how to print "source file", plus a mild rant

[Bob Duncan]

At 05:14 PM 3/3/98, phgray wrote:
>4.X does not seem to provide that option - and as the writer has noted -
>the built in viewer does not allow printing.

But it does. As a previous message pointed out, Ctrl-P will do the job, *as
it does in just about every other PC application.*

I'd like to take this opportunity to point out something (a pet peeve,
sorry) that I think escapes many Web surfers I've encountered: browsers are
*not* magical entities, they are just another piece of software. As such,
most of the common keyboard shortcuts available in other applications are
available in Netscape, or IE, or whatever, regardless of version or
platform. And most actions can *usually* be carried out whether or not
those actions appear conveniently on a button or in a menu (as long as the
action is appropriate to the situation).

In every PC application I use, Ctrl-P will bring up a Print dialog just as
Ctrl-A will select all the text on a page and Ctrl-C will copy the current
selection to the clipboard and Ctrl-N will open a new window, etc., etc.,
etc. (Macs use the Command key instead of Ctrl, but the letters are the
same.) Knowledge of this sort comes in real handy when you're looking for a
particular chunk of source code and you know that Ctrl-F will bring up a
Find dialog regardless of whether you're in IE or Netscape or Word or Excel
or Eudora or most anything else. Or when you've just copied a text string
and you want to paste it into that Find dialog but there's no Paste command
available because there's no Edit menu---Ctrl-V will do it, whether you're
in IE or Netscape or Word or whatever.

Keyboard shortcuts are more than just insidious teenage work-arounds to
menu-less browser windows; they're useful tools that we should all know,
use, and teach.

Bob Duncan


  ~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~'~
  Robert E. Duncan
  Reference/Instruction Librarian
  David Bishop Skillman Library
  Lafayette College
  Easton, PA  18042
  duncanr at lafayette.edu