Quick Question

[Thasaidon]

Hi

While the cursor is on an opening tag s there a way of highlighting/showing its closing tag?

I checked the Manual and searched the forum but did not spot anything.

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by Thasaidon

While the cursor is on an opening tag s there a way of highlighting/showing its closing tag?

AFAIK, that's not possible. What you can do is install a Scintilla-based editor, e.g. Notepad++ (freeware), and assign it to Sigil's Open With menu. (Notepad++ will automatically highlight the closing tag.)

[BetterRed]

FWIW - the calibre editor highlights corresponding closing and opening tags - that's one of the reasons I sometimes use it.

BR

[Thasaidon]

Thank you for the info Doitsu and BetterRed.

I thought that might be the case.

I already use the Calibre Editor and have Notepad++ (but do not open it from Sigil) installed so I can follow up on your advice.

[KevinH]

You do not want to move the cursor to the end tag, correct? You simply want to highlight the corresponding end tag with some colour other than the current tag syntax highlighting right?

If so I can look into adding that for a future release, although when it gets hard to see tags pairings I simply run mend and prettify so that indentation will show what goes with what.

[Doitsu]

Originally Posted by KevinH

You do not want to move the cursor to the end tag, correct? You simply want to highlight the corresponding end tag with some colour other than the current tag syntax highlighting right?

BTW, in Scintilla-based editors, the end tag has the same highlight color as the start tag. (Highlighting also works in reverse, i.e., clicking the end tag will highlight the start tag.)

[Mister L]

Originally Posted by KevinH

You do not want to move the cursor to the end tag, correct? You simply want to highlight the corresponding end tag with some colour other than the current tag syntax highlighting right?

If so I can look into adding that for a future release, although when it gets hard to see tags pairings I simply run mend and prettify so that indentation will show what goes with what.

I would also find tag pair highlighting very useful, thank you.

[BetterRed]

Originally Posted by Doitsu

BTW, in Scintilla-based editors, the end tag has the same highlight color as the start tag. (Highlighting also works in reverse, i.e., clicking the end tag will highlight the start tag.)

I miss having block collapse/expand (fold/unfold) as much, or more, than I miss having tag start/end highlighting.

BR

[KevinH]

If you want block collapse and expand, use the Inspector as it is already present and built-in, or as Doitsu said, use open-with and an editor of your choice.

I personally like to edit text not dom trees stored in Widget tree views.

[DiapDealer]

I can do without any of it, myself.

I personally can't find a use case for being able to quickly see the closing tag of the opening tag I clicked on. And block collapse drives me bonkers. I keep thinking I deleted something whenever I invariably collapse a section accidentally. It's like the light in the frig: I have to keep checking to reassure myself that the hidden code is actually still there!

But highlighting the closing tag seems innocent enough. People other than myself are clearly comforted by it somehow--else it wouldn't be so prevalent in editors. There'll be no opposition from me.

Personally, I feel that if you can't easily see the closing tag without special highlighting, then the markup you're editing is a mess. In those cases, I use a parsing tool to clean it up so I don't have to worry about manually deleting the wrong tag in a ridiculously convoluted span/div rat's nest.

[KevinH]

In many ways I agree with DiapDealer. Wouldn't it be better to highlight a entire tag in one right click (from start to end inclusive) for later processing with clips? Wouldn't that be more useful than just highlighting the end tag?

[Thasaidon]

Originally Posted by KevinH

In many ways I agree with DiapDealer. Wouldn't it be better to highlight a entire tag in one right click (from start to end inclusive) for later processing with clips? Wouldn't that be more useful than just highlighting the end tag?

Yes that would be better and more useful.

I was looking for help with what I thought could be a problem. I have investigated further and found I was wrong (Surprise, surprise :-D). What I thought could be a problem , in fact is not.

I am now wondering "how the bleep did that fix that problem? When I processed that book.

[un_pogaz]

In the case of ePub editing, the block collapse system is useless (really handy to browse a big XML with a complex hierarchy system)
Nevertheless, highlighting the open/close tag of an element would be a nice addition. Advanced hierarchies are rare, but a little help is welcome.

Case study, which I really got:

Spoiler:

<body class="content">
  <div id="unnumbered-5" class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" role="doc-chapter" epub:type="chapter">
    <div class="heading" id="unnumbered-5-heading">
      <div class="heading-contents">
        <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block">
          <div class="element-number-block">
          </div>
          <div class="heading-image-block">
            <div class="heading-image-size-container">
              <img src="../images/00003.jpeg" alt="" class="heading-image-image" data-amznremoved="mobi7"/>
              <img height="120" alt="" class="heading-image-image1" src="../images/00002.jpeg" width="129" data-amznremoved-m8="true"/>
            </div>
            <h1 class="title" id="calibre_pb_0">Chapitre 5</h1>
          </div>
          <h2 class="subtitle" id="calibre_pb_1">Kai</h2>
        </div>
      </div>
    </div>
    <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" id="unnumbered-5-text">
      <p class="pcalibre first1">corp texte</p>
      ...

Originally, I had to merge several HTML pages because each tag <h1> had caused a separation into individual pages.

