t2html - Simple text to HTML converter. Relies on text indentation rules.
Convert pure text files into nice looking, possibly framed, HTML pages.
Requirements for the input ascii files
The file must be written in Technical Format, whose layout is described in the this manual. Basicly the idea is simple and there are only two heading levels: one at column 0 and the other at column 4 (halfway between the tab width). Standard text starts at column 8 (the position after pressed tab-key).
The idea of technical format is that each column represents different rendering layout in the generated HTML. There is no special markup needed in the text file, so you can use the text version as a master copy of a FAQ etc. Bullets, numbered lists, word emphasis and quotation etc. can expressed in natural way.
HTML description
The generated HTML includes embedded Cascading Style Sheet 2 (CSS2) and a small piece of Java code. The CSS2 is used to colorize the page loyout and to define suitable printing font sizes. The generated HTML also takes an approach to support XHTML. See page http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/#guidelines where the backward compatibility recommendations are outlined:
Legal HTML XHTML requires
<P> <p> ..</p>
<BR> <br></br>
<HR> <hr></hr>
XHTML does not support fragment identifiers #foo, with the name element,
but uses id instead. For backward compatibility both elements are
defined:
< ..name="tag"> Is now <.. name="tag" id="tag">
NOTE: This program was never designed to be used for XHTML and the strict XHTML validity is not to be expected.
Motivation
The easiest format to write large documents, like FAQs, is text. A text file offers WysiWyg editing and it can be turned easily into HTML format. Text files are easily maintained and there is no requirements for special text editors. Any text editor like notepad, vi, Emacs can be used to maintain the documents.
Text files are also the only sensible format if documents are kept under version control like RCS, CVS, SVN, Arch, Perforce, ClearCase. They can be asily compared with diff and patches can be easily received and sent to them.
To help maintining large documents, there is also available an Emacs minor mode, package called tinytf.el, which offers text fontification with colors, Indentation control, bullet filling, heading renumbering, word markup, syntax highlighting etc. See project http://freecode.net/projects/emacs-tiny-tools
To convert text file into HTML:
t2html [options] file.txt > file.html
In addition to making HTML pages, program includes feature to check broken links and report them in egrep -n like fashion:
t2html --Link-check-single --quiet file.txt
To check links from multiple pages and cache good links to separate file, use --Link-cache option. The next link check will run much faster because cached valid links will not be fetched again. At regular intervals delete the link cache file to force complete check.
t2html --Link-check-single --Link-cache ~/tmp/link.cache \
--quiet file.txt
In case there are need for slides, is is possible to plit big document into pieces according to toplevel headings:
t2html --S1 --SN | t2html --simple -Out
Any extra HTML formatting or text manipulation is suppressed. Text is preserved as it appears in file. Use this option if you plan to deliver or and print the text as seen.
o If file contains "Table of Contents" it is not removed
o Table of Content block is not created (it usually would)
Author of document e.g. --author "John Doe"
The text that appears at the footer is read from this file. If not given
the default copyright text is added. Options --quiet and
--simple suppress disclaimers.
Name of the document or filename. You could list all alternative URLs to the document with this option.
The contact address of the author of the document. Must be pure email address with no "<" and ">" characters included. Eg. --email foo@example.com
--email "<me@here.com>" WRONG
--email "me@here.com" right
Print minimum footer only: contact, email and date. Use --quiet to
completely discard footer.
Allow processing embedded #T2HTML-<tag> directives inside file. See full
explanation by reading topic EMBEDDED DIRECTIVES INSIDE TEXT. By
default, you do not need to to supply this option - it is "on" by default.
To disregard embedded directives in text file, supply "no" option: --not2html-tags.
The title text that appears in top frame of browser.
Location of the HTML file. When --document gave the name, this gives the location. This information is printed at the Footer.
URL location of the HTML file in the destination site where it will be put available. This option is needed only if the document is hosted on a FTP server (rare, but possible). A FTP server based document cannot use Table Of Contents links (fragment #tag identifiers) unless HTML tag BASE is also defined.
The argument can be full URL to the document:
--base ftp://ftp.example.com/file.html
--base ftp://ftp.example.com/
Add additional [toc] navigation button to the end of each heading. This may be useful in long non-framed HTML files.
Buttons are placed at the top of document in order: [previous][top][next] and --button-* options define the URLs.
If URL is string none then no button is inserted. This may be handy if the buttons are defined by a separate program. And example using Perl:
#!/usr/bin/perl
my $top = "index.html"; # set defaults
my $prev = "none";
my $next = "none";
# ... somewhere $prev or $next may get set, or then not
qx(t2html --button-top "$top" --button-prev "$prev" --button-next "$next" ...);
# End of sample program
URL to go to previous document or string none.
