CF8 in Notepad++ (Continued)

I’ve uploaded a new package to:

http://labs.soundrage.com/CF8NPP.zip

It includes a chm for CF8 help, the bulk of the size. It’s servicable, but the conversion from html to chm was not perfect.

It includes a script for Inno Setup, which I won’t be able to get back to for a while, so if someone is interested in picking that up, feel free. Otherwise, I’ll get to it when I get to it.  I have it kind of working but for a setup package, that’s really not good enough, and there is a lot more work to be done on it.

The key items of interest are:

1) The shortcuts.xml has a line for launching keyword sensitive help right from the editor to Adobe’s LiveDoc’s or to the local help file. I had to bump the php help off of the F1 key for my own setup, but feel free to do whatever you wish. CTRL-F1 and ALT-F1 launch the help, and highlight the keyword. The shortcuts.xml file needs to be in the folder with your Notepad++.exe, default is C:\Program Files\Notepad++\

2) The keywords themselves are identified in the a\apis\coldfusion8.api file.

3)  The (User App)\Notepad++\InsertExt.ini needs to contain regular expressions to mark the beginning and ending of a function, and how to pick out the function name.  These will show up on the function list, so you can click on the function name and jump straight to it.

[User Languages]
Count User Languages=2
Name 1=ColdFusion8
KeyWBodyBeg 1=
KeyWBodyEnd 1=
MatchCase 1=0
Count Comment 1=3
Comment P1.1.1=
Comment P1.2.1=
Comment P2.2.1=
Count Syntax 1=2
Syntax P1.1.1= Syntax P2.1.1=\"\t.*\>
Syntax P3.1.1=[A-Za-z]*
Syntax P4.1.1=
Syntax P5.1.1=
Syntax P6.1.1=
Syntax P1.2.1=cffunction[\t ]*name[\t ]*\=[\t ]*\"
Syntax P2.2.1=
Syntax P3.2.1=[A-Za-z_]*
Syntax P4.2.1=
Syntax P5.2.1=
Syntax P6.2.1=

4)  Finally, our old friend, UserDefinedlanguages.xml, needs ColdFusion8 set up inside of it.  Basically, you take the contents of UserDefinedLanguages_Coldfusion8.xml, and insert it into the appropriate area inside of the real/active UserDefinedLanguages.xml.  This also sits in the (User App) folder, which is, for me, C:\Documents and Settings\Howard\Application Data\Notepad++\, so yours will be something like that.

I’m posting this over with the Notepad++ people, and will followup there.

For InnoSetup, information can be found at:

http://www.istool.org/    – The extension to InnoSetup, which adds some good stuff.

http://www.innosetup.org/    – The base InnoSetup package.

Hopefully, it will be helpful to someone.  I just enjoyed the diversion for a few hours.

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48 Responses to CF8 in Notepad++ (Continued)

  1. ziggy says:

    Never used notepad++ before. I tried to setup but see no CF on the Lang dropdown. So:

    1) replace the shortcuts.xml with yours? or?

    3) no such InsertExt.ini file found. ???

    4) >>you take the contents of UserDefinedLanguages_Coldfusion8.xml, and insert it into the appropriate area

    Which is where exactly?

    Finally,

    >>It includes a script for Inno Setup

    I don’t see any setup exe in the zip. Anyway, are you saying it works or doesn’t?

    Thanks.

  2. ziggy says:

    nothing??

  3. Brett Lewis says:

    I also can’t get this to work.

  4. Great tutorial! I had read a couple others and they had left out the Application Data step…the moment I updated that one and closed and reopened it worked like a charm! Thanks! Appreciated greatly!

  5. Seems to work except for the comments… so far. I will do further testing while I start using it.
    1) Just Copy the shortcuts.xml it in the AppData folder of Notepad++ (though it looked the same to me using Notepad++ v5.1)
    2) I dropped in the .api file in C:\Program Files\Notepad++\plugins\APIs .. the rest are XML files, so don’t know if it really matters that this is an .api file.
    3) Created the INI file at (User App)\Notepad++\InsertExt.ini and then copied the above code
    4) Dropped in (User App)\Notepad++\userDefineLang.xml — again.. spelled differently then what was shown above.
    .. I didnt do anything with the InnoSetup.. nor added any of the other files in the Notepad++ folders. Is not the help file made for Dreamweaver?

    Anyways… the “ColdFusion” now shows up in the Language menu.. right before the User Defined. I closed NPP and opened a .cfm file into it and it works.. you can change the colors if you want to match highlighting in HomeSite or Dreamweaver. I suppose that one can open up the program files\Npp\ langs.xml .. and create a line for ColdFusion.