Spoiler:

Page 1

Spoiler:

<body class="content">
  <div id="unnumbered-5" class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" role="doc-chapter" epub:type="chapter">
    <div class="heading" id="unnumbered-5-heading">
      <div class="heading-contents">
        <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block">
          <div class="element-number-block">
          </div>
          <div class="heading-image-block">
            <div class="heading-image-size-container">
              <img src="../images/00003.jpeg" alt="" class="heading-image-image" data-amznremoved="mobi7"/>
              <img height="120" alt="" class="heading-image-image1" src="../images/00002.jpeg" width="129" data-amznremoved-m8="true"/>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
 </div>
</div>
</body>

Page 2

Spoiler:

<body class="content">
  <div id="unnumbered-5" class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" role="doc-chapter" epub:type="chapter">
    <div class="heading" id="unnumbered-5-heading">
      <div class="heading-contents">
        <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block">
          <div class="heading-image-block">
            <h1 class="title" id="calibre_pb_0">Chapitre 5</h1>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</body>

Page 2

Spoiler:

<body class="content">
  <div id="unnumbered-5" class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" role="doc-chapter" epub:type="chapter">
    <div class="heading" id="unnumbered-5-heading">
      <div class="heading-contents">
        <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block">
          <h2 class="subtitle" id="calibre_pb_1">Kai</h2>
        </div>
      </div>
    </div>
    <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" id="unnumbered-5-text">
      <p class="pcalibre first1">corp texte</p>
      ...

After merging and before cleaning

Spoiler:

<body class="content">
  <div id="unnumbered-5" class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" role="doc-chapter" epub:type="chapter">
    <div class="heading" id="unnumbered-5-heading">
      <div class="heading-contents">
        <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block">
          <div class="element-number-block">
          </div>
          <div class="heading-image-block">
            <div class="heading-image-size-container">
              <img src="../images/00003.jpeg" alt="" class="heading-image-image" data-amznremoved="mobi7"/>
              <img height="120" alt="" class="heading-image-image1" src="../images/00002.jpeg" width="129" data-amznremoved-m8="true"/>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
  <div id="unnumbered-5" class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" role="doc-chapter" epub:type="chapter">
    <div class="heading" id="unnumbered-5-heading">
      <div class="heading-contents">
        <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block">
          <div class="heading-image-block">
            <h1 class="title" id="calibre_pb_0">Chapitre 5</h1>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
</div>
  <div id="unnumbered-5" class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" role="doc-chapter" epub:type="chapter">
    <div class="heading" id="unnumbered-5-heading">
      <div class="heading-contents">
        <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block">
          <h2 class="subtitle" id="calibre_pb_1">Kai</h2>
</div>
</div>
</div>
    <div class="title-page-contributor-primary-block" id="unnumbered-5-text">
      <p class="pcalibre first1">corp texte</p>
      ...

Well, a bit of REGEX, that's what it does. But it would have helped me a lot.

EDIT: Another practical case is to find the end of an inline element in a large block of text :

Spoiler:

Lorem ipsum <i>dolor sit amet, <b>consectetuer adipiscing elit. Duis sem velit</b>, ultrices et, fermentum auctor, rhoncus ut, ligula. Phasellus at purus sed purus cursus iaculis. Suspendisse fermentum. Pellentesque et arcu. Maecenas viverra. In consectetuer, lorem eu lobortis egestas, velit odio imperdiet eros, sit amet sagittis nunc mi ac neque. Sed non ipsum. Nullam venenatis gravida orci</i>. Curabitur nunc ante, ullamcorper vel, auctor a, aliquam at, tortor. <i>Etiam sodales orci nec ligula. Sed at turpis vitae velit euismod aliquet. Fusce venenatis ligula in pede. Pellentesque viverra dolor non nunc. Donec interdum vestibulum libero. Morbi volutpat. Phasellus hendrerit. Quisque dictum quam vel neque. Quisque aliquam, nulla ac scelerisque convallis, nisi ligula sagittis risus, at nonummy arcu urna pulvinar nibh. Nam pharetra.</i>

[Tex2002ans]

Originally Posted by un_pogaz

Nevertheless, highlighting the open/close tag of an element would be a nice addition. Advanced hierarchies are rare, but a little help is welcome.

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

Personally, I feel that if you can't easily see the closing tag without special highlighting, then the markup you're editing is a mess.

Not necessarily. For example, I work on a lot of HTML articles -> EPUB.

<a> links can be extremely long and turn into visual spaghetti:

<a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/column-minimum-wage-lowers-employment-teens-low-skill-workers"><i>PBS</i></a>

or:

<a href="https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/column-minimum-wage-lowers-employment-teens-low-skill-workers">https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/column-minimum-wage-lowers-employment-teens-low-skill-workers</a>

Toss in a few classes or tons of URLs close together (an Index with page numbers), and you can quickly get tough-to-visualize sections, even with the help of Syntax Highlighting.

Also, tables, tables, tables. You mend/prettify, and even though the indentation levels help, those things can get hideously large.

[DiapDealer]

Hey, I'm not opposed. I just don't get it. Still.

Those a tag lines you posted look imminently readable to me with no highlighting. How exactly does highlighting the closing tag help though? No one has still given me a reason that makes sense to me. What can you do with the closing tag highlighted that you couldn't do with without it highlighted? Inquiring minds want to do know. I'm assuming it's something more than, "Hey look! There's the closing tag right there. Look at that puppy in all its highlighted glory."