URL to go to next document or string none.
You can add any custom references (tags) inside text and get them expand to any value. This option can be given multiple times and every occurrance of TAG is replaced with VALUE. E.g. when given following options:
--reference "#HOME-URL=http://www.example.com/dir";
--reference "#ARCHIVE-URL=http://www.example.com/dir/dir2";
When referenced in text, the generated HTML includes expanded expanded to values. An example text:
The homepage is #HOME-URL/page.html and the mirrot page it at
#ARCHIVE-URL/page.html where you can find the latest version.
See above. String that is used to split the TAG and VALUE. Default is equal sign "=".
Display URLs (contructed from headings) that build up the Table of Contents (NAME AHREF tags) in a document. The list is outputted to stderr, so that it can be separated:
% t2html --Toc-url-print tmp.txt > file.html 2> toc-list.txt
Where would you need this? If you want to know the fragment identifies for your file, you need the list of names.
http://www.example.com/myfile.html#fragment-identifier
This option affects how the code section (column 12) is rendered. Normally the section is surrounded with a <pre>..</pre> codes, but with this options, something more fancier is used. The code is wrapped inside a <table>...</table> and the background color is set to a shade of gray.
Option --css-code-bg is required to activate this option. A special word
defined using regexp (defualt is 'Note:') will mark code sections specially.
The first word is matched against the supplied Perl regexp.
The supplied regexp must not, repeat, must not, include any matching group
operators. This simply means, that grouping parenthesis like
(one|two|three) are not allowed. You must use the Perl non-grouping ones
like (?:one|two|three). Please refer to perl manual page [perlre] if
this short introduction did not give enough rope.
With this options, instead of rendering column 12 text with <pre>..</pre>, the text appears just like regular text, but with a twist. The background color of the text has been changed to darker grey to visually stand out form the text.
An example will clarify. Suppose that you passed options --css-code-bg and --css-code-note='(?:Notice|Note):', which instructed to treat the first paragraphs at column 12 differently. Like this:
This is the regular text that appears somewhere at column 8.
It may contain several lines of text in this paragraph.
Notice: Here is the special section, at column 12,
and the first word in this paragraph is 'Notice:'.
Only that makes this paragraph at column 12 special.
Now, we have some code to show to the user:
for ( i = 0; i++; i < 10 )
{
// Doing something in this loop
}
One note, text written with initial special word, like Notice:,
must all fit in one full pragraph. Any other paragraphs that follow,
are rendered as code sections. Like here:
This is the regular text that appears somewhere
It may contain several lines of text in this paragraph
Notice: Here is the special section, at column 12,
and the first word in this paragraph is 'Notice:'
which makes it special
Hoewver, this paragraph IS NOT rendered specially
any more. Only the first paragraph above.
for ( i = 0; i++; i < 10 )
{
// Doing something in this loop
}
As if this were not enough, there are some special table control directives that let you control the <table>..</table> which is put around the code section at column 12. Here are few examples:
Here is example 1
#t2html::td:bgcolor=#F7F7DE
for ( i = 0; i++; i < 10 )
{
// Doing something in this loop
}
Here is example 2
#t2html::td:bgcolor=#F7F7DE:tableborder:1
for ( i = 0; i++; i < 10 )
{
// Doing something in this loop
}
Here is example 3
#t2html::td:bgcolor="#FFFFFF":tableclass:dashed
for ( i = 0; i++; i < 10 )
{
// Doing something in this loop
}
Here is example 4
#t2html::td:bgcolor="#FFFFFF":table:border=1_width=94%_border=0_cellpadding="10"_cellspacing="0"
for ( i = 0; i++; i < 10 )
{
// Doing something in this loop
}
Looks cryptic? Cannot help that and in order for you to completely understand what these directives do, you need to undertand what elements can be added to the <table> and <td> tokens. Refer to HTML specification for available attributes. Here is briefing what you can do:
The start command is:
#t2html::
|
After this comes attribute pairs in form key:value
and multiple ones as key1:value1:key2:value2 ...
The key:value pairs can be:
td:ATTRIBUTES
|
This is converted into <td attributes>
table:ATTRIBUTES
|
This is converted into <table attributes>
There can be no spaces in the ATTRIBUTES, because the First-word must
be one contiguous word. An underscore can be used in place of space:
table:border=1_width=94%
|
Interpreted as <table border="1" width="94%">
It is also possible to change the default CLASS style with word
tableclass. In order the CLASS to be useful, its CSS definitions must be
either in the default configuration or supplied from a external file.
