ÿþe-Tip #36 - February 2010 - Text-Only Version



<> Keith Vincent:  10 Years of e-Tips



In just a few months, e-Tips will celebrate a double milestone.  June 2010 will see the 100th issue of our monthly newsletter.  It will also be 10 years since Wil Wilcox and I began this service.



Credit where credit s due.  Wil Wilcox had the idea for e-Tips.  At the time, EclipseNT was still a new product.  Many reporters were simply used to DOS programs. They were making a transition to Windows programs in general and EclipseNT in particular.  So Wil and I offered e-Power weekend workshops in Houston, Los Angeles, San Diego, Chicago, San Antonio, Indianapolis, San Francisco, and even Honolulu. 



The e-Tips were born to promote the workshops and the video tutorials that eventually developed. However, they ve continued even after we stopped offering the workshops.  



As our 10th anniversary approaches, I am presenting a few webinars that will demonstrate some of my favorites e-Tips. These will be offered through EclipseWebinars.com. The first such webinar occurred on January 14th, with a second part scheduled for March 10th.  There s also the possibility of a third webinar in the set because there are so many tips that we ve pushlished in the past decade.



If you re interested in the webinars, it s not too late to view the January 14th presentation.  The webinars  two-hour  live  sessions are recorded so that you can view them online for several weeks afterwards and can fit them into your schedule. For more information, visit EclipseWebinars.com.





<> Wil Wilcox:  Windows File-and-Folder Shortcuts



Shortcuts are small files that point to other files.  In particular, shortcuts can point to Eclipse documents and folders.  Conveniently placed shortcuts on your Windows computer can save you lots of time navigating around to find the files and folders that you work with most.



With shortcuts you're not stuck hunting down files and other items within the Windows program file directory and can go straight to the folder or file that you want to work with.  The actual file, folder, or program remains stored in its original location.  You simply place an icon representing the shortcut in a convenient location, such as in another folder or on the desktop. 



This all sounds good, but what is the catch? A shortcut is only a link to an item. If you delete the shortcut, it will not delete the file or folder it points to.  If you move the file that the shortcut pointed to, such as into a file archive, the shortcut will no longer work.



One of the best ways to get started using shortcuts is to place a shortcut to your Eclipse documents folder on your desktop.  To do this, when you're in Eclipse, press CTRL-F, and while still holding down the control key press F again or CTRL-F-F for short.  The Windows file manager will open.  Right click on your Jobs Folder and select Send to Desktop (create shortcut).  Now when you click that shortcut from the desktop of your computer your Jobs folder will open up in Eclipse and you're ready to go.  Once you get used to this idea, you'll find that you want to create shortcuts all over your computer.



So how would you use shortcuts to files?  Let's say that when you open your Jobs folder, you have many transcripts listed there and you have to scroll to find the one you want to work on.  You could create a new folder within your jobs folder where you could place shortcuts to the transcripts you are currently working on or that have been ordered to be produced. 



When you've edited the transcript that the shortcut points to, simply delete the shortcut from the shortcut folder, which does not delete the actual file itself.  By clicking on this new folder, you will only see the outstanding transcripts that you have and will not be burdened by looking through all of them.  



To give this a whirl and set this system of shortcuts to transcript files up, you need to once again be in the Windows Explorer.  So press CTRL-F-F and click on your Jobs folder to open it up.  Right click anywhere within that folder.  Click New Folder and name it 1-Pending Jobs or 1-Transcripts Ordered, 1-Shortcuts, etc.  I put the number 1 before the shortcut folder's name so that your new folder will be listed at the top of your transcripts list and is easier to find that way.



Now you're ready to add some transcript shortcuts to this folder.  Find the .ECL file of the transcript within your Eclipse Jobs Folder that you re working on.  Right click on it and click Create Shortcut.  Then just drag and drop that shortcut into your Pending Jobs folder that you created.  If you don't like dragging and dropping, the alternative is to right click anywhere within your shortcut folder, just not on a file, and click New and select Shortcut.  You will then browse for the file you want the shortcut to point to and be asked to name your shortcut.  To see your shortcuts in action just click on your Pending Jobs folder.  Then click on the shortcut and the transcript opens up.  Voila.



One more tip. You can name these shortcuts whatever you want.  For instance, if you named it  Due 3-17-10  followed by the name of the transcript, your transcript would be listed in the order that it is due.  (Forgive me for this, but you also now know one of my sons  birthdays.  He is turning 4 that day.)



I'm sure that you'll come up with many ways to use Windows files-and-folders shortcuts. Now if someone could just give me a shortcut to getting transcripts done.





<> Keith Vincent:  Auto-Brief Helps with Newly Spelled Names



New names can frustrate even experienced reporters. It s especially awkward during realtime transcription when  Higuera  comes out as  had I engineer are a.   



With Auto-Brief, Total Eclipse makes it possible for new names to come out perfectly the first time and also easy to write each time thereafter.  When you write a word or name that takes at least five steno strokes, Eclipse immediately creates a shortcut for you.
	
Alphabet strokes are not my favorite steno, but I ve been getting better at them because of how they work with Auto-Brief. Some reporters use five or more sets of alphabet strokes.  For now I concentrate on two alphabets -- one for upper-case letters and one for lower-case letters.



A-FPLT is the steno that I use for capital  A .  It s defined as {&A} in my main dictionary.  The ampersand here is the  glue  symbol.  So when this  A  is part of a sequence of letters that each contain the  glue  symbol, the letters stick to each other without intervening spaces, but they do not stick to ordinary words that come before or after. An upper-case alphabet like this is obviously very helpful for writing acronyms like CAT and also for writing the first letter of a name.



A* is the steno that I used for lower-case  a .  Define it as either {&a} or {^}a.  Defining it as {&a} uses the  glue  symbol.  So this letter would attach itself without spaces when it s written in a set of letters that each contain the  glue  symbol.  



You can also define your lower-case alphabet as {^}a and thus NOT use the  glue  symbol. This simply deletes the space that comes before the  a  -- rather like adding a suffix.  Since the  a  is not inside the braces, Eclipse is not being asked to make spelling adjustments; it s simply asked to hook on an  a .



I ve used both of these lower-case alphabets at one time or another.  Currently, {^}a is how I ve defined my little  a  because I often add a few letters to a common word in order to form a less common one.  For instance, I could write  concert  and then add an  o  to form  concerto.   



The ^{a} will always delete a space to attach an  a .  If I want to spell a word that begins with  a , I ll need to start off with a  force space  stroke.  I would not need to do that if my lower-case  a  was defined as {&a}.  Thus, if you find that you spell a lot of words that start with a lower-case letter, then use the {&a} approach.  If you more often attach letters to existing words, use the {^}a approach.    



So you ve written a word that took at least five steno strokes.  As soon as you move on to the next word, you Auto-Brief suggest a shortcut for your word or name that took so many strokes.  In other words, you won t have to write it a second time before Auto-Brief offers its help.