Plato Guide

7/31/2019 Plato Guide

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Plato

Operating Guide

ZorbaSoft2011 Version 01 Build 001


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Contents

1 Introduction 11.1 So What Exactly is Plato ? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

1.2 Whats Plato to You? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21.2.1 Information Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31.2.2 File Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

1.3 How does Plato work? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41.4 What You Can Expect from Plato . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51.5 What You Need To Run Plato . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61.6 Platos Limitations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

2 Getting Your Feet Wet 92.1 For Starters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

2.1.1 Setting Up Plato . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92.1.2 Starting and Quitting Plato . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

2.2 The Plato Display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112.2.1 Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112.2.2 Window Pane Navigation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142.2.3 Color Cues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

2.3 About Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152.4 About Class Libraries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162.5 About Databases . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

2.5.1 Whats a Database? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 162.5.2 Opening, Closing, and Listing Databases . . . . . . . . 17

2.6 Data entry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172.6.1 Selecting Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172.6.2 Entering and Saving Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182.6.3 Undoing Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182.6.4 Data Entry Without Using the Mouse . . . . . . . . . 19

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2.6.5 Template Data Entry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

2.7 Creating objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 192.8 Importing Objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 212.9 Editing objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

2.9.1 Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 232.9.2 Editing Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242.9.3 Editing Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27

2.10 Copying, moving, deleting objects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 302.10.1 Using the Cross Reference Window . . . . . . . . . . . 302.10.2 Copy/Moving Objects between Folders . . . . . . . . . 302.10.3 Copy/Moving Objects between Databases . . . . . . . 302.10.4 Deleting Objects from Folders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

2.10.5 Deleting Objects from the Database . . . . . . . . . . . 322.11 Searches and lookups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

2.11.1 Searching . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 322.11.2 Lookups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

3 In to Your Waist 393.1 Folders and Views . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39

3.1.1 Folders . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 403.1.2 Category views . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 403.1.3 Multi-dimensional Category views . . . . . . . . . . . . 403.1.4 xRef views . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

3.2 Cross References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413.2.1 Cross reference Chains and Hierachies . . . . . . . . . 42

3.3 Bookmarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 423.3.1 Creating Bookmarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433.3.2 Finding Bookmarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433.3.3 Deleting Bookmarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433.3.4 The Bookmark List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 433.3.5 Bookmark Editing Pane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 443.3.6 Getting the Most from the Bookmark Comment Feature 443.3.7 Preventing Problems with Bookmarks . . . . . . . . . . 45

3.3.8 Using Bookmarks as Footnotes . . . . . . . . . . . . . 453.4 Categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 453.5 Concordance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

3.5.1 Building a concordance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 483.6 Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48


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3.7 Document Templates . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

3.7.1 Using Templates to Automate File Creation . . . . . . 50

4 Up to Your Neck 53

4.1 External Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

4.1.1 Standard Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

4.1.2 Other Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

4.1.3 Editors and File Signatures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

4.1.4 Plato Post-Processing Scripts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

4.2 Scripts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

4.2.1 Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55

4.2.2 Scope . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 564.2.3 Output . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

4.3 Multidimensional Clusters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

4.3.1 Configuring Multidimensional Clusters . . . . . . . . . 58

4.4 Configuration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

4.4.1 Configuration files . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

4.5 Messages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

4.5.1 General information on message buffers . . . . . . . . . 60

4.5.2 Message buffer settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61

4.6 Error Handling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

4.7 Resource . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

5 Editing the Class Library 65

5.1 Class Library . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

5.2 Class Library List . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65

5.3 Class Library List Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

5.4 Class Library Settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

5.5 Object Actions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

5.6 Object Attribute Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

5.7 Object Attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

5.8 Object Class Editing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67

5.8.1 Transferring object classes to another class library . . . 67

5.8.2 More About Copying Object Classes . . . . . . . . . . 68

5.9 Object Classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68


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6 Using Markup 69

6.1 Markup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 696.2 Markup Tags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 706.2.1 General Guidance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 706.2.2 The Markup Editor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 736.2.3 Markup Formatting Options . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 736.2.4 Markup Examples . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

6.3 Swap Lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 766.3.1 General Guidance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 76

6.4 Post Processing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 786.5 Importers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

6.5.1 General Guidance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

6.5.2 Approaches to Importing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 796.5.3 Importing mechanics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 826.5.4 Importer Format . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84

6.6 Exporters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 906.7 Auto-enumeration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92

6.7.1 Auto-enumeration with formatting . . . . . . . . . . . 926.7.2 Auto-enumeration without formatting . . . . . . . . . . 93

7 Screen Reference 957.1 Screen reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 957.2 Class library, main screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 977.3 Class library, settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 997.4 Class library, categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1017.5 Class library, change impact . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1037.6 Class library, transfer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1057.7 Class library, object classes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1077.8 Class library, class attributes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1097.9 Class library, markup . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1107.10 Class library, markup editor, tags . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1127.11 Class library, markup editor, swap lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1157.12 Class library, markup editor, importers . . . . . . . . . . . . . 117

7.13 Class library, markup editor, exporters . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1197.14 Class library, markup editor, autoenumerators . . . . . . . . . 1237.15 Database, main screen . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1257.16 Database, view pane (folders) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1287.17 Database, view pane (categories) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130


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7.18 Database, view pane (cross reference hierarchies) . . . . . . . . 132

7.19 Database, view pane (multi-dimensional categories) . . . . . . 1347.20 Database, view pane (files) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1357.21 Database, lookup pane (folders) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1367.22 Database, lookup pane (bookmarks) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1377.23 Database, lookup pane (lists) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1387.24 Database, lookup pane (cross references) . . . . . . . . . . . . 1397.25 Database, lookup pane (validation lists) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1407.26 Database, lookup pane (hyperlinks) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1417.27 Database, lookup pane (note search) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1427.28 Database, lookup pane (parent folders) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1437.29 Database, lookup pane (words in object) . . . . . . . . . . . . 144

7.30 Database, lookup pane (object word profile) . . . . . . . . . . 1457.31 Database, lookup pane (words in concordance) . . . . . . . . . 1467.32 Database, scripts pane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1477.33 Database, graphics pane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1487.34 Database, maintenance pane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1497.35 Database, export pane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1527.36 Database, properties, description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1547.37 Database, properties, display . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1557.38 Database, properties, inheritance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1567.39 Database, properties, validation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1577.40 Database, properties, omit lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1587.41 Database, properties, backups . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1597.42 Concordance (main view) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1607.43 Concordance (settings) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1617.44 Concordance (statistics) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163

7.44.1 Concordanace settings, statistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1647.45 Concordance (profiles) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 167

7.45.1 Concordanace settings, profiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1687.46 Cross reference display (main) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1697.47 Cross reference display (maps) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1727.48 Cross reference pane (assigning cross references) . . . . . . . . 174

7.49 Cross reference pane (change object class) . . . . . . . . . . . 1767.50 Script pane (script name, type) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1777.51 Script pane (script scope) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1797.52 Script pane (script output) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1817.53 Script pane (find and replace) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183


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7.54 Script pane (markup templates) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 184