See option --script-file.
tableclass:name
|
Interpreted as <table class="name">
For example, there are couple of default styles that can be used:
1) Here is CLASS "dashed" example
#t2html::tableclass:dashed
for ( i = 0; i++; i < 10 )
{
// Doing something in this loop
}
2) Here is CLASS "solid" example:
#t2html::tableclass:solid
for ( i = 0; i++; i < 10 )
{
// Doing something in this loop
}
You can change any individual value of the default table definition which is:
<table class="shade-note">
To change e.g. only value cellpadding, you would say:
#t2html::table:tablecellpadding:2
If you are unsure what all of these were about, simply run program with --test-page and look at the source and generated HTML files. That should offer more rope to experiment with.
Include <LINK ...> which refers to external CSS style definition source. This option is ignored if --script-file option has been given, because that option imports whole content inside HEAD tag. This option can appear multiple times and the external CSS files are added in listed order.
Set the BODY element's font defintion to CSS-DEFINITION. The default value used is the regular typeset used in newspapers and books:
--css-font-type='font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;'
Set the body element's font size to CSS-DEFINITION. The default font size is expressed in points:
--css-font-size="font-size: 12pt;"
Delete lines matching perl REGEXP. This is useful if you use some document tool that uses navigation tags in the text file that you do not want to show up in generated HTML.
Delete email headers at the beginning of file, until first empty line that starts the body. If you keep your document ready for Usenet news posting, they may contain headers and body:
From: ...
Newsgroups: ...
X-Sender-Info:
Summary:
BODY-OF-TEXT
Use this option to suppress default text deletion (which is on).
Emacs folding.el package and vi can be used with any text or
programming language to place sections of text between tags {{{ and
}}}. You can open or close such folds. This allows keeping big
documents in order and manageable quite easily. For Emacs support,
see. ftp://ftp.csd.uu.se/pub/users/andersl/beta/
The default value deletes these markers and special comments
#_comment which make it possible to cinlude your own notes which
are not included in the generated output.
{{{ Security section
#_comment Make sure you revise this section to #_comment the next release
The seecurity is an important issue in everyday administration... More text ...
}}}
Additional attributes to add to HTML tag <BODY>. You could e.g. define language of the text with --html-body LANG=en which would generate HTML tag <BODY LANG="en"> See section "SEE ALSO" for ISO 639.
The default interpretation of columns 1,2,3 5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12 can be changed with beg and end swithes. Columns 0,4 can't be changed because they are reserved for headings. Here are some samples:
--html-column-beg="7quote <em class='quote7'>"
--html-column-end="7quote </em>"
--html-column-beg="10 <pre> class='column10'"
--html-column-end="10 </pre>"
--html-column-beg="quote <span class='word'>"
--html-column-end="quote </span>"
Note: You can only give specifications up till column 12. If text is beyound column 12, it is interpreted like it were at column 12.
In addition to column number, the SPEC can also be one of the following strings
Spec equivalent word markup
------------------------------
quote `'
bold _
emp *
small +
big =
ref [] like: [Michael] referred to [rfc822]
Other available Specs
------------------------------
7quote When column 7 starts with double quote.
For style sheet values for each color, refer to class attribute and use --script-file option to import definitions. Usually /usr/lib/X11/rgb.txt lists possible color values and the HTML standard at http://www.w3.org/ defines following standard named colors:
Black #000000 Maroon #800000
Green #008000 Navy #000080
Silver #C0C0C0 Red #FF0000
Lime #00FF00 Blue #0000FF
Gray #808080 Purple #800080
Olive #808000 Teal #008080
White #FFFFFF Fuchsia #FF00FF
Yellow #FFFF00 Aqua #00FFFF
See --html-column-beg
Define FONT SIZE. It might be useful to set bigger font size for presentations.
If given, then three separate HTML files are generated. The left frame will
contain TOC and right frame contains rest of the text. The FRAME-PARAMS
can be any valid parameters for HTML tag FRAMESET. The default is
cols="25%,75%".
Using this implies --Out option automatically, because three files cannot be printed to stdout.
file.html
--> file.html The Frame file, point browser here
file-toc.html Left frame (navigation)
file-body.html Right frame (content)
Use language ID, a two character ISO identifier like "en" for English during the generation of HTML. This only affects the text that is shown to end-user, like text "Table Of contents". The default setting is "en". See section "SEE ALSO" for standards ISO 639 and ISO 3166 for proper codes.
