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Macros, tips, and templates for Corel® WordPerfect® for Windows®
© Copyright 1996-2010 by Barry MacDonnell. All Rights Reserved.

Enhancing the Find and Replace feature

Related pages -

How to efficiently use "Find:" in the Find and Replace (F&R) dialog

The standard Find and Replace dialog has to be dragged from its position in the center of the screen if you want to see the item found or the item to be replaced. Moreover, it does not provide an easy way to replace (or format) just certain instances of an item. Finally, having to repeatedly open the F&R dialog (Edit, Find and Replace, or <Ctrl+F>) to find or replace the same item is tedious.

Here's a tip posted by Pam Britt on WordPerfect Universe that may help:

"To repeat a find once you have closed the dialog box, you need not reopen the box. Simply press <Ctrl+Shift+F> . . . to go to the next occurrence of your designated find text.

[Editor's note: If you use the DOS keyboard instead of the standard Windows keyboard, you will need to assign the "Find and Replace" and "Find Next" features to <Ctrl+F> and <Ctrl+Shift+F>. See the tip about assigning a macro, feature, program, or string of keystrokes to a key or key combination (i.e., a "shortcut" or "hot key"), here.]

This is an extremely efficient tool for the kind of templates I have prepared over the years and through many versions of WP, placing # symbols where I would eventually need to add text and @ symbols where others would need to do so. These and other symbols can be searched to easily and then replaced on the run. (The "find" highlights the character [but see below], and all you have to do is start typing the new text -- no <Escape>, no <Delete>, no nothing. If text (or a symbol) is highlighted and you need to change it, start typing; if you need to go to the next instance, just press <control>+<shift>+f again.)

It is also very simple to replace text using this feature. All that's needed is for you to have already marked for copying [i.e., copied to the clipboard with <Ctrl+C>] the "replace with" text; then, when you hit on an instance where you need the text replaced, paste the "replace with" text over the found text [with <Ctrl+V>]...."

However, sometimes there is a problem with the part of Pam's tip that says -

...The "find" highlights the character, and all you have to do is start typing the new text...

Most of the time this will be true. But if the user has set Edit > Find and Replace > Action to anything other than "Select Match," or plays a macro that sets the Action to another value, then the items found will not be selected (i.e., highlighted in reverse color). The Action menu in Find and Replace is "sticky": settings will persist into the next WP session.

Here's a solution: Create (or download) and play the Find and Replace macro below, which could be assigned to the <Ctrl+F> and/or <F2> key instead of simply the "Find and Replace" feature. It will reset the Find and Replace dialog's settings first; then it will pop up the Find and Replace dialog. This will be completely transparent to the user.

Tip: For your convenience, download the following macro here.

// Find and Replace.wcm - Enhances the use of the standard Find and Replace feature by ensuring that WordPerfect default settings for the F&R dialog are reset -- especially the "Select Match" setting in the Action menu, which normally leaves the item selected (and thus more visible on screen) after it is found. // For convenience, you can assign this macro to the <Ctrl+F> key and/or <F2> key to replace the standard methods of bringing up the Find and Replace dialog. If(?DocBlank)   Messagebox(;"Error";"Document is blank.";IconInformation!)   Go(End@) Endif OnCancel (End@) pResetFindReplace () FindDlg () // Set the found item vertically on screen - QuickmarkSet () Display(On!) QuickmarkFind () Label (End@) Quit Procedure pResetFindReplace () SearchString ("") ReplaceString ("") // Only one of these next 4 Match... commands can be active at any one time: // MatchPositionAfter () // MatchExtendSelection() // MatchPositionBefore() MatchSelection() SearchFindWholeWordsOnly (No!) MatchWithAttributes (No!) ReplaceWithAttributes (No!) SearchCaseSensitive (No!) ReplaceWithCase (No!) MatchWithFont (No!) ReplaceWithFont (No!) MatchWithFontSize (No!) ReplaceWithFontSize (No!) SearchInSelection (No!) SearchWordForms (No!) SearchWrap (No!) MatchLimit (No!) EndProcedure

For help assigning macros to keystroke combinations ("shortcut keys") see here.

In addition to the tip above, here's another related tip:

When the found item is shown selected on screen you can use other standard formatting shortcut keys to quickly make the instance bold, italic, underlined etc. Just press <Ctrl+B> for bold, <Ctrl+I> for italic, etc., while the item is selected. Then simply press <Ctrl+Shft+F> to go to the next instance of the item, if desired.

You might even like to highlight found-and-selected items in the current highlight color. Since there doesn't seem to be a built-in feature in WP's keyboard editor that you can directly assign to a shortcut key for this, use a macro instead. You can assign the small macro below to, for example, the <Ctrl+H> key to toggle highlighting on for the selected item.

Tip: For your convenience, download the following macro here (included with the Find and Replace macro above). Note: If you use the Redaction Tool in the initial release of WordPerfect X4, here are some tips (click here for the PDF version) when using normal highlighting (Tools, Highlight) in the same document that is marked up for redaction (Tools, Redaction).

// Highlight Toggle.wcm - Toggle selected text to highlighted text. // Assign to <Ctrl+H> or similar key for convenience. If(?BlockActive)  PosSelectBottom   HighlightToggle Else  Messagebox(;"Highlight Toggle";"Select some text first!";IconWarning!) Endif Quit

Finally, note that redline or strikeout formatting (not to be confused with similar effects produced during a file Compare or Review) are not assigned to any standard shortcut key. However, they can be assigned to one using the "Attribute Redline" and "Attribute Strikeout" choices in the Format feature list, found in the keyboard editor's Keyboard Shortcuts window. Assigning them to <Alt+Ctrl+R> and <Alt+Ctrl+S> or other preferred keys might be handy. Since they do not require that the item be selected first, no macro such as Highlight Toggle above is needed.

For help assigning macros to keystroke combinations ("shortcut keys") see here.