Using clipboards

In addition to the usual Cut, Copy and Paste Eddie has an entire array of clipboard extra features to serve the needs of heavy Copy/Paste editing. To start with, there are four independent clipboards available. Each of the first three clipboards has a clipboard button in the button bar.

The clipboard button indicates that a clipboard is full. The first clipboard is shared with the rest of the system and uses familiar keyboard shortcuts as well as few new ones:

Alt-X Cut
Alt-Shift-X Cut and append to clipboard
Alt-C Copy
Alt-Shift-C Copy and append to clipboard
Alt-V Paste
Alt-Control-V Swap paste
Appending to the clipboard

Appending to existing clipboard contents can be usefull when collecting several pieces of text that are to be inserted with a single paste. You can use Cut and append (Alt-Shift-X) and Copy and append (Alt-Shift-C) to do just that. When you use normal Cut or Copy functions, the previous contents of the clipboard is completely replaced with the new selected text. With the appending flavors of Copy and Cut the selected text gets appended to whatever is already in the clipboard. In the following text, you can select 111,

Copy (Alt-C), then select 222, Copy and append (Alt-Shift-C) and the clipboard will now contain 111222.

Swap Paste

Swap paste pastes the contents of a clipboard into a selection while putting the old selection contents back onto the clipboard. Using Swap paste you can easily go from:

one two three

to:

three two one

First double click on one, Copy (Alt-C), then double click on three, Swap paste (Alt-Control-V) and then with three in the clipboard double click on one and Paste (Alt-V).

Clipboard Stack Mode

A clipboard can also be used in stack mode - this allows a single clipboard to hold multiple independent clipboard items at the same time. By using a stack mode Copy, or Cut the text being copied is pushed onto the clipboard, on top of the existing items. Stack mode Paste pops the topmost item from the clipboard stack and pastes it into a document. If there is any clipboard element left on the clipboard stack, it will be used in the next Paste. Stack mode and regular mode copy/cut/paste commands can be used interchangeably. Stack mode Copy/Paste is usefull for gathering several fragments of text in one part of a document and then pasting them in another. Unlike the appending flavors of Cut and Copy, you can still paste the individual clipboard items into different places.

Alt-Win-X Cut and Push onto clipboard stack
Alt-Win-C Copy and Push onto clipboard stack
Alt-Win-V Pop from clipboard stack and Paste

When using the stack mode, it is usefull to examine the contents of the different levels of the clipboard stack by pressing the corresponding clipboard button. The stack item that will get pasted next is the lower item in the clipboard panel, config in our example.

Using multiple clipboards

Currently Eddie supports four independent clipboards. Each of the first three clipboards is represented by a clipboard button in the button bar. The first clipboard on the left is the main clipboard. The topmost element on the stack of this clipboard is the standard Be clipboard, shared among applications.
The second and third and fourth clipboard have the following keyboard shortcuts assigned:

Keypad 1 Paste from second clipboard
Keypad 2 Paste from third clipboard
Keypad 3 Paste from fourth clipboard
Alt-Keypad 1 Copy to second clipboard
Alt-Keypad 2 Copy to third clipboard
Alt-Keypad 3 Copy to fourth clipboard
Win-Keypad 1 Pop from second clipboard stack and Paste
Win-Keypad 2 Pop from third clipboard stack and Paste
Win-Keypad 3 Pop from fourth clipboard stack and Paste
Alt-Win-Keypad 1 Copy and Push onto second clipboard stack
Alt-Win-Keypad 2 Copy and Push onto third clipboard stack
Alt-Win-Keypad 3 Copy and Push onto fourth clipboard stack

The fourth clipboard does not have a corresponding button and you will probably use it very rarely. You may prefer to use mouse clicks to use the clipboard:

Click Paste
Win-Click Pop from clipboard stack and Paste
Alt-Click Copy
Alt-Win-Click Copy and Push onto clipboard stack
Control-Click Make clipboard empty

All of the four clipboards are persistent - if you quit and relaunch Eddie, their contents will be preserved.