Select Columnar

The Select Columnar command is used to set Boxer's default selection mode to Columnar. In this mode text is selected in rectangular blocks, as opposed to lines.

The default selection mode determines what selection style is used when text selection is initiated either from the keyboard or with the left mouse button. If the default selection mode is Stream, a temporary override to Columnar can be achieved by holding down the Ctrl key before selecting with the mouse. If a three-button mouse is installed, the center button can be used to perform Columnar text selection regardless of the current selection mode.

Text selection can be performed by keyboard by pressing and holding down the Shift key and moving the text cursor. Any cursor movement key can be used to move the cursor, e.g., PgUp, PgDn, Home, End, etc., as long as the Shift key remains depressed. As the text cursor is moved through the file, the selected area is extended.

Text selection can be accomplished with the mouse by pressing and holding the left (or center) mouse button and dragging the mouse to highlight the desired text. As the mouse pointer is moved through the file, the selected rectangle is extended. An existing selection can be extended by depressing Shift or Ctrl before clicking or dragging the mouse.

The entire file can be selected by issuing the Select All Text command. Doing so while in Columnar mode will result in the default selection mode being changed to Columnar.

Text selection ends when the mouse button or the Shift key is released. The selected text remains highlighted and is ready to be operated upon by any of Boxer's Block commands, such as Cut, Copy, Append, Cut-Append, etc.

When selected text is present, the Go to Line and Find commands provide options to extend the selection to the new cursor position that results from their operation. The Replace command provides an option to limit the replacement operation to the selected text.

When text is selected, issuing either the Save or Save Selection As command prompts the user to save the selected area to a disk file. Similarly, when text is selected and the Print command is issued, an option is available to print only the selected area.

Selected text can be deselected by clicking once with the left mouse button, pressing the Escape key, or pressing any of the cursor arrow keys. Pressing Enter, or any other alphanumeric key will cause selected text to be deleted.

If a columnar selection is started in the virtual space beyond the end of a line, or within the virtual space of a preceding Tab character, the starting column of the selection will be moved to the nearest column to the left which contains a character.

If you start a selection and find that the mode was set to Stream, simply issue this command to convert the existing selection to Columnar. There's no need to cancel a selection; the selection mode can be toggled between Stream and Columnar at will.