7.55 Script pane (messages) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1857.56 System configuration (colors) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1867.57 System configuration (chat templates) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1887.58 System configuration (default lists) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1907.59 System configuration (editors) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1927.60 System configuration (signatures) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1947.61 System configuration (file templates) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1967.62 System configuration (elements) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1987.63 System configuration (messages) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2007.64 System configuration (paths) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2027.65 System configuration (report templates) . . . . . . . . . . . . 204

7.66 System configuration (user variables) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2067.66.1 User Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2067.66.2 Subdirectory Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2077.66.3 Internal Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2077.66.4 Text Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 208

8 Properties Reference 2098.1 Database Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209

8.1.1 Database settings: descriptive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2108.1.2 Database settings: display/performance . . . . . . . . . 2118.1.3 Database settings: inheritance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2138.1.4 Database properties: data validation . . . . . . . . . . 2148.1.5 Database properties: omit lists . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2158.1.6 Database properties: file format/backups . . . . . . . . 2168.1.7 Database properties: system . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218

8.2 Concordance Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2208.2.1 Concordanace settings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2208.2.2 Concordanace settings, statistics . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2268.2.3 Concordanace settings, profiles . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

8.3 Class Library Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2298.4 Object Class Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 229

8.4.1 Object Class Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2298.4.2 Object Class Actions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2328.4.3 Object Attribute Properties . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2348.4.4 Object Attribute data types . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2368.4.5 text . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 236


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8.4.6 numeric . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 237

8.4.7 pick list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2398.4.8 internal list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2398.4.9 date . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2398.4.10 path name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2408.4.11 conversion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2408.4.12 file name . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2418.4.13 field list . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2418.4.14 folder sorts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2418.4.15 flag . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2428.4.16 cross reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2428.4.17 numeric, incrementing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242

8.4.18 record key . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2428.4.19 Special Property reference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244

8.5 Plato Macros . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244


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Chapter 1

Introduction

1.1 So What Exactly is Plato ?

Plato is the namesake of the ancient Greek philosopher who taught that ideasmust always preceed and govern particulars. Plato is the pre-eminent toolby which this excellent principle may be applied to organizing data on yourcomputer. In addition, you may note that Plato , when pronounced in theAmerican vernacular, sounds a lot like play-dough. This is a happy coinci-dence because this reflects the second aspect of Plato s character, namelythat you can mold and configure it any way you want, as if it were putty inyour hands.

What you need is a mind, ideas to organize, and the desire to organizethem. With these trifles, Plato allows you to go forth and clutter your com-

puter instead of your mind. If you are the type that insists on a nit-pickysort of orderliness, Plato will give your computer the cleanliness you nor-mally demand of your clothes closet. If youre of a more slipshod sign, youwill still enjoy fiddling around with Plato . It may even give you the illusionof orderliness. But no mechanical device is a substitute for an orderly mind!

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2 CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION

1.2 Whats Plato to You?

Plato can be anything from a personal information manager to a full-featuredresearch assistant. To be the former, you need only use it as it comes fromthe boxit comes preconfigured to manage tasks, contacts, notes, and files,as well as commonly inventoried items such as books, videos, CDs, software,and generic household items. To be the latter, Plato can be configured tomeet the most minute requirementssimply and without programming.

Plato helps you store, find, classify, and transform information and con-cepts. Information may be research informationclipped electronic articles

and books, references, notes, survey results, images, and the like. Or it couldbe your collections: books, films, coins, stamps, recipes. Concepts may becategories or classification schemes you use to understand and order the in-formation. When youre not sure which concepts apply to your information,Plato can profile and cluster your information in ways that may allow thegoverning concepts to emerge.

Plato lets you classify your information. Classifying your information canbe as simple as putting your information into categorized folders. Or it canbe quite complex: you may develop several concurrent classification schemesand link your information to the relevant classifications, then see how theinformation falls out, or clusters, within all the classifications at once.

Plato lets you classify types of information in addition to the informationitself. It does this through the use of objects and object classes. In otherwords, all your book information will reside in objects called books, whichwill in turn all be members of an object class called book, which will inturn have specified book attributes such as title, author, publisher, date andanything else you may want to use to define a book. Object classes mybe linked to one another: the book object class, for instance, can referencean author object class. In this way you can see at a glance all the booksassociated with an author without having performing a query.

Plato lets you transform your information: into documents, spreadsheets,

database tables, lists, and more. Using scripts and markup, Plato cantake your information and create web pages; XML spreadsheets; format-ted database tables; complex documents with footnotes and indexes usingTEX, LATEX, or RTF; formatted plain text documents of your own devising.Plato cross references may be converted to GraphViz dot maps, where they


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1.2. WHATSPLATO TO YOU? 3

may be viewed as graphs in tools such as Gephi or Zgvr Viewer.

1.2.1 Information Management

Lets mention a few of the things Plato can do. A computer applicationshould do something, right? (Something hopefully useful or at least amus-ing.) Plato can:

Keep lists, from the simple (a list for Santa Claus, perhaps) to the verycomplex (a library catalog, photographic inventory, or geodatabase).Plato also has special features for managing task lists.

Manage things that you or others write (scattered or structured notes,daily journals, correspondence, web clips, articles, novels, research, sci-entific treatises, or just about anything else). Manage your projects,ideas for projects, notes, and documents (of any sortdrawings, reports,memos, poems, novels...). Catalog your phone numbers and addresses,books and articles, photography and print collections, or research notes.

Classify your information using virtually any classification system youcan adopt or invent.

Show relationships between things, from simple one-to-one relations to

complex maps with thousands of interrelations. Navigate interactivelythrough these relations with your mouse, with the ability to access andedit underlying data at any point.

Combine written things with lists and all their relationships to buildsimple or elaborate research databases (for your use) or specializedexpert systems (for use by others).

By means of file signatures, know which application any file belongstowithout having to bother about clumsy file extensions.

Logically extend your databases to include objects outside to the com-puter environment such as paper in filing cabinets, books, records, sheetmusic, photographs, etcetera.

Work hand in hand with other applications via markup to:


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Create RTF documents for use Microsoft Word and other word

processors Create XML documents for use in Microsoft Excel

Create TEX/LATEX documents and BibTEX bibliographies for re-ports, journal submissions, and textbooks

Create dot language cross reference maps and display them withGraphViz.

1.2.2 File Management

Plato is also a file manager. Its file management features are mostly geared

towards getting data into Plato or using Plato to manage matadata associatedwith files. However, Plato s file manager has a few unusual features:

Store and reuse complex instructions for automated file searches.

Select a list of files and join them into one file. This can can be used inconjunction with Plato import scripts to facilitate importing data intoPlato , such as contact information in vcards or similar informationfrom structured text files.

Attach lengthy descriptions to files and display them in the file list

display Keep a sorted list of selected subdirectories displayed for easy access

to commonly used files.

Associate files with applications using Plato file signatures and launchthem from the file manager.

1.3 How does Plato work?

Plato works using three central concepts: object, cross reference, andscript.

Every item in a Plato database is an object of one sort or another.Objects are simply the things you work with or are studying: books, chapters,


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1.4. WHAT YOU CAN EXPECT FROM PLATO 5

notes, journals, publications, authors, publishers, and the like. Some objects

have special uses toPlato

, such as folders, lists, and scripts. But objectscan be anything you want to make them: mountains, stars, movies, plants,birds, kinship categories, mythical beasts.

