Editing Screen
The Edit Functions on the Main Screen of INTERDLG include EDIT and UNDO.
INTERDLG's editor is quite powerful, even if a bit unconventional. To edit a frame click the "Edit" button. The index list will disappear and a new set of editing controls will appear. So will a blank frame which represents the map frame you are working on. At first many users are surprised that the original map cannot be directly viewed when editing. This is because INTERDLG works with HPGL plotter graphics code. This code is a standard for serious engineering use. Unfortunately, it cannot be treated in the same manner as some CAD programs treat their drawing code. Therefore, the HPGL map being edited can only be viewed after the edit change has been made. This takes a little getting used to, but after a few tries you will become proficient.
Moving a label
Click the "Move" command button and then tell INTERDLG the name of the label you wish to move. You only need type in enough letters for INTERDLG to match. You will see your match on the screen at its location in the frame. If INTERDLG has not correctly identified location of your label, click the next button or use your right mouse button to click map frame area of the edit to sequence to the next match of your label. Continue this process until you have correctly identified your label then use your mouse to click a new location for the label on the map... then click "Save". The map will then be displayed for you and your label will be at the location you clicked. If this location needs adjusting simply hit the "Esc" key to escape back to the editor. The editing screen will re-appear with the last location of your label placement still identified. Click the screen again at the adjusted location and then click "Save" again. Repeat this process until the label is properly located. Clicking "Undo" at any time will remove all changes made by the editor.
Changing the location or contents of a label
When you select the "Change" edit button, you end up editing the actually HPGL graphics code. If you know a little about HPGL this can be a very powerful tool for you. Let us say that you have click the "Change" button and then given the computer a label to identify. The matching text will appear in the text box on your screen where you can edit it at your leisure. Your matching text will always appear after the HPGL code for a text label "LB" which signifies "label.". (If you remove the "LB" indicator the label will not print.)
Say you typed in a station's call-letters, the first HPGL line to show up would likely be the map title line, which appears just above the frame line at the bottom of your frame.
PA 500, 500SI .19,.31 DI 1,0 ; LBWAAA BLED900105KB 204C - 100kW ||
Note that the line is positioned at X= 500, Y= 500. This is determined by the "500, 500" found after the "PA" or "pen absolute" command. If you wish to move the label up or down, change the Y value or to move left or right change the X value. For A size plotting there are 10,365 tics in the X plane (horizontal) and 7,962 in the Y plane (vertical.) There are about 1000 tics per inch.
The screen works like a word processor for the line you are editing, so just click your mouse at the position of the characters you wish to change.
But the line shown above is the frame label line and we wanted to change the call letter line of the station's service contour plot. So just click the "Next" command button to continue searching for the next mention of WAAA. The screen now looks like this...:
SP2 SI .50, 1 SM+ ; PA 5100, 4500 SM PA 5150, 4490 SI .26,.36 DI 1,0 ; LBWAAA 204C||
The bold vertical line character, (shown as a double vertical line for these examples) will appear as a delimiter (ending each line of text). Do not remove this delimiter, since it is a character the computer keyboard can't reproduce. If you take it out by accident you can't put it back in without copying another delimiter from somewhere else in the frame or using "Undo" to recover your previous frame.
If we have moved the mouse cursor over to the Y value (4490) and change the value to 4890 the location of the call letters will be moved up by .4 inches or 400 tics. The change will not take effect until you click the "Save" command button.
Now let's say you wish to enlarge the size of the call letters. The text will still be on your screen. Now move your cursor past the second occurrence of the "SI" dimension characters (which stand for size of label), over to the .26 (the horizontal letter height) and change it to something larger like .29, then place the cursor over the .36 (vertical letter height) and change it to something corresponding larger such as .39. When you are done click the "Save" button again. INTERDLG will show you your change. When you hit "Esc" the HPGL text code window will continue to display your changes.
SP2 SI .50, 1 SM+ ; PA 5100, 4500 SM PA 5150, 4490 SI .29,.39 DI 1,0 ; LBWAAA 204 ||
Don't change the first occurrence of the size dimensions found at the beginning of the line after the "SI" unless you wish to increase the size of the symbolic "+" mark (found immediately after the first occurrence of the symbolic character code "SM") which is used to mark the transmitter site.
You can change the direction of the lettering by changing the 1,0 found after the DI (direction) in the line. (See the description of run and rise.) You should be able to write the label in vertical, horizontal, slanted, left to right and upside down by changing the values after DI. (Make sure you keep the comma.) The first number after the "DI" is the run and the second is the rise. At least one should be non-zero. Values of less than one may be used for slants.
Adding new text
The Editor's "Text" command will allow you to add a line of text at screen location of the your choice. When you click the "Text" command button, the computer will respond with the "Add Text" screen. At this point type in your line of text. Then choose the rise and run of the text. The default value for text direction is horizontal. If you click either the "Run" or "Rise" sliders the box will show a straight line which indicates the direction of the text you are adding. A run of less than 1 and a rise greater then 0 will produce a line of text which will run up hill from left to right. A run of .45 and a rise of .45 will produce a line of text which is at 45 degrees. The font size slider should be set for the size font desired. The default value for the font size is calculated by the computer from the map scale in use. The larger the map scale the smaller the font size.
You must click the "OK" button on the "Text Add" screen for the changes to take effect.
Deleting a Contour
The "Delete" command button will allow you to delete one of numerous contours you have on a map. The user should find this particularly useful if a map is made with numerous contours one of which was not needed. This command will entirely delete the contour from the map.
Viewing while editing
The "View" command button will show you the current state of the map frame you are editing. (Esc) key removes the map and returns you to the edit screen.