The selected langauge changes propgram's internal arrays in two ways: 1) Instead of default "Table of ocntents" heading the national langaugage equivalent will be used 2) The text "Pic" below embedded sequentially numbered pictures will use natinal equivalent.
If your languagae is not supported, please send the phrase for "Table of contents" and word "Pic" in your langauge to the maintainer.
Include java code that must be complete <script...></script> from FILE. The code is put inside <head> of each HTML.
The --script-file is a general way to import anything into the HEAD element. Eg. If you want to keep separate style definitions for all, you could only import a pointer to a style sheet. See 14.3.2 Specifying external style sheets in HTML 4.0 standard.
Meta keywords. Used by search engines. Separate kwywords like "AA, BB, CC" with commas. Refer to HTML 4.01 specification and topic "7.4.4 Meta data" and see http://www.htmlhelp.com/reference/wilbur/ and
--meta-keywords "AA,BB,CC"
Meta description. Include description string, max 1000 characters. This is used by search engines. Refer to HTML 4.01 specification and topic "7.4.4 Meta data"
First 1-4 words from the heading are used for the HTML name tags. However, it is possible that two same headings start with exactly the same 1-4 words. In those cases you have to turn on this option. It will use counter 00 - 999 instead of words from headings to construct HTML name references.
Please use this option only in emergencies, because referring to jump block name via
httpI://example.com/doc.html#header_name
is more convenient than using obscure reference
httpI://example.com/doc.html#11
In addition, each time you add a new heading the number changes, whereas the symbolic name picked from heading stays as long as you do not change the heading. Think about welfare of your netizens who bookmark you pages. Try to make headings to not have same subjects and you do not need this option.
Convert file only if tag #T2HTML- is found from file. This option
is handy if you run a batch command to convert all files to HTML, but
only if they look like HTML base files:
find . -name "*.txt" -type f \
-exec t2html --Auto-detect --verbose --Out {} \;
The command searches all *.txt files under current directory and feeds
them to conversion program. The --Auto-detect only converts files
which include #T2HTML- directives. Other text files are not
converted.
Check all http and ftp links. This option is supposed to be run standalone Option --quiet has special meaning when used with link check.
With this option you can regularly validate your document and remove dead links or update moved links. Problematic links are outputted to stderr. This link check feature is available only if you have the LWP web library installed. Program will check if you have it at runtime.
Links that are big, e.g. which match tar.gz .zip ... or that run programs (links with ? character) are ignored because the GET request used in checking would return whole content of the link and it would. be too expensive.
A suggestion: When you put binary links to your documents, add them with space:
http://example.com/dir/dir/ filename.tar.gz
Then the program does check the http addresses. Users may not be able to get the file at one click, checker can validate at least the directory. If you are not the owner of the link, it is also possible that the file has moved of new version name has appeared.
Print condensed output in grep -n like manner FILE:LINE:MESSAGE
This option concatenates the url response text to single line, so that you can view the messages in one line. You can use programming tools (like Emacs M-x compile) that can parse standard grep syntax to jump to locations in your document to correct the links later.
write generated HTML to file that is derived from the input filename.
--Out --print /dir/file --> /dir/file.html
--Out --print /dir/file.txt --> /dir/file.html
--Out --print /dir/file.this.txt --> /dir/file.this.html
When links are checked periodically, it would be quite a rigorous to check every link every time that has already succeeded. In order to save link checking time, the "ok" links can be cached into separate file. Next time you check the links, the cache is opened and only links found that were not in the cache are checked. This should dramatically improve long searches. Consider this example, where every text file is checked recursively.
$ t2html --Link-check-single \
--quiet --Link-cache ~tmp/link.cache \
`find . -name "*.txt" -type f`
Like --Out, but chop the directory part and write output files to DIR. The following would generate the HTML file to current directory:
--Out-dir .
If you have automated tool that fills in the directory, you can use word none to ignore this option. The following is a no-op, it will not generate output to directory "none":
--Out-dir none
Print filename to stdout after HTML processing. Normally program prints no file names, only the generated HTML.
% t2html --Out --print page.txt
--> page.html
Print filename in URL format. This is useful if you want to check the layout immediately with your browser.
% t2html --Out --print-url page.txt | xargs lynx
--> file: /users/foo/txt/page.html
Split document into smaller pieces when REGEXP matches. Split commands are standalone, meaning, that it starts and quits. No HTML conversion for the file is engaged.