Objects have named classes, actions, attributes, and unstructured notes.Lets make one out of our previous list: a mountain. Our object has thenamed class mountain. There is no action associated with it; its just data.We will give it several attributes: name, parent range, elevation, politicallocation, and geographical coordinates (latitude and longitude). For un-structured notes we might include a lengthy description of it. If we were todescribe this object in plain text, it might look like this:

Object: Mt Everest

====================================================

Object class = mountain

Action = data only

Attributes Notes

----------------------------- ---------------------

Name = Mt. Everest Mt. Everest is a big

Parent Range = Himalaya mountain in a big

Elevation = 29,028 feet mountain range in the

Location = Nepal biggest continent onLatitude = 27 59 North Earth.

Longitude = 86 56 East

Cross references show relations between objects.

1.4 What You Can Expect from Plato

You can expect that Plato will address every conceivable need you may everencounter as you use your computer. This would be a false expectation,however! You may more reasonably expect that Plato will manage the infor-mation on your computer very well and be a constant, amenable companion


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to your day-to-day computer work. You may also expect that it will become

addictive to the point that you wonder how you could possibly work withoutit.

1.5 What You Need To Run Plato

Memory In general, a half-gigabyte (512 MB) of main memory shouldbe sufficient unless you run several memory-hogging applications con-currently. Large databases and concordances will like as much memoryas you can give them. With less than half a gigabyte your milage willvary, but at the worst performance may falter and creep painfully andthat can be frustrating.

Disk space The base installation will consume less than 5 megabytesof disk space. The disk space your databases will consume will varyIuse Plato for research and I currently have 15 database files ranging insize from 100 kilobytes to 18 megabytes.

Operating System Plato will run on Intel machines running WindowsNT, 2000, XP, or Vista. It will also run on Windows 95 and 98 (ifthe machines running these older OSs have acceptable memory and

processing speed). It might run on a Mac (using one of the manyWindows XP emulators), but I havent tried it.

1.6 Platos Limitations

Database size Database size will be limited by your computers mem-ory and performance. Platos databases are loaded entirely into mainmemory (although for databases with a lot of text there is a paging

option that may reduce memory requirements considerably in somecases).

Number of Objects Beyond the issue of available memory and ac-ceptable performance, there are no limits to the number of objects you


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1.6. PLATOS LIMITATIONS 7

can put in a database.

Size of Objects Objects may have no more that 30 field attributes.There is no limit to the amount of text an object may contain, how-ever performance will once again dictate practical limits. Performanceshould not degrade significantly with object text of up to 1,000,000characters. If you are using a concordance set for real time updating,saving changed records will result in a slight processing delay, whichmay increase as the amount of text in an object increases. I say maybecause the increase will be less noticable on faster computers withmore memory.

Number of Folders There is no limit to the number of folders you cancreate. Your practical limit will again be based on performance andconvenience. Folders can be nested to any depth, but Plato s scriptingengine will only descend to ten levels of recursion. Folders nested moredeeply than this can still be accessed manually however.

Plato does not use the Windows registry.


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Chapter 2

Getting Your Feet Wet

2.1 For Starters

2.1.1 Setting Up Plato

Plato installs automatically without fuss. Here are some of the details:

When Plato is installed it will set up a directory hierarchy with which tostore its working files. (You are free to set up your own directory structurelater if you like.) Here is the Plato directory structure.

9


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10 CHAPTER 2. GETTING YOUR FEET WET

Screenshot 1 Plato installation file structure

The base directory must either be the application directory (the directorywith the Plato.exe file in it) or the users home directory. These will usuallybe:

C:\Program Files\Plato

C:\Documents and Settings\[your name]\Plato

The data directory will contain Plato configuration and other data files. thesefiles will be:

Post-Installation Set Up

Since Plato works in concert with other applications on your computer, youwill need to tell Plato the applications you want it to work with. This is amanual process and it will require that you find the applications executablefiles and register them with Plato . See Incorporting partner applicationsfor more information.

2.1.2 Starting and Quitting Plato

Starting Plato Click the Plato icon (a little cloud) from the desktop, taskbar, or start menu; cover your ears and stand back. (You dont really need tocover your ears.) The Plato splash screen appears and displays its start-up


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2.2. THEPLATO DISPLAY 11

chatter in a scrolling text box. The Plato console is launched (in a minimized

stateit will appear on your Windows task bar) and then the last databaseyou used is loaded and displayed.Quitting Plato Select exit from the database drop down menu to

quit Plato .

2.2 The Plato Display

2.2.1 Overview

Platos user interface consists of three main windows and a passel of helperwindows. The three main windows, along with their helper windows, are:

The Database Window The main Plato window, which displays listsof database views, folder contents, and the contents of objects. Thiswhere you will do most of your work.

Database Properties Window Shows the underlying databaseproperties that govern the behavior of the currently loaded data-base. Each database has its own set of properties.

Database Export Window Displays the various options for ex-porting a database into other formats, and allows you to performexports.

Database Utilities Window Displays a list of database utilitiesand allows you to execute them.

Catagories Window Allows you to create and edit categoriesand link them to database objects.

Cross Reference Window Allows you to make and break crossreferences, and manage cross references in various other ways.

Search window Allows you to search a database by word, phrase,

time, or date.

Concordance Properties Window Allows you to manage con-cordance settings and rebuild a concordance.

Folder Properties Window Allows you to set folder properties


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xRef Properties Window Allows you to manipulate folder prop-

erties Script Builder Window Allows you to build scripts.

The Class Library window The class library window allows you tocreate and edit Plato object classes and their attributes. It also allowsyou to edit markup for use in import and export scripts.

Class Library Properties Window Allows you to edit class libraryproperties such as descriptions and protections.

Object Class Categories Window Allows you to set up categoriesfor object classes.

Markup Editing Window Allows you to create and edit markup.

System Utility Windows Utility windows allow you to view andmanage Plato s general settings, operating parameters, and messages.

Database List Window Allows you to display and edit lists ofPlato databases, database categories, and class libraries.

System Console Window Allows you to display and managePlato windows.

Messages Window Allows you to view the current message log

as well as old message logs. You may also view a comprehen-sive list of current (unsaved) database changes, and external com-mands that have been executed.

System Configuration Window Allows you to change Platosystem defaults and parameters.

External Application Window Allows you to run the externalapplications on Plato s application list.

Scratchpad Window Allows you create and edit scratchpads(notes files managed by Plato that are not incorporated into adatabase.


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2.2. THEPLATO DISPLAY 13

Screenshot 2 Plato Database window


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2.2.2 Window Pane Navigation

TAB and SHIFT-TAB The TAB key will allow you to navigate the win-dow panes in the database window. Hitting TAB successively will traversewindows in this order (hitting SHIFT-TAB will navigate in reverse):

1. Views/lookup/image/script buttons

2. folder/view tree, lookup, or script pane (depending on what is visible)

3. Folder pane

4. object properties pane

5. Note pane

If a particular window pane is not visible it will be skipped on the list.

