Want to fancy up your post, but don't want to deal with the BBCode? Envious of colored text and speech bubbles? Tired of copy-pasting things from your notes?
Do I have the solution for you: Text Expanders!
Text expanders are programs and extensions that will automatically replace one string of text with another.
This means you can turn this:
Into this:
To work, these plugins scan what you're typing, which could include password fields. These plugins are both open source, which means you can see how they work, but in the end it's up to you to decide how much you trust them!
Firefox: Auto Text Expander
A basic expander, and the only option on Firefox.
Chromium (Chrome, Edge, Brave, etc):
Power Text for Google Chrome
Essentially the same expansion as on Firefox. There are a few that are the same, but this one is probably the simplest.
Magical
More features, but it requires registration and is aimed towards business. This tutorial won't be covering this one.
This tutorial will focus on Auto Text Expander and Power Text for Google Chrome, as they use the same interface.
After installing the plugin, you'll have a screen like this:
There will be some default shortcuts included. You can safely delete these. Then, to add a new macro, hit Add. This will open up a blank template for a new shortcut:
Shortcut is what you type, while Expanded Text is what your shortcut will be replaced with. When making a shortcut, it's highly recommended to have a prefix of some kind - this will ensure that you don't have inadvertent text replacement when typing things. I use "/", but you could use anything.
Once you're happy with your shortcut, hit Save and you're ready to go!
Cursor Placement: If you put the snippet
Shortcut Timeout: The shortcut timeout determines how long the system waits between you typing the start of your shortcut and the end of your shortcut. By default this is 750ms, but you can set it to be shorter or longer depending on your preference.
Do I have the solution for you: Text Expanders!
Text expanders are programs and extensions that will automatically replace one string of text with another.
This means you can turn this:
/aislingInto this:
[speech=https://i.imgur.com/QVBQwfv.png][/speech]Thus letting you automatically create a speech bubble!
To work, these plugins scan what you're typing, which could include password fields. These plugins are both open source, which means you can see how they work, but in the end it's up to you to decide how much you trust them!
Firefox: Auto Text Expander
A basic expander, and the only option on Firefox.
Chromium (Chrome, Edge, Brave, etc):
Power Text for Google Chrome
Essentially the same expansion as on Firefox. There are a few that are the same, but this one is probably the simplest.
Magical
More features, but it requires registration and is aimed towards business. This tutorial won't be covering this one.
This tutorial will focus on Auto Text Expander and Power Text for Google Chrome, as they use the same interface.
After installing the plugin, you'll have a screen like this:
There will be some default shortcuts included. You can safely delete these. Then, to add a new macro, hit Add. This will open up a blank template for a new shortcut:
Shortcut is what you type, while Expanded Text is what your shortcut will be replaced with. When making a shortcut, it's highly recommended to have a prefix of some kind - this will ensure that you don't have inadvertent text replacement when typing things. I use "/", but you could use anything.
Once you're happy with your shortcut, hit Save and you're ready to go!
Cursor Placement: If you put the snippet
<!--?atec?--> into your expanded text, then it will automatically put your typing cursor in that location. This is great for dialogue codes, as it'll just drop it where you need this. This only works when the rich text editor is being used - if you're using the BBCode editor, it'll put your cursor at the end.Shortcut Timeout: The shortcut timeout determines how long the system waits between you typing the start of your shortcut and the end of your shortcut. By default this is 750ms, but you can set it to be shorter or longer depending on your preference.
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