If REGEXP is found from the line, it is a start point of a split. E.g. to split according to toplevel headings, which have no numbering, you would use:
--split '^[A-Z]'
A sequential numbers, 3 digits, are added to the generated partials:
filename.txt-NNN
The split feature is handy if you want to generate slides from each heading: First split the document, then convert each part to HTML and finally print each part (page) separately to printer.
This is shorthand of --split command. Define regexp to split on toplevel heading.
This is shorthand of --split command. Define regexp to split on second level heading.
Additional directive for split commands. If you split e.g. by headings using --split1, it would be more informative to generate filenames according to first few words from the heading name. Suppose the heading names where split occur were:
Program guidelines
Conclusion
Then the generated partial filenames would be as follows.
FILENAME-program_guidelines
FILENAME-conclusion
Render using strict XHTML. This means using <hr/>, <br/> and paragraphs use <p>..</p>.
Note: this option is experimental. See BUGS
Turn on debug with positive LEVEL number. Zero means no debug.
Print help screen.
Print help in HTML format.
Print help page in Unix manual page format. You want to feed this output to nroff -man in order to read it.
Print the test page: HTML and example text file that demonstrates the capabilities.
Print to stderr time spent used for handling the file.
Print verbose messages.
Print no footer at all. This option has different meaning if --link-check option is turned on: print only errorneous links.
Print program version information.
This is simple text to HTML converter. Unlike other tools, this tries to minimize the use of text tags to format the document, The basic idea is to rely on indentation level, and the layout used is called 'Technical format' (TF)
--//-- decription start
0123456789 123456789 123456789 123456789 123456789 column numbers
Heading 1 starts from left with big letter
The column positions are currently undeined and may not
format correcly. Do ot place text at columns 1,2,3
This is heading2 at column 4 started with big letter
Standard text starts at column 8, you can *emphatize*
text or make it _strong_ and write =SmallText= or
+BigText+ show variable name `ThisIsAlsoVariable'.
You can `_*nest*_' `the' markup. more txt in this
paragraph txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt
Normal but colored text is between columns 5, 6
Emphatised text at column 7, like heading level 3
"Special <em> text at column 7 starts with double quote"
Another standard text block at column 8 txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
strong text at columns 9 and 11
Column 10 is normally reserved for quotations
Column 10 is normally reserved for quotations
Column 10 is normally reserved for quotations
Column 10 is normally reserved for quotations
Column 12 and further is reserved for code examples
Column 12 and further is reserved for code examples
All text here are surrounded by <pre> HTML codes
(This CODE column in affected by --css-code* options,
see more ideas from there.)
Heading2 at column 4 again
If you want something like Heading level 3, use colum 7 (bold)
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
[1998-09-10 comp.lang.perl.misc Mr. Foo said]
cited text cited text cited text cited text cited
text cited text cited text cited text cited text
cited text cited text cited text cited text cited
text cited text
[1998-09-10 comp.lang.perl.misc Mr. Bar said]
cited text cited text cited text cited text cited
text cited text cited text cited text cited text
cited text cited text cited text cited text cited
text cited text
If you want something like Heading level 3, use colum 7 (bold)
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
* Bullet 1 text starts at column 1
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
,txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
Notice that previous paragraph ends to P-comma
code, it tells this paragraph to continue in
bullet mode, otherwise this text at column 12
would be intepreted as code section surrpoundedn
by <pre> HTML codes.
* Bullet 2, text starts at column 12
* Bullet 3. Bullets are adviced to keep together
* Bullet 4. Bullets are adviced to keep together
. This is ordered list nbr 1, text starts at column 12
. This is ordered list nbr 2
. This is ordered list nbr 3
.This line has BR, notice the DOT-code at beginning
of line. It is efective only at columns 1..11,
because column 12 is reserved for code examples.
.This line has BR code and is displayed in line by itself.
.This line has BR code and is displayed in line by itself.
!! This adds an <hr> HTML code, text in line is marked with
!! <strong> <em>
"This is emphasised text starting at column 7"
.And this text is put after the previous line with BR code
"This starts as separate line just below previous one"
.And continues again as usual with BR code
See the document #URL-BASE/document.txt, where #URL-BASE
tag is substituted with contents of --base switch.
Make this email address clickable <account@example.com>
Do not make this email address clickable bar@example.com,
because it is only an example and not a real address. Notice
that the last one was not surrounded by <>. Common login names
like foo, bar, quux are also ignored automatically.
Also do not make < this@example.com> because there is extra
white spaces. This may be more convenient way to disable
email addresses temporarily.