Screenshot 3 Plato Database window TAB order


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2.3. ABOUT OBJECTS 15

2.2.3 Color Cues

Plato uses colors to indicate when things have changed in a database, or toindicate active data sources.

When you change a note or the data in an objects fields, theobject title bars color will change from white to pale yellow. When thechanged data is saved to the database, the title bar color will changeback to white.

When a database object has changed, the database change barwill change color from light blue to orange. When the database is saved,the change bar will change back to light blue.

When the data source changes, the color of the folder listchanges. You will normally browse through objects in the folder paneand the object data will display in the data pane when you scroll. How-ever, you can also browse object data when you click through a crossreference hierarchy. When the browsing source is the cross referencelist, the color of the folder pane will change. When you use subdirec-tory folders, the color of the folder pane will also change. When you usea cross reference work space, the color of the folder pane will change.

Plato uses icons to indicate when you have messages

When there are unread messages in the message buffer, the informationicon will appear on the toolbar and in the system message pane. Whenthere are unread warning messages, the warning icon will appear in thesame places. For errors, the error icon will appear. When you haveread the messages, the cloud icon will reappear.

2.3 About Objects

Youll be seeing the word object a lot here so we might as well say what itis. An object is the most basic item of information in a Plato databaseyou could also call it an item or record (or thing), but we settled onobject. We like the term because its so utterly generic and nondescriptpathetic, in factits just crying to be given a form and purpose. And thats


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right where we want it, because before an object can be put into a Plato

database must be given a form and purpose.Objects have attributes

2.4 About Class Libraries

Plato objects have to be defined, and object definitions are contained inspecial files called class libraries. Plato comes with a prebuilt, standardclass library with predefined objects such as contacts, tasks, notes, images,

books, journals, and many other paraphernalia of research. But if you havemore specialized data requirements you can add to this library or build yourown. One of the nice things that makes a Plato database different from arelational database is that these object definitions can be changed wheneveryou want, without having to modify or restructure the database in any way.

2.5 About Databases

2.5.1 Whats a Database?Plato databases are collections of objects and descriptions of the relation-ships between objects. In their native, internal form, Plato databases areessentially unstructured heaps of objects that can be viewed just about anyway you want. Objects are always accessed through an view, which isbasically an index of selected objects in the heap. Plato creates and main-tains some views automatically; others you make yourself, based on how youwant to access your data. Plato supports some very sophisticated views, in-cluding multi-dimensional views. All the various views of a Plato databaseare organized in the left-hand pane of the Plato user-interface window. See

concepts, folders and views for more information.Another feature of Plato databases is that relationships between objects

do not have to be defined in the database structure, but can be defined andredefined at will. Relationships can be built into the database structure, ifyou choose, but they can also be made arbitrarily. Relationships between


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2.6. DATA ENTRY 17

objects in a Plato database are bi-directionalthey can be followed in any

direction arbitrarily. As you will see, this may allow you to discover moredistant relations between objects you didnt know were there.

2.5.2 Opening, Closing, and Listing Databases

Plato databases must be opened from the Plato managed database list.

2.6 Data entry

You can enter data in Plato directly from the keyboard or through importsfrom the clipboard or files. Plato has features to make either way a friendlyprocess.

For importing data, Plato easily imports files as blocks of text or as simplelists. For complex files, Plato has standard import templates (or allows youto write your own templates to cover less standard situations).

For the keyboarder, Plato is optimized for direct key entry so that nearlyall necessary functions can be performed without using the mouse.

2.6.1 Selecting DataObject data can be selected from the folder, the cross reference hierachy,and the cross reference display in the lookup pane. Note: to see what youveselected, the object data plane must be displayed. If it isnt, press F3 orunselect hide object data pane from the view dropdown menu. Most oftenyou will select data from the folder list, which can be done by clicking on alist item with the mouse, or scrolling up and down the screen using the arrowkeys, page up or down, home (start of list) and end (end of list). Shortcut:If you are doing data entry from the object properties pane, you can move tothe next object in the folder list by pressing lower case z; to move to the

previous object, press lower case a.Object data may be selected while traversing cross references. Double-

clicking an object in the cross reference hierarchy will display the object datain the data pane if it is not hidden. This action will grey out the folder list,indicating that the source of the object data is the cross reference pane.


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2.6.2 Entering and Saving Data

Manual data entry is done through the object properties and/or note pane.In the object properties pane, use the up and down arrows to select a fieldand press ENTER to access the data. An entry form will appear whereyou may edit the data (text data may be pasted from other sources as wellas manually entered). To save the edit, press ENTER or click the savebutton. In the notes pane, simply type in new text or cut and paste it froman external source.

You dont have to do anything to save your changesthe changes willautomatically be saved as soon as you do something else in Plato selectanother object, perform a menu operation, click the toolbar, or the like.

Note that when youve changed the data in an object, the databasechanges bar above the tree view/lookup pane will turn orange and keepcount of the changes youve made since you opened the database (it will alsotell you how many of your changes can be undone).

2.6.3 Undoing Changes

You can undo changes either before or after they are saved.Undoing changes before they are saved Note that when the object

data has been changed, the object description bar will turn yellow and anundo button will appear. This means that the object data has changed buthasnt been saved yet. To undo your changes before saving, press the undobutton or select undo current changes from the object pulldown menu.Note that this will undo ALL your changes and return the objectto its state before you changed it.

Undoing Changes after they are Saved You can undo the last savedchange by selecting undo last object change from the object pulldownmenu, or pressing CTRL-U. You can also undo any saved changes in anyorder via the changes pane. To open the changes pane, select show sessionchanges from the database pulldown menu or click the database changesbar above the tree view/lookup pane. Select the change you want to undo

from the changes list and click the undo changes button. You can undoas many as you like from this list. Note that some changes to the databasecant be undone. In general, only changes you make to objects can be undone.Changes to cross references or database settings cant be undone. The changeslist lists all changes whether they can be undone or not. If a change cant be


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2.7. CREATING OBJECTS 19

undone, the undo changes button will be disabled.

2.6.4 Data Entry Without Using the Mouse

Most Plato commands can be entered from the keyboard for mouseless use.Pressing F10 from any pane in the database window will access the maindropdown menu, which can then be navigated using the arrow keys; pressENTER to execute an item.

2.6.5 Template Data Entry

Template data entry is useful when you need to create many objects that have

only minor variations of the same metadata. Using a template allows you touse the same data over and over, changing only what you need to. Templatedata entry allows you to use existing objects as templates. Select the objectyou want to use as a template from the folder pane. Change the existingfield data as needed (be careful not to save your changes though). SelectDuplicate current object from the object menu (or press F9). You havenow created a new object having the changes you made, leaving the templateobject as it was before you changed it. Note that the folder selection willhave jumped to the new object youve created. This is the default behaviorand if you want the selection to remain on the template object youll have

to change it.

2.7 Creating objects

New objects are created within folders. When they are created, they will beadded to the end of the folder. The options for creating new object are:

Duplicate Current Object This selection will duplicate the object

selected in the folder.

Use folder default This selection will create a new object using thefolders default object class. If you havent specified a folder object classdefault, this selection will be greyed out.


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Specify object type This selection will bring up a dialog and allow

you to manually choose an object class for the new object youll create.

