QStripper

[NormanDunbar]

I originally developed QStripper on the PC, using QT version 4. It seems that was way back in 2012, which means I'm very very old now.

Given that not much has been needed over the years, I have recently been informed that most current Linux distributions don't have the QT4 support files as an installable option any more.

I had a look to see what's needed to update from QT4 to a current version, QT5 or QT6, and it seems that there is a lot of backwards incompatibilities now. My bad, I should have kept on top of new QT versions as and when they arrived. I am aware that upgrading the major version of the software can, and sometimes does, introduce these problems, but I missed out.

The current version is 6.x.x and I'm attempting a rewrite to make sure I get everything up to date. I did try to convert over to wxWidgets instead of QT -- there are some users here who really don't like QT software (no names!) -- but I didn't get anywhere with it.

Hopefully, the new version will take tabs into consideration -- currently only the text in paragraphs is extracted, with bold, italic and such like -- and tabs and margins are simply ignored. The potential problem here is, Quill docs are a fixed line length, but reformatting for PDF, say, makes the lines longer so while the beginning of the line may have the correct tabs in place, once the line exceeds 48/64/80 characters, any tab stops will probably be "weird"!

So, question, do you want the exported Quill data to be formatted as per the Quill document, with fixed line lengths, or are you happy with the current operation where the data are simply pulled out with no consideration for formatting, line lengths etc? (Or both?)

Oh, don't be looking for an update "any time soon", I'll do my best to get my finger out, but time isn't something I have much of, not the free stuff anyway, these days!


Cheers,
Norm.

[RalfR]

Any chance for a windows version?

[NormanDunbar]

Hi Ralf,

Any chance for a windows version?

There always has been a Windows version. Latest at https://github.com/NormanDunbar/QStripp ... ripper.exe and the required support files at https://github.com/NormanDunbar/QStripp ... tFiles.zip.

Unzip into the same folder as the executable.

Cheers,
Norm.

[afx]

Good news to know that there will be an updated version of QStripper.

So, question, do you want the exported Quill data to be formatted as per the Quill document, with fixed line lengths, or are you happy with the current operation where the data are simply pulled out with no consideration for formatting, line lengths etc? (Or both?)

The current operation is fine for me.

Best regards.

[RalfR]

Thanks Norm,

I have got an error message: "QtCore4.dll is missing". From where do I get a 64bit version?

[NormanDunbar]

Thanks Norm,

I have got an error message: "QtCore4.dll is missing". From where do I get a 64bit version?

Interesting. The application and the support files are all 32 bit for Windows, so it should work on 64 bit Windows.

Q1. Did you extract the support file.zip into the same folder as the executable?

Q2. Does the missing file actually exists in the folder or is it missing from the zip file?

I've just downloaded and noticed that I've got san extra folder where the dll files are found. Bummer! The dlls should al be in the same folder as the exe file. If not, they will not be found. It looks like the zip utility has created a folder that is not needed. (Or I did and nobody told me!)

The file reported as being missing is indeed present. Here's what it should look like:

Cheers,
Norm.

[ansar]

Hi NormanDunbar,

If the app was or can be written to SuperBasic lanquage then it can be compiled to a PC exe with my new compiler. It can also be compiled to QL also.

Best Regards,
ansar

[pjw]

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If the app was or can be written to SuperBasic lanquage then it can be compiled to a PC exe with my new compiler. It can also be compiled to QL also.
<>

If I understood you correctly, you have a compiler that can compile S*BASIC programs to a PC (Windows?) executable? If so, could you share some samples with us?

[ansar]

Hi Norm,

Exactly.
You can see my welcome post for some more details.
In a PC we can develop also an S*BASIC program with my Interpreter and then to compile it with my native PC compiler to run in a PC.
Also the same .bas file can be compiled with my cross compiler to QL 68xxx code and run in the QL.
The same is valid for an assembly program.
With my native assembler an Intel .asm can be assembled to run in a PC.
We can develop an 68xxx .asm file and with my cross assembler in a PC to create an .exe for the QL.
More in my next posts here with photo and video of known QL S^BASIC porograms.

Regards, ansar.

[NormanDunbar]

Morning All,

the QStripper app was written in C++ using the QT4 cross platform development kit. It has versions for Windows and Linux. Mac versions can be generated if someone wants to, but I don't have a Mac so I can't.

The original QStripper was named Stripper and was written in C68 and based on an article in IQLR magazine in Volume 3. Dilwyn Jones, Myself and Phil Borman had a hand in it at various times, I think I did the C68 conversion and added bits here and there.

That was way, way, way back in the depths of time and that version simply dragged the document's textual content out into a text file. I used it to create files ready to import into Microsoft Write, the word processor of note at the time on Windows 3 -- which was actually a good word processor -- for documentation for the code I wrote for Dilwyn Jones Computing back then. The manuals looked much better when Write was used to create them.

Ah, history!

I still have my original source code too, I just found it on my hard drive.


Cheers,
Norm.