Heading1 again at colum 0
Subheading at colum 4
And regular text, column 8 txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt txt
--//-- decription end
That is it, there is the whole layout described. More formally the rules of text formatting are secribed below.
There are only two heading levels in this style. Heading columns are 0 and 4 and the heading must start with big letter or number
at column 4, if the text starts with small letter, that line is interpreted as <strong>
A HTML <hr> mark is added just before printing heading at level 1.
The headings are gathered, the TOC is built and inserted to the beginning of HTML page. The HTML <name> references used in TOC are the first 4 sequential words from the headings. Make sure your headings are uniquely named, otherwise there will be same NAME references in the generated HTML. Spaces are converted into underscore when joining the words. If you can not write unique headings by four words, then you must use --name-uniq switch
The basic rules for positioning text in certain columns:
Text at column 0 is undefined if it does not start with big letter or number to indicate Heading level 1.
Text between colums 1-3 is marked with <em>
Column 4 is reserved for heading level 2
Text between colums 5-7 is marked with <strong>
Text at column 7 is <em> if the first character is double quote.
Column 10 is reserved for <em> text. If you want to quote someone or to add reference text, place the text in this column.
Text at colums 9,11 are marked with <strong>
Column 8 for text and special codes
Column 8 is reserved for normal text
At the start of text, at colum 8, there can be DOT-code or COMMA-code.
Column 12 is special
Column 12 is treated specially: block is started with <pre> and lines are marked as <samp></samp>. When the last text at column 12 is found, the block is closed with </pre> Note follwing example
txt txt txt ;evenly placed block, fine, do it like this
txt txt
txt txt txt txt ;Can not terminate the /pre, because last
txt txt txt txt ;column is not at 12
txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt
txt txt txt txt
;; Finalizing comment, now the text is evenly placed
If there is .(dot) at the beginning of a line and immediately
non-whitespace, then <br> code is added to the end of line.
.This line has BR code at the end.
While these two line are joined together
by your browser, depending on the frame width.
If there is ,(comma) then the <p> code is not inserted if the previous
line is empty. If you use both .(dot) and ,(comma), they must be in
order dot-comma. The ,(comma) works differently if it is used in bullet
A <p> is always added if there is separation of paragraphs, but when you are writing a bullet, there is a problem, because a bullet exist only as long as text is kept together
* This is a bullet and it has all text ketp together
even if there is another line in the bullet.
But to write bullets tat spread multiple paragraphs, you must instruct that those are to kept together and the text in next paragraph is not <sample> while it is placed at column 12
* This is a bullet and it has all text ketp together
,even if there is another line in the bullet.
This is new paragrah to the previous bullet and this is
not a text sample. See COMMa-code below.
* This is new bullet
// and this is code sample after bullet
if ( $flag ) { ..do something.. }
_this_ is intepreted as <strong class='word'>this</strong>
*this* is intepreted as <em class='word'>this</em>
`this' is intepreted as <sample class='word'>this</sample> `
Exra modifiers that can be mixed with the above. Usually if you want bigger font, CAPITALIZE THE WORDS.
=this= is intepreted as <span class="word-small">this</span>
+this+ is intepreted as <span class="word-big">this</span>
word [this] is intepreted as <span class="word-ref">this</span>
word[this] is intepreted as superscript. You can use like
this[1], multiple[(2)] and almost any[(ab)] and
imaginable[IV superscritps] as long as the left
bracket is attached to the word.
Stanadard special HTML entities can be added inside text in a normal way, either using sybolic names or the hash code. Here are exmples
× < > ≤ ≥ ≠ √ −
α β γ ÷
« » ‹ › - – —
≈ ≡ ∑ ƒ ∞
° ±
™ © ®
€ £ ¥
this feature is highly experimental. It is possible to embed pure HTML inside text in occasions, where e.g. some special formatting is needed. The isea is simple: you write HTML as usual but double every < and > characters, like:
<<p>>
The other rule is that all, let's repeat, ALL PURE HTML must be
kept together. There must be no line breaks between pure HTML
lines. This is invalid:
<<table>
<<tr>>one
<<tr>>two
<</table>>
The pure HTML must be written without separating newlines:
<<table>
<<tr>>one
<<tr>>two
<</table>>
This "doubling" affects normal text writing rules as well. If you write documents, where you describe Unix styled HERE-documents, you MUST NOT put the tokens next to each other:
bash$ cat<<EOF # DON'T! It will confuse parser.
one
EOF
You must write the above code example using spaces to prevent "<<" from interpreting as PURE HTML:
bash$ cat << EOF # RIGHT, add spaces
one
EOF
A !! (two exclamation marks) at text column (position 8) causes adding immediate <hr> code. any text after !! in the same line is written with <strong> <em> and inserted just after <hr> code, therefore the word formatting commands have no effect in this line.