The create new object options can be accessed from the folder popupmenu or the main menu. From the main menu, select Object ] Create newobject. From within a folder, right click to pull up the folder menu. SelectNew from the menu and drag right to get the same selections.

Screenshot 4 Plato Folder popup menu: creating new objects

If you choose to specify an object class manually, the following dialog willappear:


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2.8. IMPORTING OBJECTS 21

Screenshot 5 Plato Create New Object window

From this dialog you may select the object class you want to create. Notethat there are two ways to filter the list: objects in use and unused objects.The first gives a list of the object classes currently in use in the database.The second give a list of all the object clases in the current class library thatare not in use by the current database.

2.8 Importing Objects

Data can be imported into Plato from the clipboard or from files. To import,right-click in the folder pane and select import... Or from the main menu,select import new object... from the object menu. This will invoke theimport pane.

The import pane allows you to import the current contents of the clip-board or a selected file. The default is the clipboard. You may import textor RTF from the clipboardimage information cannot be imported using theimport pane, however you can drag and drop images into existing notes.

The import pane has the following settings:


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Import from Use this combo box to select the clipboard or a file as

ther source of the import.

Filename If file is selected as the source, use this combo box to typein the filename. To browse files to select, click on the browse button tothe right of the filename combo.

Import as Object Class This field contains the object class the im-

port to which the will be assigned. If the folder youre importing tohas a default object class, this field will inherit it. To select anotherobject class, click the browse button to the right of the field.

Parsing Options This field allows you to select how the clipboard orfile will be imported. Options are as follows:

1. Import Contents as Note This will place the contents of theclipboard or file into the note field of the new object. The selectionwill copy the first 45 characters of the note and use it for thedescription field.

2. Import as list, one new object per line This will break theclipboard or file into lines and create a new object for each line.The contents of the line will be placed in the description field.This selection is intended for creating a series of objects from alist.

3. Other Parsers Any other parsers that are associated with theobject class selection in Import as Object Classs will be listedhere.


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2.9. EDITING OBJECTS 23

Screenshot 6 Plato Import pane

2.9 Editing objects

2.9.1 Overview

For imformation on selecting objects see 2.6.1. Objects can be changed and

edited by selecting them from a folder and opening the object propertiespane. Open the object properties pane by right clicking in the folder list andbringing up the folder pop-up menu. From the menu, uncheck hide datapane. The data pane will appear beneath the folder pane. Note the dropdown list at the top right-hand corner of the pane. This allows you to select


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the data viewnotes, properties, or notes and properties in a split pane.

When you change the note text or properies of an object, the object titlebar will turn yellow to indicate that youve changed it. Clicking on anotherobject in the folder or starting some other action will automatically save thechanges. Until then, clicking the undo button on the object title bar willundo the changes youve made.

2.9.2 Editing Notes

Screenshot 7 Plato Object Note pane

The note field is a rich-text window allowing any amount of text to be placedinto it. Notes can be entered in plain text and enhanced using rich textattributes. Text and graphics may be dragged and dropped into the notefield from other Windows applications as well. Formatting operations suchas word wrap and text clean-ups may be applied selectively or to the entirenote. The note field is not a full featured text editor or word processor butit does allow basic control over fonts, text enhancements, and lookups.

Here is the note popup menu with a list of note functions:

Highlight text Highlights the selected text with the default highlightcolor (the default color is selected in the format pane, below).

Bold Text Toggles boldface on or off for the selected text.


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Italicize Text Toggles italics on or off for the selected text.

Bullet Text Toggles bullets on or off for the selected text (bullets areapplied to start of each paragraph.

Format... Opens the format pane, which allows you to apply a varietyof formatting changes to the selected text (if no text is selected thechanges will apply to the whole note).

Character formatting This portion of the dialog allows youto select fonts, font sizes, text attributes (bold, italics, underline,bullets), and font color.

Text formatting This portion of the dialog allows you to setcustom word wrap, or strip extra spaces and hard carriage returns.

Look up in concordance This will look up highlighted word(s) inthe concordance and display the results in a new window.

Bookmark and comment This will set a bookmark for the high-lighted text and automatically open the bookmark editing window soyou may enter comments.

Bookmark This will set a bookmark for the highlighted text.

Add to list This will add the highlighted text to the current list

copy Copies the selected text to the clipboard

cut Cuts the selected text and puts it in the clipboard

paste Pastes text in the clipboard into the note at the selection point.

delete Deletes highlighted text (does not place it in the clipboard)

Select all Selects all text in the note.

Delete note Deletes the entire note.


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Screenshot 8 Plato RTF popup menu and Note format pane


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2.9.3 Editing Properties

Screenshot 9 Plato Object properties pane

The property pane displays the various properties (metadata) of an object.The left column displays the property name; the center column the data; andthe right column the data type. The three lines above the property fieldsdisplay the description of the object, brief information about the object, andinformation about the selected field.

Properties may be edited by selecting the property from the propertypane and double-clicking or pressing enter. This will open editing panestailored for various field types. The behavior of editing panes depends onthe way the field is configured in the class library. Each field pane has anaccept button and a cancel button with which to save your field changesor abandon them. Shortcut: You may also press ENTER to acceptchanges of ESC to cancel. Some fields have additional buttons that allow

you to configure the field.All fields are fully validated according to the rules set up for them in the

class library. For numeric fields, this can meanText Panes The captions on top give the name of the field and its

formatting: upper case, lower case, title case, name case, or literal case.


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Beneath these is the text field. Its designed to accomodate small amounts

of text, but any amount of text up to 30 kb can be placed there.

Number panes The top captions give the name of the field and itsformatting: number mask, units (if any), and range. Below this is the numberfield. What you may enter in the number field is restricted by the numbermask and range.

Date panes The top captions give the name of the field and its format-ting; for dates this will the predefined display format selected in the classlibrary. Dates can be typed in any format and they will automatically becorrectly formatted (or the dialog warn you when theres something wrongwith the date youve typed). You may also type now or today and to-days date will be used. Note: the date pane may become confused if the dateis supplied in year-day-month order.

Pick Lists Displays the items in the pick list. When multiple itemsare displayed, multiple selections can be made. If the Edit list button isdisplayed, the entire list may be edited from the edit pane.

Cross References Displays a list of objects to be cross referenced. Aswith the pick lists, when multiple items are displayed multiple selections canbe made. Selections made here will automatically be cross referenced withthe object youre editing.


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Screenshot 10 Plato validated editing panes


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2.10 Copying, moving, deleting objects

2.10.1 Using the Cross Reference Window

The cross reference window is a multi purpose window; from it you copyor move objects, as well as change object classes and cross references. Foreach of the actions below you will access the cross reference window to carrythings out.

2.10.2 Copy/Moving Objects between Folders

Objects can be copied or moved between folders using the cross referencepane. Select the objects you want to move or copy in the folder pane andright click the mouse, and select copy/move to another folder from the popup menu. The cross reference window will appear with a list of the objectsyou selected in the top list. The bottom list contains a list of the folders youmay move them to. Note the option buttons to the right of the copy/movebutton. Select either copy or move (the default is copy). Then selecta folder and click the copy/move button to copy or move the objects. Notethat moving objects means that they will be first copied to the new folderthen deleted from the current folder. (Note: you are only copying or moving

pointers to objects in this operation; the object itself will never be deletedfrom the database).