  6. harsha says:

    Hi all,
    Same problem i also faced…
    Every one think if we place in C:\program files\nodepad++\

    But please that is not the place in my case.

    type
    %userprofile%/application Data/notepad++
    in run menu

    and place all files respective to this folder.

    This is because while installing u might have elected install for all users in the system.
    was it was usefull?

  7. Richard says:

    To easily find your doc and settings folder, don’t forget the handy %APPDATA% environment variable!

  8. After further use and installing it in a computer class for our ColdFusion class, I found 1) the CF Comment does not work properly 2) The API file doesn’t seem to do anything, I just get the color highlighting.

  9. ziggy says:

    >>CTRL-F1 and ALT-F1 launch the help, and highlight the keyword.

    ALT-F1 brings up the Notetab licence. CTRL-F1 does nothing.

    Are we supposed to edit your file and change this line to something else?

    http://www.php.net/%20$(CURRENT_WORD)

    To what???

    Other than do syntax highlighting, does this package do anything else?

    What are the cf help files for? They don’t do anything either.

    ???

    Thanks.

  10. It appears that the syntax highlighting file (userDefineLang.xml) doesn’t contain all of the new CF8 tags. isn’t included, and possibly others are missing too.

  11. Micah says:

    I followed the steps of William Frankhouser exactly but it did not work. After restarting Notepad++ I see the option “User Defined” in the languages drop down but no languages are listed under it. If I select the “User Defined” language it italics all text. Like William I did not already have a userDefineLang.xml or UserDefinedlanguages.xml. I also had to create my own InsertExt.ini and copy the code listed above into it. Any possible suggestions? I’d really like to stop using Dreamweaver.

  12. Paul says:

    Did anybody ever get the comments working?

    As far as I can tell, adding as operators prevents comments from working. :-( other than that it is pretty cool!

  13. CF says:

    refer to harsha above

  14. Matt from Solus Cristus says:

    I have tried following the directions above, and they are FAR too complicated to be worth trying to figure out. If the directions are made simpler and updated to the most recent version of Notepad++, then I might consider it, but for now, I will continue using jEdit for my ColdFusion coding. Thanks.

  15. Daniel says:

    Worked perfectly the first time. I downloaded, copied the zip contents the the unicode version folder of NP++, closed and opened, and it worked perfectly. Thanks for a great tool!

  16. Matt says:

    Where is the unicode version folder of NP++? If it was so easy for you, would you mind expounding on the process, because I still don’t know how to do it. Best Regards. Thanks!

  17. Michelle says:

    I got it working after reading the comments to copy the XML file into the documents & settings\(user)\application data\Notepad++ folder instead of the Program Files one. Thanks for putting this together and for the comments too!

  18. Another Matt says:

    When I read the instructions/comments above, I thought only the userLang.xml files needed to go in \(user)\application data\, and that did not work for me. Then I installed the whole zip file there (and NOT under Program Files), and it did work. Thanks!

  19. singetak says:

    It worked for me when added the
    i Created the INI file at (User App)\Notepad++\InsertExt.ini and then copied the above code .

  20. This will get it work. says:

    I was struggling for this to work and then I found this article.

    http://bigkidsdidit.co.uk/coldfusion-language-in-notepad

    Thanks

  21. Mirko says:

    For the online help I had to replace the line with the php help with this:

    http://www.cfquickdocs.com/cf8/#$(CURRENT_WORD)

  22. Derek says:

    The download link no longer works. Can someone send me a copy?
    dab [at] bowesmail [dot] com

  23. Casey says:

    Yes, alas the link is deceased. Is there another location on ye’ ol’ internet to find it? No luck with google…

  24. mildstallion says:

    Also looking. What up?

  25. Davit says:

    thanks for this help. but the download link for the files has been broken already. could someone make a mirror?

  26. Topper says:

    Same – download link doesn’t work – links to an irritating spam page instead. Would appreciate this.

  27. Titus says:

    I’d like a copy of the download too, I don’t really like editing CF in Dreamweaver.

