Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
I've written many of these complex macros that involve serious programming, and while I
can say confidently that it's not nearly as bad as working in VBA or even AppleScript, it's
different
. And the way you construct the commands and routines to do these nifty things is
far from obvious.
Unfortunately, there's not room here for me to get into the finer points of the language. You
can get some guidance from the Nisus Writer Pro macro reference—choose Help > Macro
Language Reference in Nisus Writer. That document contains all (well, nearly all) of the
commands in the language, and a number of examples. But candidly, it wasn't written for the
layperson. The macro language itself isn't unduly complicated, but the documentation makes
it seem harder than it is. Someone ought to write a better guide. Maybe one day, somebody
will.
In the meantime, I recommend the same thing for learning Nisus Writer Pro macros as I
recommend elsewhere in this topic for VBA and AppleScript: start with things other people
have written (including the 50+ macros included with Nisus Writer Pro), try modifying them
a little bit, and once you get the hang of that, start exploring new commands and features.
Use Multi-Key Shortcuts in Nisus Writer Pro
Nisus Writer Pro lets you assign a keyboard shortcut to any command, including macros
you create yourself. That isn't unusual. What
is
unusual, and extremely cool, is that you're
not limited to modifier keys and a single character (like Command-P or
Command-Option-Shift-I). Youcandoallthat,butyoucanalsohavekeyboardshortcutsthat
are
sequences
of keys.
For example, there's a menu command that capitalizes the first letter of each selected word:
Edit > Convert > To Capitalized. You could assign Command-Control-Shift-C to it, but
that's hard to remember. What's easy to remember is Command-C-A-P. That is, hold down
Command while typing C, and then A, and then P. Cool, no?
Multi-key shortcuts are much easier to remember, because you can build in more mnemonic
clues. How about:
•
Save As:
Command-S-A
•
Save As PDF:
Command-P-D-F
•
Replace and Find:
Command-R-F
•
Page Break:
Command-P-B
•
12 (font size):
Command-1-2