2.10.3 Copy/Moving Objects between Databases

Follow the procedure for copy/moving between folders, except select copy/movebetween databases from the folder pop up menu. The bottom list in thecross reference window will now contain a list of databases instead of folders;otherwise the procedure is the same.

You should select a database that uses the same class library as the current

database, otherwise the target database may not recognize the objects youvesent to it. Plato will warn you if you are about to copy or move objects to adatabase that uses a different class library.

Warning: When you move objects between databases, the objects youremoving willreally be deletedfrom the current database, unlike when moving


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2.10. COPYING, MOVING, DELETING OBJECTS 31

between folders.

Screenshot 11 Plato Cross Reference pane

2.10.4 Deleting Objects from Folders

To delete objects from folders, select the objects you want to delete in thefolder pane and right click the mouse, and select delete from view fromthe pop up menu. The objects will be deleted from the folder (but not thedatabase).


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2.10.5 Deleting Objects from the Database

To delete objects from the database, select the objects you want to delete inthe folder pane and right click the mouse, and select delete from databasefrom the pop up menu. Plato will warn you, then delete the objects from thedatabase. The objects will also be deleted from every folder that containedit. If you decide youve made a mistake you can always undo the command.

2.11 Searches and lookups

Plato is pre-eminently geared towards browsing but it searches faster than acar full of speed-fueled private eyes. So lets take searching first.

2.11.1 Searching

Databases can be searched by word, phrase, or date. Word searches can beconducted using the concordance, in which case finds can be nearly instan-taneous. More complex phrase and date searches take a bit longer.

Concordance searches

A concordance is a list of all the words in a database with pointers for eachword to every object that contains it. Since the database already knowswhere each word resides, word searches are instantaneousit takes longer todisplay the results to the screen than to find where the word resides. So thefirst thing you need for a concordance searches is a concordance. See SACKOfor buiding concordances and options for maintaining them. If a concordancedoesnt exist, search tabs and menu items relating to concordances will bedisabled or not visible.

You can search the database using the concordance a couple of differentways:

1. Click the search button (a little pair of binoculars) in the toolbar. Thesearch window will appear and will automatically show the concordancesearch tab. Type the words youre looking for into the word pane andpress enter. The search results will display in the results pane.


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2.11. SEARCHES AND LOOKUPS 33

2. If you are browsing through a note and want to search for something,

highlight the words you want to search, then right-click the mouse.From the pop-up menu, select Look up in concordance. The wordsyou highlighted will automatically be placed in the word pane and thesearch results listed in the result pane.

The concordance can be searched using the * wildcard in which casecognates of a word will be returned as well as the word itself. For example,

can* returns can, cant, cannot, candy, etc.

*ing returns floating, fighting, camping, etc.

b*ing is not supported

The results of a concordance search are displayed in order of most toleast matches. Match means the search word was found in the object.When your search contains several words, the objects which contain the mostmatches will sort to the top of the list. Search results can be further filteredby restricting the display to certain object classes, or only showing completematches.

If you want to examine the search results in more detail, click one of thesend to folder buttons. The search results will be placed in a scratch folder

and displayed in the folder pane.

Text/Phrase searches

Text/phrase searches are slower than concordance searches but the searchparameters are more extensive and can be tuned with greater finesse. Hereare the text/phrase parameters:

Select text in any field Enter text in the combo box and Plato willlook in all fields for the text.

Select text in specific fields Select the field to look in (up to threedifferent fields) using the left-hand drop down lists; enter the text youwant to look for in the corresponding text box to the right of the dropdown list. This is best used in conjunction with ther select objectoption, below.


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Select objects Selecting an object here will restrict the search to the

object class you select. This selection will determine which fields areavailable to select.

Restrict search to current folder Checking this box will force Platoto look only in the current folder.

Search in notes also Checking this box will force Plato to look innote fields as well as metadata.

Use raw data (dont expand) Checking this box forces Plato to lookat all data before it is formatted for display. This is for expert usersand requires that you understand how Plato stores its data internally.


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Screenshot 12 Plato Concordance Search Pane

Date Searches

Date seaches will find objects based on the date data thats associated withthem. Most often this is the date they were created or last edited, but it canalso be any other date field. Here are the date parameters:

Use general range Allows you to seach within general range of dates


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starting with today (i.e., 7 days ago, 14 days ago, 30 days ago,

etc.) Specify month and year Allows you to specify a month and a year

and search for dates within that time frame.

Select date attribute to search on This is a drop down list con-taining all ther date attributes currently in use in the database. Selectthe date attribute you want to search on.

2.11.2 Lookups

Lookups are a hodge-podge of ways to keep information at your fingertips.

Lookups are accessed by clicking the lookups option button at the top ofthe view pane, and then by selecting the lookup mode from the drop-downlist that appears below it. Available lookup types are:

1. Folder Access History Displays an alphabetical list of folders thathave been opened. To clear the list, right click the mouse and clickclear list on the pop-up menu. Note that folders in the folder stackwill not be cleared.

2. Bookmarks Displays book marks for the object currently selected inthe folder list. To display all bookmarks in the database, right click

the mouse and click show all bookmarks in the opo-up menu.

3. Lists Displays a list of lists in a drop-down menu, with the content ofthe selected list displayed in the lookup pane below.

4. Find in note

5. Hyperlinks

6. Cross References

7. Words in Object

8. Objects Word Profile

9. Words in Object

10. Validation List Lookups


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11. Find in concordance


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Chapter 3

In to Your Waist

3.1 Folders and Views

Views are the portals through which you may look at objects in a database.

Views do not actually contain objects; they display objects within a certaindefined frame of reference. An object can appear in any number of views,even though it only exists once in the database. Therefore, if an object ischanged, the change will appear simultaneously in all the views in which itappears. Likewise if an object is deleted, it will disappear from all views.PLATO supports several types of views:

folders

categories

multi-dimensional categories

cross-reference hierarchies

file system

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40 CHAPTER 3. IN TO YOUR WAIST

3.1.1 Folders

Generic folder views: Folders are populated with objects that are placedthere explicitly by you. You may create objects in a folder, importthem into a folder, or copy and move them from one folder to another.Objects within a folder or document may be sorted by field, or bearranged in some other order determined by you.

Object class index views: Object class index views are populated auto-matically with all objects that belong to a specific object class. Indexviews are re-created each time they are requested (by double-clickingon the index entry in the view pane).

Scratch view: Whenever you query the database (to perform a search,run a script, or request an index) Plato creates a scratch folder tohold the results of the query. The scratch view is a list of all thesescratch folders, which you may open by double clicking them. You canpurge scratch folders at any time by selecting purge scratch from thefolder view menu. You can also tell Plato how to deal with scratchfolders when the database is saved: always purge before saving, neverpurging before saving, or asking you whether to purge before saving.This setting is contained in the database properies dialog under fileformats/backups.

3.1.2 Category views

Category views display any of the category families you create. Categorieswithin a family are displayed as simple lists or hierarchies, depending on howyou arrange them. Clicking on a category will display all items related tothe category in a scratch folder. See categories for more information.