All http and ftp references as well as <foo@example.com> email addresses are marked clickable. Email must have surrounding <> characters to be recognized.
If url is preceded with hyphen, it will not be clickable. If a string foo, bar, quux, test, site is found from url, then it is not counted as clickable.
<me@here.com> clickable
http://example.com clickable
< me@here.com> not clickable; contains space
<5dko56$1@news02.deltanet.com> Message-Id, not clickable
-http://example.com hyphen, not clickable
http://$EXAMPLE variable. not clickable
The bulletin table is contructed if there is "o" or "*" at column 8 and 3 spaces after it, so that text starts at column 12. Bulleted lines are adviced to be kept together; no spaces between bullet blocks.
The ordered list is started with ".", a dot, and written like bullet where text starts at column 12.
All line breaks are visible in your document, do not use more than one line break to separate paragraphs.
Very important is that there is only one line break after headings.
You can cancel obeying all embedded directives by supplying option --not2html-tags.
You can include these lines anywhere in the document and their content is included in HTML output. Each directive line must fit in one line and it cannot be broken to separate lines.
#T2HTML-TITLE <as passed option --title>
#T2HTML-EMAIL <as passed option --email>
#T2HTML-AUTHOR <as passed option --author>
#T2HTML-DOC <as passed option --doc>
#T2HTML-METAKEYWORDS <as passed option --meta-keywords>
#T2HTML-METADESCRIPTION <as passed option --meta-description>
You can pass command line options embedded in the file. Like if you wanted the CODE section (column 12) to be coloured with shade of gray, you could add:
#T2HTML-OPTION --css-code-bg
Or you could request turning on particular options. Notice that each line is exactly as you have passed the argument in command line. Imagine surrounding double quoted around lines that are arguments to the associated options.
#T2HTML-OPTION --as-is
#T2HTML-OPTION --quiet
#T2HTML-OPTION --language
#T2HTML-OPTION en
#T2HTML-OPTION --css-font-type
#T2HTML-OPTION Trebuchet MS
#T2HTML-OPTION --css-code-bg
#T2HTML-OPTION --css-code-note
#T2HTML-OPTION (?:Note|Notice|Warning):
You can also embed your own comments to the text. These are stripped away:
#T2HTML-COMMENT You comment here
#T2HTML-COMMENT You another comment here
#INCLUDE- command
This is used to include the content into current current position. The URL can be a filename reference, where every $VAR is subtituted from the environment variables. The tilde(~) expansion is not supported. The included filename is operating system supported path location.
A prefix raw: disables any normal formatting. The file content is
included as is.
The URL can also be a HTTP reference to a remote location, whose content is
included at the point. In case of remote content or when filename ends to
extension .html or .html, the content is stripped in order to make
the inclusion of the content possible. In picture below, only the lines
within the BODY, marked with !!, are included:
<html>
<head>
...
</head>
<body>
this text !!
and more of this !!
</body>
</html>
Examples:
#INCLUDE-$HOME/lib/html/picture1.html
#INCLUDE-http://www.example.com/code.html
#INCLUDE-raw:example/code.html
#PIC command is used to include pictures into the text
#PIC picture.png#Caption Text#Picture HTML attributes#align#
(1) (2) (3) (4)
1. The NAME or URL address of the picturere. Like image/this.png
2. The Text that appears below picture
3. Additional attributes that are attached inside <img> tag.
For <img width="200" height="200">, the line would
read:
#PIC some.png#Caption Text#width=200 length=200##
4. The position of image: "left" (default), "center", "right"
Note: The Caption Text will also become the ALT text of the image
which is used in case the browser is not capable of showing pictures.
You can suppress the ALT text with option --no-picture-alt.
#REF command is used for refering to HTML <name> tag inside current document. The whole command must be placed on one single line and cannot be broken to multiple lines. An example:
#REF #how_to_profile;(Note: profiling);
(1) (2)
1. The NAME HTML tag reference in current document, a single word.
This can also be a full URL link.
You can get NAME list by enabling --Toc-url-print option.
2. The clickable text is delimited by ; characters.
#URL tag can be used to embed URLs inline, so that the full
link is not visible. Only the shown text is used to jump to URL.
