Selecting Text

Selecting Text

In Atlantis you can select (mark) any unbroken fragment of text within a document window.

The selected text is displayed in inverse colors. For example, if the unselected text is displayed with black font color on white background, then the same text but selected is displayed with white font color on black background.

Each open document can contain a single selected fragment in the same time. In other words, you cannot select two different fragments of the same document simultaneously.

The term selection is very important for Atlantis as well as for other word processors. The most Atlantis operations are applied either exclusively to the selected text, or are applied to the selected text if any.

Atlantis offers various ways for selecting text using the keyboard as well as the mouse.

Selecting Text With the Keyboard

You might be already familiar with the most Atlantis hot keys that are used to move the cursor within the active document.

You should memorize a very simple rule about how to select text with the keyboard.

When pressing the hot keys that change the location of the cursor, you can hold the Shift key to select the text from the previous cursor position to its new position.
In other words, by holding the Shift key when the cursor is being moved, you expand the selected fragment.

Let's conduct an experiment.

Let's imagine that our document contains the only sentence Selecting Text....

As you see, the caret is located before the first character of this sentence.
Now let's press the Right Arrow key to move the cursor one character right.

The cursor is between the first and second characters.

Let's back the caret to the beginning of the document again.

Now we hold the Shift key, and press the Right Arrow key again.

The cursor is actually between the first and second characters (though you cannot see it) but the text between the initial cursor position and the recent one has became selected.

We can press the Right Arrow again to expand the selection to the right (note that the Shift key is still held).

You can use the Shift key in conjunction with other hot keys that move the cursor.
The example. The Ctrl+Right Arrow moves the cursor one word right. But the Ctrl+Shift+Right Arrow keys expand the selection one word right.

Also you can use the following hot keys to select text.

  1. Ctrl+K, T selects the word closest to the current cursor position.
  2. Ctrl+K, L selects the current line.
  3. Ctrl+K, E selects the sentence closest to the current cursor position.
  4. Ctrl+K, P selects the current paragraph.
  5. Ctrl+K, G selects the current page.
  6. Ctrl+A selects the whole active document.

Selecting Text With the Mouse

The classical technics for selecting text is:

  1. Place the cursor to the beginning of the text fragment that you wish to select (simply click this beginning).
  2. Hold the left mouse button down.
  3. Drag the mouse to the end of the fragment that you wish to select (do not release the left mouse button when dragging).
  4. Release the left mouse button when the desired fragment is selected.

Also Atlantis offers many additional ways for quick selecting with the mouse.

  1. You can quickly select a word with a double-click.
  2. You can quickly select a line of text by aiming your mouse pointer at it from the left margin and clicking your left button.
  3. You can select a sentence in a flash by holding down the Ctrl key and giving the sentence a left click.
  4. You can quickly select a paragraph by double-clicking its left margin, or triple-clicking any word of that paragraph.
  5. You can quickly select a whole document by holding down the Ctrl key and clicking its left margin.
  6. You can quickly select a whole document by triple-clicking its left margin.
  7. You can select several whole sentences with the mouse. Hold down the Ctrl key, aim your mouse pointer at the start of your intended selection, press your mouse left button, then move the mouse pointer over the text you want to select.
    Release mouse button and Ctrl key when your selection is complete.
  8. You can select several whole paragraphs with the mouse. Double-click the first paragraph left margin but do not release the left mouse button after the second click. Move the mouse pointer over the text you want to select.
    Release the mouse button when your selection is complete.
  9. You can select several whole paragraphs with the mouse. Triple-click inside the first paragraph but do not release the left mouse button after the third click. Move the mouse pointer over the text you want to select.
    Release the mouse button when your selection is complete.
  10. You can quickly select a large fragment of document. Place the text cursor at the start of your intended selection. Hold down the Shift key, position your mouse cursor at the end of the selection, then click with your left button.

Tip:

When you select text with the mouse, and the Select Whole Words Automatically option (the Tools | Options... command, Edit tab) is on, Atlantis will expand the selection by whole words regarding whether you have fully captured with the mouse all the words of the selected fragment. So you simply have to drag the mouse pointer over any point of a particular word to completely select it.
If this option is off, Atlantis always selects text with the mouse "character by character".

See also...

Working With Column Blocks