3.1.3 Multi-dimensional Category views

3.1.4 xRef views

Platos folder management system consists of tools for creating, changing,and deleting folders


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3.2. CROSS REFERENCES 41

3.2 Cross References

Cross references link items in a database with other items. They show re-lationships. If a relationship between items is possible, PLATO can showit: each object in a PLATO database may be associated with any numberof other objects. In addition, PLATO links are bi-directional. Bidirectionalmeans a cross reference may be followed forwards or backwards. Following across reference forward usually denotes a parent to child relation; followinga cross reference backward is a child to parent relation.

Bidirectional cross referencing allows you to see relationships between

records in a database that may be very subtle and complex. A net of crossreferences may show records to be related in ways that were never suspectedat first. Because of this, bidirectional cross referencing can be a valuable toolfor qualitative analysis of data.

Cross references can be named to show other relationships besides parentto child. For instance, in a database that contains genealogy data, you cancreate a named link called married to to capture the marriage relationshipas well as the child of and sibling relationships already depicted by thestandard parent-child links.

Plato displays cross references in a horizontal tree format, like the tree inWindows Explorer, as shown in the following figure:

Screenshot 13 Plato Croos Reference Display


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3.2.1 Cross reference Chains and Hierachies

Plato descends (or ascends, as the case may be) through cross references. Itworks like this: You select an object to check for cross references, and Platodoes the following:

1. Checks the object for cross references, and makes a list of them.

2. Checks each item on the list for cross references, and makes listsPlato

3.

Screenshot 14 Plato Cross Reference flow

Cross references can be assigned automatically or manually.Setting up Cross references ManuallyManual cross refereences are set up through the cross reference pane. This

pane is accesed from the folder

3.3 Bookmarks

Bookmarks allow you to mark selected text within a note, and if you want,attach comments to what youve marked. Bookmarks can also be incorpo-rated into scripts so that they may be used as footnotes, endnotes, or marginnotes (depending on the capabilities of the markup language.


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3.3. BOOKMARKS 43

3.3.1 Creating Bookmarks

To create a bookmark, select the text within a note that you want to mark.Then right-click the mouse and select bookmark from the pop-up menu,or press ALT-K. A bookmark will be created for the text you selected. Tobookmark and comment, follow the same procedure except select bookmarkand comment from the pop-up menu or press ALT-B. The selected textwill be bookmarked and the bookmark editing window will be displayed sothat you may enter comments.

3.3.2 Finding Bookmarks

With both the note pane and the bookmark pane open, click on a bookmarkin the bookmark pane to jump the cursor to the marked location in the noteand highlight the marked text.

3.3.3 Deleting Bookmarks

With the bookmark pane open, select the bookmark you want to delete fromthe list, then right click the mouse to open the bookmark pop-up menu.Select delete from the menu to delete the bookmark.

3.3.4 The Bookmark List

Bookmarks are listed and managed from the bookmark list. Click the lookupsoption button at the top left portion ofPlato s database window, then se-lect bookmarks from the drop-down combo box. The three columns in thebookmark pane display:

Bookmark A short description of the bookmark

Offset This is the position of the bookmark in the note. The numberrepresents the number of characters from the start of the note.

Bookmark parent This the description of the bookmarks parentobject.

The bookmark list is context-sensitive; it will display only the book-marks attached to the currently selected object. As an option however, you


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may display all the bookmarks in the database at once. Right click in the

bookmark list, and select show all bookmarks from the pop up menu. Usethe same procedure to toggle back to the context-sentive display.You may sort the bookmark list by description, offset, or parent descrip-

tion by clicking on the appropriate column header.

3.3.5 Bookmark Editing Pane

You can add or edit bookmark comments by selecting a bookmark from thelist, right clicking the mouse, and selecting edit bookmark from the popup menu. This will display the bookmark editing pane. From this paneyou can edit the bookmarks description, add or edit comments, and reset

the bookmark location.The bookmark editing pane is synchronized with the bookmark list.

This means you can leave the editing pane open while you scroll through thebookmark list, the contents of the pane will change as you scroll.

Edit Bookmark Description Type changes into the bookmark de-scription field to edit the description

Add or edit comments Type your comments in to the comment box.Text can be cut and pasted into the box as well.

Reset Bookmark Location To reset the bookmark location, select

the new text you want associated with the bookmark in the databasenote pane. Then click the reset button on the bookmark pane. Thebookmark will now be associated with the new text you selected.

Saving Changes to the Bookmark Changes to the bookmark areautomatically saved when you close the editing pane.

3.3.6 Getting the Most from the Bookmark CommentFeature

Plato bookmarks are more than your typical bookmarkyou should think of

them as margin notes as well. Just as you would jot notes in the marginsof a book youre reading, Plato bookmarks allow you to jot notes in themargins of the electronic article youre reading in Plato . You can usebookmarks as notes to yourself, or you can use them to cite references, inwhich case you bookmarks can double as footnotes.


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3.4. CATEGORIES 45

3.3.7 Preventing Problems with Bookmarks

Bookmarks are tied to a specific location in a Plato note. But what if youedit the note and the bookmark location changes? If this happens, Platorelocates the bookmark by searching for the text you highlighted when youcreated the bookmark. It will first look in the vicinity of the old location,and if it doesnt find it it will search the whole note. When it finds the text,it will register the new location and automatically update the bookmark. Acouple of things can get in the way of this, however:

If the text you selected occurs several places throughout the note, Platomight select an occurance of the text at a wrong location. The bestway to prevent this is to select at least several words to bookmark

If you change the text of the selection itself, Plato wont be able tofind it. This can most easily happen when you select two or more linesof text to bookmark, then later remove the line break that seperatesthem. A good practice is to strip hard line breaks from your noteswhen you import them. If for some reason you dont want to do this,try not to select bookmark text across two or more lines of text.

3.3.8 Using Bookmarks as Footnotes

See Using Markup for guidance.

3.4 Categories

Categories are one of Platos methods of allowing you to categorize yourinformation. The basic procedure is: you create the catergories you want,and link them to objects in the database. Then when you click on a categoryall the objects related to it will be displayed in a scratch folder. Objects can

be linked to as many different categories as you want.Categories can be anything you want them to bewords, phrases, standard

terms. They can be linked to one another to form hierarchies (up to ten levelsdeep) or can simply be lists. They can start out as simple lists and evolveinto complex hierachies (or vice versa) as your needs change. Categories can


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be added or deleted, or linked to one another in hierarchies, on the fly as you

work. When you double-click on a category, all the objects in the databasethat are linked to the category will be displayed in a folder.Categories belong to families. Depending on your needs, you may have

as many category families as you want. Within a family, you can have asmany categories as you want.

Lets take an example of how this might work. Lets say you are a birdwatcher and are collecting notes of all your bird sightings. You decide tocorrelate your sightings by bird species, the location of the sightings, and thetime of year of the sightings, and the year of the sighting. So you will set upfour category families: 1) bird species, 2) sighting locations, 3) time of year(by month), and 4) year. The first family will be a list of all the bird species

you observe. The second will be list of all the locations you visit. The thirdwill be a list of the twelve months of the year. The fourth will be list of theyears in which your observations take place.

