 've been too busy to backup or install it yet!

Wow -we really are on the same page - I just sent you private mail about that very same topic!

The May release of Create is cool because, on Tiger, it has the integrated titlebar/toolbar look of eg Mail!
http://homepage.mac.com/stone_design/.c ... binhex.hqx
The latest Create

So does PhotoToWeb...

I'm curious about the new integrated toolbar look actually, or rather, I'm interested in its behavior. I'm wondering about the clickable areas of the toolbar buttons in such a case. Since the toolbar backgroud acts as a draggable area, does that play funny games with some icons such as the pattern editor icon and the autotrace icon with its large amount of transparent area. I'll have to install and check it out. We might need some revised icons if that turns out to be a problem.

The unified toolbar is only really intended for button-like toolbar styles - otherwise as you mention, there is a conflict between the clickable and dragable parts of the toolbar.

Actually - that's not quite true- I'm sitting here on tiger and getting the correct behaviour [that's spelled that way for Robert] even if I click on the transparent part of the button. An example might be the Align Panel icon which has lots of transparent bits - it still highlights correctly and brings up/hides the align panel even if clicked in the transparent area.

I tested this yesterday and concur all works fine for me. Except I get no u in colour!

I think the issue is what the heck is Apple's rationale for one appearance versus another?! Their guidelines AFAIK do not speak to this new look at all, and I was expecting all of Apple's Tiger apps to use this appearance to supplant the older look, but that's not the case. Well, we can do what we want until Apple can post-rationalize some scheme for these things in their HIG.

I like the new integrated look for a few reasons:

1. You know the app's been recompiled to take advantage of Tiger
2. Lets you drag the window more easily
3. Clearly demarcates the top document from others
4. Creates more consistency between metal/non-metal windows *

*a pre-release of iMaginator 1.1 now has a Preference to allow you to have either Metal or Aqua windows which you can test what I'm saying in one app!

I thought I might add some more thoughts to this.

I do like the new look of Mail, from which this look is being showcased and it does make people aware of the new Tiger Inside™ element of Stone apps.

However, it doesn't behave like the old style - anywhere where there is a space or flexible space in the toolbar is now draggable as opposed to clickable as with the old style.

The unified toolbar looks great in an Aqua iMaginator because the majority of the toolbar icons are either buttons, or distinct simplified shapes.

I imagine Apple's intention is to have more unity between the Aqua and metal styles, while encouraging a style diversity.