  28. msyu says:

    I published working link about 2 days ago, but it is still “awaiting moderation”. Maybe this forum dislike links, or my email is suspicious…

  29. msyu says:

    original Insertion plugin would not work with up-to-date unicode NPP, but some kind person compiled it for Unicode (thanks): http://www.mailinglistarchive.com/html/notepad-plus-plus@lists.sourceforge.net/2009-03/msg00677.html

  30. msyu says:

    I suggest using remastered chm reference: http://sites.google.com/site/msyu812/files-1/ColdFusion8Reference.zip with LanguageHelp NPP plugin by Franco Stellari

  31. msyu says:

    LanguageHelp NPP plugin by Franco Stellari: http://sites.google.com/site/fstellari2/npp_plugins (take latest build)
    I see, this forum suspends posts having more than 1 link… so 2 of my messages are still awaiting moderation

  32. msyu says:

    Uploaded ColdFusion 9 reference:
    http://sites.google.com/site/msyu812/files-1/ColdFusion9Reference.zip also for use with Language Help Plugin for NPP

  33. msyu says:

    It is convenient to remap language help from Ctrl+F1 to F1. In the Main menu of shortcut mapper find About (in my case it is on line 122) and assign it to some unused key combination like Ctrl+Alt+Shift+F1 (or None). Then, in Plugin commands, find Help item of LanguageHelp plugin. Unfortunately, there is a lot of similar “Help” items in the list. You may locate it by original Ctrl+F1 assignment. Other option: you can manually edit shortcuts.xml: PluginCommand moduleName=”LanguageHelpU.dll” internalID=”0″ Ctrl=”no” Alt=”no” Shift=”no” Key=”112″ . Of course, there can by 2 shortcuts.xml files, in NPP installation directory and in user settings, you should edit the latter.

  34. Your download is no longer available. Is there any change you could repost it somewhere, or if anyone’s reading this and has a copy, would you mind linking to it? Thanks.

  35. msyu says:

    2 Brian Meloche: already done, read comments please (I recommend you read to the end before downloading original version)

  36. Strange. I got no follow up comments via email.

    No need to be snippy about it. I did read down to the end, and those links weren’t there at the time (perhaps I was viewing a cached version of the page from wordpress.com… I don’t know; it wouldn’t have been cached on my end, though, unless my ISP did). The problem is that there are multiple sites links to http://labs.soundrage.com/CF8NPP.zip. You should at least put something there to replace it or set up a redirect to the correct location. I’ve also seen multiple comments on the web saying your link is no longer available. You might want to post a separate blog entry to publicize it.

  37. Cialis says:

    KkYvHS Thank you for the material. Do you mind if I posted it in her blog, of course, with reference to your site?

  38. Rick says:

    Here’s some instructions that I worked up for Windows 7 and NP++ 5.6.8. Should work on Vista as well with minor changes.

    These instructions assume you have the files in CF8NPP.zip.

    In your %appdata%\Notepad++ (Username\AppData\Roaming\Notepad++) folder, place the following files:

    help\ColdFusion8Reference.chm – right-click on it and Unblock it once you copy it.

    InsertExt.ini

    shortcuts.xml – you may want to merge this with yours if you have customized shortcuts. This gives you the ability to
    look up the current word in LiveDocs by hitting Alt + F1.

    userDefineLang.xml – This identifies keywords for color coding syntax.

    Install the NP++ LanguageHelp plugin. Setup the extensions in the Plugin options and provide the path to the help file you just installed.

    In your C:\Program Files\Notepad++\plugins\APIs folder, add:

    Coldfusion.xml – this is an XML list of keywords for auto-completion.

    You can find it attached to this post:

    http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?func=detail&aid=2966753&group_id=95717&atid=612385

    Hope that’s helpful to someone.

  39. Rick says:

    Forgot to mention that ColdFusion.xml is a conversion of the coldfusion8.api file in the CF8NPP.zip to the new XML format NP++ uses. The file name must match the language name you defined in the userDefineLang.xml file exactly.

  40. Rick says:

    I notice the CF8NPP.zip link no longer works. Here are all the files that work with my instructions:

    http://dl.dropbox.com/u/838014/NPandCF8.zip

    Be aware also that there is a bug in comment highlighting in NP++ 5.6.8. If you have the comment symbols defined also as symbols, it won’t work. Since ! and – are all CF symbols and used in comments, comment highlighting doesn’t work properly at the present time. There may be a way around that using stylers.xml.

  41. Phil says:

    @Rick – I downloaded and installed the files per your text files, but I don’t get how it all works. I mean there is a Coldfusion selection in my plugins menu but when I click on it, and start typing in CF, nothing happens. And when I try to use the help file it just brings up the normal help file. Shortcuts don’t work either. The only thing that makes me think I did anything right is that it says “Coldfusion”on the bottom of the screen. Any help is appreciated.

    • Phil says:

      I’m sorry, I spoke too soon. I needed to restart the program. Everything is fine now. Thank you for spelling it out in the text file. I’m sorry I bothered you and this site with my comments. And thank you for whoever produced this plugin. It really is a lifesaver.

  42. Clases Dreamweaver…

    CF8 in Notepad++ (Continued) « Delayed Instantiation…

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