When you enter your notes into Plato, you will link each note to categoriesin each of the four families. You can do this manually by clicking and linkingfrom the category pane while your note is selected in the folder pane. Or youcan set up your note in the class library to have each of the category familiesas attributesthe categories can then be selected from drop-down lists as youdo your data entry.

Objects that are cross referenced to several category families can be ana-lyzed for clustering. See multi-dimensional clusters for information on this.

The category display is selected via the dropdown list in the databaseview pane. Select category (single hierarchies). Immediately below theview dropdown list will be a dropdown list of category families. Select thefamily you want to view from this list. The categories will be displayed inthe pane below.

Double-clicking on a category will display all the objects that are linkedto it in a scratch folder.

Right clicking on the category pane will open the category popup menu.

link category to current object Selecting this will link the selected folder

object to the selected category.

link category to current bookmark This will only be active if the book-mark editing pane is displayed. Selecting it will link the open bookmarkto the selected category.


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3.5. CONCORDANCE 47

add, change, delete category Selecting this will open the category edit-

ing window. More on this below. display children of children Selecting this will toggle subcategory dis-

play on and off. When this is on, double clicking on a category willdisplay all objects linked to the selected category and all of its subcat-egories.

display category counts

Creating New Category Families

New category families are created in the class library.

3.5 Concordance

A concordance is a list of all the words found in a database, with each wordindexed to the objects that contain it. A databases concordance allows fora number of things:

For all users: very fast word searches, relevancy ranked searches

For reseachers: a comprehensive word list for an entire database, seper-ate word lists for each object in a database, analysis of word/objectrelationships, word frequency determinations

Concordances are interactive. If you click on a word in the concordancelist, all the objects that contain it are displayed in a folder where they maybe edited.

Concordances are tailorable. Each concordance can have its own stop listand list of word seperators. The concordance can be set to encompass object

metadata, note text, or both.Concordance maintenance is selectable. Concordances can be generated

ad-hoc, or made a persistant part of the database. Concordances can alsobe self-maintaining; that is, the concordance can update itself in real time asyou edit the database.


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3.5.1 Building a concordance

To access the dialog for building the concordance and managing concordancesettings, select concordance... from the database drop down menu. Thiswill open the concordance dialog.

In brief

To build a concordance using the standard options, click the build con-cordance button. If you have a big database with lots of words, buildinga concordance can take a few minutes. If you change you mind after theprocess has started, click the stop button. The concordance build will becancelled and the unfinished concordance will be deleted.

In depth

3.6 Lists

Lists are pretty self-explanitorythey are a simple way of keeping lists relatingto the things youre studying. To add things to your list, you can simplyhighlight the word or phrase you want to add, right click the mouse, and

select send to list the put the highlighted text on the list.Like most things in Plato , lists are interactive. Click on a list item andall the objects related to it will be displayed. If you later want to turn yourlist into a series of Plato objects, simply send the list to the clipboard andimport it onto your database as a list of objects. Lists can also be convertedinto markup for use as an LaTeX index.

3.7 Document Templates

Document templates are templates you set up to automate the creation ofcommonly used documents. You might set up a correspondence template,for instance, which would be a blank document with your return address anda salutation. Or you might set up a spreadsheet template, which would be


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3.7. DOCUMENT TEMPLATES 49

a blank spreadsheet with labeled columns and rows, plus preset formulas.

Document templates can be anything. The idea is to capture repetitivecontent in a template and use it over and over again.

A list of document templates are found in the system configuration paneunder templates. Each listed template must have a description, a templatefile, and an editor for the file.

Description A brief desciption of the template.

Template file The filename of the template file, complete with path-name. Template files are external to Plato . Create them with theapplication that uses them. For better organization, you should storeall your template files in the same directory, but this is not required.

Editor The editor is the application that created the file. If you createa correspondence template in Microsoft Word, for instance, then selectMicrosoft Word as the template editor.


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Screenshot 15 Plato Document Template Configuration

3.7.1 Using Templates to Automate File Creation

Document templates work in conjunction with the autofile folder settingsto automate the creation of standard documents. When the autofile settingsare properly set, a document will automatically be created when the Platoobject is created. The document will have the content you specify, be placedin the subdirectory you specify, and have the filename you specify. Filenamescan be automatically incremented by Plato when they are created.

The set up a folder to automate the creation of documents, the followingfolder properties must be set:

Default object The folders default object must have the object actiontype of Launch file with editor.


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3.7. DOCUMENT TEMPLATES 51

Default template A template must be selected from the template list

auto file Auto file must be set to on

autofile path to files An autofile path must be specified. This is thepath where the new file will be created.

autofile name template An autofile name template must be speci-fied. The name template tells Plato how to name the file. Through theuse of numbering templates and Plato s internal variables filenamescan be incremented and date stamped.

autofile incrementer


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Chapter 4

Up to Your Neck

4.1 External Applications

Plato

is designed to work with external applications. Potentially these can beany external applications, but there are a few standard applications that willbe immediately useful. Plato interacts with external applications by buildingdata files formatted for the application, reading files from applications andconverting them to Plato formatted data, executing external applications viaPlato scripts, or some combination of the three.

4.1.1 Standard Applications

Plato is designed to work easily with a handful of standard applications. Hereare the main ones.

Microsoft Word Plato can be used to create RTF files and load theminto Microsoft Word (or any other RTF compatible editor) for furtherediting.

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Microsoft Excel Plato can be used to create Excel formatted XML

spreadsheets and load them into Microsoft Excel for further analysis.Alternatively, it can create simpler CSV spreadsheets for loading intoExcel or various database applications.

HTML Processors and Editors Plato can be used to create HTMLformatted files for use as web pages, or as intermediate forms for eBookbuilders such as MobiPocket.

LATEX Processors and Editors Plato can be used to create LATEXformatted files and load them into LATEX editors such as TexMaker. Orit can use LATEX to directly process a LATEXformatted file and load the

resulting DVI file into the DVI viewer of your choice. I personally usethe MikTex TEX distribution to directly process Plato generated LATEXfiles and view them in the YAP DVI viewer. When I am designingcomplex LATEX books composed of many files, I send the LATEX assemblyto TexMaker for debugging and viewing.

BibTEX Plato can be used to create BibTEX bibliography files for useby LATEX or BibTEX bibliography managers such as JabRef.

GraphViz Plato can be used to create DOT files for use by GraphVizor other graph generating programs. This interaction is particularly

useful in displaying Plato cross reference maps

Free Mind FreeMind and some other mind mapping programs canread simple indented text files and convert them to hierachical, graph-ical displays. Plato can convert its cross reference maps to such filesand load them into the mind mapping program via the clipboard orcommand line.

4.1.2 Other Applications

With a little ingenuity Plato can be configured to work with other appli-cations provided the application accepts input in plain text format. Thisincludes a large variety of applications that read and write XML data, CSVdata, or special text formats such as FrameMakers maker interchange format(MIF) and the like.


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4.2. SCRIPTS 55

4.1.3 Editors and File Signatures

Before Plato can work with an application, the application must be listed inPlato s editor list. The editor list is used to tell Plato how to work withthe application: where to find it, how it should be displayed in Plato slists, which command arguments should be passed to it when it launches,and the like.