dualwriter

Hello, writers; this is a terrible, very makeshift program for writing in a double-author structure using a laughably basic notation. Outputs in HTML (browser format) of all things.

The intended result is that you put this .html file through some html-to-pdf converter to get an actually usable .pdf file lol

What you'll need

Things included which you'll need to download and use, but you don't have to care about how they work:

1. dualp.jar file (stands for dualwriter-parser)
2. "head" file
3. "tail" file

Things not included which you'll need to use, but you don't have to care about how they work:

1. Java (you might already have this)

Usage

Steps:

1. Write your text file (I'll call mine myInput.txt) using the markup notation (detailed later).
2. Put that text file, the dualp.jar file, the "head" file and the "tail" file all in one folder.
3. Open your command prompt and go to that folder (google the 'cd' command lol).
4. Now, type in the command prompt:

# Let's say the name of the file you wanna output is myOutput.html
java -jar dualp.jar myInput.txt head tail myFile.html

A new file called myOutput.html should appear in the same folder. Now, because it's an .html file (the same kind of file all browsers view), you need to open myOutput.html in your browser. So... 4. Open whatever browser you have 5. Key into the address bar:

C:\MyFolder\myOutput.html

This is called the path to myOutput.html. 6. That's all. You should now see the document in dual-writer format in your browser. Of course, this software is crappily written, so if it doesn't work, it might not be your fault lol

Markup Notation

\\1

Write for the first person. (Justified and shifted to the left of the page.) For example:

\\1This is the first person speaking.

\\2

Write for the second person. (Justified and shifted to the right of the page.) For example:

\\2This is the second person speaking.

\\s

Write text in the middle of the two (Not justified, shrunk to the middle of the page.) By the way, 's' stands for "simul" (because I thought of it like two people speaking together).

\\sNow we're talking together.

\\d

Ok, this is also for two people speaking together, but each saying their own thing. The text belonging to each person will lean to their respective sides.

In order to denote which text belongs to which person, you use this in conjunction with the below two sub-notations, namely: @@a for the first person, and @@b for the second person.

For example:

\\d@@aI want to talk! Stop talking over me!
@@bI'm still talking... Blah blah blah.

Problems

Watch out for:

• Every space is counted as part of the main text body (you've probably realized there's no spaces in \\1Hello, for example)
• Every newline is counted, or at least does affect the .html file (so technically, \\d@@aI want to talk! Stop talking over me!@@bI'm still talking... Blah blah blah. should be exactly like that, with no newlines nor spaces between speakers, but meh readability matters too... idk you decide. At this point, I'm not even sure browsers really take note of this slight difference.)
• I haven't yet made escape sequences if by any chance you need to write "\\" or "@@" as part of your passage body itself for some reason lol

License & Contributing

See LICENSE.md