This directive cannot be broken to separate lines,
#URL<FULL-HTTP-LINK> <embedded inline text>
| |
| whitespace allowed here
Must be kept together
Like if written:
See search engine #URL<http://www.google.com>; <Google>
If there is heading 1, which is named exactly "Table of Contents", then all text up to next heading are discarded from the generated HTML file. This is done because program generates its own TOC. It is supposed that you use some text formatting program to generate the toc for you in .txt file and you do not maintain it manually. For example Emacs package tinytf.el can be used.
The most common mistake is that there are extra newlines in the document. Keeep one empty line between headings and text, keep one empty line between paragraphs, keep one empty line between body text and bullet. Make it your mantra: one one one ...
Next, you may have put text at wrong column position. Remember that the regular text is at column 8.
If generated HTML suddendly starts using only one font, eg <pre>, then you have forgot to close the block. Make it read even, like this:
Code block
Code block
Code block
;; Add empty comment here to "close" the code example at column 12
Headings start with a big letter or number, likein "Heading", not "heading". Double check the spelling.
To print the test page and show all the possibilities:
% t2html --test-page
To make simple HTML page without any meta information:
% t2html --title "Html Page Title" --author "Mr. Foo" \
--simple --Out --print file.txt
If you have periodic post in email format, use --delete-email-headers to ignore the header text:
% t2html --Out --print --delete-email-headers page.txt
To make page fast
% t2html --html-frame --Out --print page.txt
To convert page from a text document, including meta tags, buttons, colors and frames. Pay attention to switch --html-body which defines document language.
% t2html \
--print \
--Out \
--author "Mr. foo" \
--email "foo@example.com" \
--title "This is manual page of page BAR" \
--html-body LANG=en \
--button-prev previous.html \
--button-top index.html \
--buttion-next next.html \
--document http://example.com/dir/this-page.html \
--url manual.html \
--css-code-bg \
--css-code-note '(?:Note|Notice|Warning):' \
--html-frame \
--disclaimer-file $HOME/txt/my-html-footer.txt \
--meta-keywords "language-en,manual,program" \
--meta-description "Bar program to do this that and more of those" \
manual.txt
To check links and print status of all links in par with the http error message (most verbose):
% t2html --link-check file.txt | tee link-error.log
To print only problematic links:
% t2html --link-check --quiet file.txt | tee link-error.log
To print terse output in egep -n like manner: line number, link and error code:
% t2html --link-check-single --quiet file.txt | tee link-error.log
To split large document into pieces, and convert each piece to HTML:
% t2html --split1 --split-name file.txt | t2html --simple -Out
If environment variable EMAIL is defined, it is used in footer for contact address. Option --email overrides environment setting.
The default language setting for switch --language Make sure the
first two characters contains the language definition, like in:
LANG=en.iso88591
perl(1) html2ps(1) htmlpp(1)
Jan Kärrman <jan@tdb.uu.se> has written Perl html2ps which was 2004-11-11 available at http://www.tdb.uu.se/~jan/html2ps.html
HTML validator is at http://validator.w3.org/
iMATIX created htmlpp which is available at http://www.imatix.com/
Emacs minor mode to write documents based on TF layout is available. See package tinytf.el in project http://freecode.net/projects/emacs-tiny-tools
RFC 1766 contains list of langauge codes at http://www.rfc.net/
Latest HTML/XHTML and CSS specifications are at http://www.w3c.org/
639 Code for the representation of the names of languages http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/iso639a.html
3166 Standard Country Codes http://www.niso.org/3166.html and http://www.netstrider.com/tutorials/HTMLRef/standards/
The implementation was originally designed to work linewise, so it is unfortunately impossible to add or modify any existing feature to look for items that span more than one line.
At the time being, it is not to be expect the option --Xhtml to produce syntactically valid markup.
CPAN/Administrative html
No additional CPAN modules needed for text to HTML conversion. If link
check feature is used to to validate URL links, then following modules are
needed from CPAN use LWP::UserAgent HTML::FormatText and
HTML::Parse
If module LWP::UserAgent is available, program can be used to verify the
URL links.
If you module HTML::LinkExtractor is available, it is used
instead of included link extracting algorithm.
any
Homepage is at http://freecode.net/projects/perl-text2html
Copyright (C) 1996-2009 Jari Aalto. This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself or in terms of Gnu General Public license v2 or later.
This documentation may be distributed subject to the terms and conditions set forth in GNU General Public License v2 or later; or, at your option, distributed under the terms of GNU Free Documentation License version 1.2 or later (GNU FDL).